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Google Classroom for Students

September 24, 2020 by John R. Sowash

Help your students navigate Classroom

Just because your students have cell phones and use TikTok doesn’t mean that they are masters of Google Classroom.

While they aren’t likely to admit it, some students would benefit from some training and support. 

Why your students need Google Classroom training

I teach several courses using Google Classroom. 

This gives me a front-row seat to observe where students get confused and some of the common issues they make when navigating Google Classroom. 

Here are some common issues students experience:

  • Understanding the difference between a private comment and a class comment
  • Accidently responding to a discussion question in the class comment section. 
  • Forgetting to click “view assignment” to see ALL of the assignment details. 
  • Forgetting to go back to the classwork page to view the next assignments. 
  • Logging in to their personal Gmail account, not their school account.
  • Not knowing how to view missing assignments or receive feedback. 
  • Forgetting to click the turn in or mark as done button. 

I want students to focus on the content of my course, not on clicking the right button in Google Classroom. 

Google Classroom includes several tools and features that can help students track their assignments, plan their schedule, and receive feedback from students. 

Most students don’t take advantage of these helpful features. 

Providing your students with instructions on how to use Google Classroom will help them complete their assignments more efficiently and allow you to focus on your lessons, not tech support. 

Two resources to help your students master Classroom

I created two student guides to Google Classroom that you are welcome to use, remix, and modify for your classroom. 

The first resource is an 8 min video that you can watch as a class or assign as an activity for students to complete independently. 

The second resource is a quiz that includes video instructions followed by quiz questions to make sure that students have mastered the core features of Google Classroom.  

Let’s take a closer look at both of these student resources. 

Student overview of Google Classroom (video)

This video reviews each of the main sections of Google Classroom and includes some entertaining GIF surprises along the way. This video was created for students in grades 3 and up. 

Table of Contents: 

  • 0:00 Introduction
  • 0:30 Classroom home page
  • 1:18 To-do and Calendar page
  • 2:11 The stream page
  • 3:13 The classwork page
  • 4:58 Assignment screen
  • 7:38 Discussion question

Google Classroom quiz

If you want to be a little more intentional about training your students on how to use Google classroom, consider assigning this Google Form quiz. 

This is a mastery quiz. Students should be allowed to retake the quiz as many times as necessary to achieve a passing score (I recommend 80%). 

Sections of the video above are included in the quiz; Students watch a short segment and answer 2-3 questions related to the video. 

This Google classroom quiz will familiarize students with the features and elements of Google classroom so that they can focus on their academic work. 

  • Preview the quiz (view only)
  • Copy the quiz (make a copy and modify for your own classroom)
MAKE A COPY FOR YOUR CLASSROOM

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Tara Piccione says

    August 12, 2021 at 6:47 pm

    This is fantastic! I just shared it in a webinar I’m participating in for Applied Digital Skills with the Tranchina’s. Attendees will surely visit and become followers. I love your work and appreciate all that you offer teachers!

    Reply
    • John R. Sowash says

      August 13, 2021 at 7:57 pm

      Cool! Thanks, Tara! 🙌

      Reply
  2. Tammy Heckman says

    August 14, 2021 at 4:40 pm

    I love this! Thank you so much for creating it. I want to use with my classes as a refresher (?) for the start of the school year. My only questions is for for the quiz – are the videos supposed to work when you create a copy? I only get a screen shot of the video but no hyperlinks.

    Reply
    • John R. Sowash says

      August 16, 2021 at 1:47 pm

      Hmm. They should automatically copy. Let me make a copy and see what’s going on.

      Reply
    • Darlease Monteiro says

      August 22, 2021 at 4:25 pm

      Hi Tammy. I don’t know if John has gotten back to yet but I saw the what you are talking about. Click the preview button and you will see the videos. While editing the quiz, you will only see a screenshot. Hope this helps.

      Reply
  3. Alex Lesk says

    August 16, 2021 at 5:46 pm

    This was fabulous. I copied and adapted your form to add a few extra GC features. I’m not sure if you do videos on these other topics, but I found some others….
    Thought I’d share it back with you in case you are interested.
    https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfBUrocvYvvV6aJpLHDnIGrX2SmalMbvwjrGmOV9hprvGbm1g/viewform

    Reply
    • John R. Sowash says

      August 20, 2021 at 1:49 pm

      Thanks!

      Your form is locked to your domain, so I wasn’t able to check it out.

      Reply
  4. Darlease Monteiro says

    August 22, 2021 at 4:28 pm

    John! Thank you for sharing this! It will be such a time saver for me this year. Appreciate all you do.

    Reply
  5. Neal Sonnenberg says

    August 24, 2021 at 2:11 pm

    Thanks for sharing – the ‘statements’ on the Home page section of the quiz are not showing

    Reply
  6. Simone Serrao-Gore says

    August 31, 2022 at 4:22 am

    This is a fantastic resource. It was definitely a lifesaver when having to put together an emergency tutorial for incoming students who have never used google classroom. Thank you so much.

    Reply
  7. Darla A. Miller says

    September 1, 2024 at 8:18 am

    This is helpful even as a parent. I love how easy this is to use.

    Reply

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