New year...new students

Life is about to get crazy!  You are busy setting up classrooms, organizing 
class lists, materials and all the logistics of starting a new school year.  Each
school year brings a new set of students with various interests and learning 
styles.  There are many ways to get to know your new students - spending time with them and having personal conversations being the best way of course!  But
you can also use a Google Form to ask pertinent questions.  It's a great way to get your quieter students to open up too!

Some questions you may want to include in your questionnaire include:

• What do you want me to call you in class? (preferred first name)
• What is your favorite color?
• What is your favorite food?
• What are you passionate about?
• If you could learn anything at school, what would you choose to learn?
• Do you like to be recognized for your accomplishments in front of the class?
• What characteristics do you like in a teacher?
• Is there anything that you struggle with in class?
• What do you do if you don't know how to answer a question or problem?
• How do you learn best?
• Do you wear glasses?
• What do you want me to know or understand about you?
• Do you prefer to work in groups or on your own?
• Do you like to read aloud?
• What are your favorite books?
• Do you enjoy reading?

Click here for your copy of a sample Student Interview Form. Feel free to make it your own by adding or removing any questions.  Student responses will automatically populate on a Google Sheet in your Drive!  It’s that easy!

Google Classroom Updates

Welcome back!  It’s hard to believe that summer is coming to an end.  I hope you all had a wonderful, relaxing summer. As you begin to settle back into school mode, I wanted to let you know Google Classroom has made some new updates.

First and foremost, Google Classroom has added a ‘Classwork’ page.  The ‘Stream’ page is now used for general announcements and student posts (if enabled).  Each time you post an assignment on the ‘Classwork’ page, an announcement will also appear on the Stream page as well as the Classwork page.

Your students will spend most of their time on the Classwork page.  This is where you will post any new assignments or pose a question to the class.

Previously, assignments the stream may have been cumbersome. You can now add assignments by topic. Assignments can easily be moved up and down in the stream.

In the past, you managed student and guardian access on the ‘Student’ page. Now on the ‘People’ page, you can manage student, parent, and co-teacher access.

Students can be invited to join your class using the class code.  The code can be found on the People page. However, you can quickly project the code to your class by clicking on the word “About” on the Stream page.  

There are also new features within the grading features of Google Classroom.  Let me know if you want more information regarding grading features.

I also found this overview video of Google Classroom 2018 updates.

Coming soon:  you will have the ability to lock down tabs on student Chromebooks as they take a quiz using Google Forms!

Let me know if you have any questions or would like help setting up your Google Classroom.