Category: Google Docs

Using Instant Messaging in Education – Good or Bad?

Google Docs, My class, TwitterPublished onUpdated on6 Comments on Using Instant Messaging in Education – Good or Bad?

Every single upper junior class that I have taught has loved instant messaging (IM). It is probably the most popular use of technology at home. But does that mean it needs to be used in the classroom? It falls into the same category as console gaming does and seems to spark differing reactions from people in education. I believe it can engage learners and much more.

I began the hashtag #IMinEDU to keep a record of a discussion on this topic that took place on Twitter. It revealed a range of views, some great resources and ideas. I have archived the conversation in a Google Doc because over time a hashtag Twitter search will disappear.

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I have had a few experiences of the impact that IM can have on a lesson. When we began using Google Docs in our lessons we used the instant messaging function in Spreadsheets. I was able to post questions about the data we collected together – the children responded in the chat window. We repeated this recently and once again it was a great plenary to the lesson.

A further example is the use of the chat feature in a Google Presentation (In presentation/slideshow mode – “View Together”). I created a reading text and asked comprehension questions in the chat window – the children accessed the text for the answers and posted them in the chat. We have also done some peer review on a range of presentations using the chat – children posted comments and responses to work shared by others.

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In my experience of using instant messaging I have discovered some common elements:

Engage, Engage, Engage – sometimes the children seem set to explode when they realise they are using IM in class. They are totally engaged with the tasks. They love using it.

Motivated – when asking a question in IM the children are really motivated to answer it, they all want to get their responses posted. They want to write – that can only be a good thing.

Inclusive – everyone can contribute at the same time. No-one misses out, everyone is involved. Responding in this way breaks the “hands-up” culture.

Behaviour – I don’t see any point in asking the children to behave completely differently when using IM in class. We can still say things like, “No smileys in the next answer,” or “I am watching your spelling for this one.” I think this flexible approach is better than saying, “You are never allowed to use smileys when we use IM in class!” That’s like asking them not to lick their lips when eating a sugar doughnut – it’s just what you do.

Teacher directed – in the examples I explained above I have been specific about the way we are using IM. It is not a free for all, it is carefully planned and directed. It is useful to have your questions typed up so you can paste them in the chat quickly.

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There needs to be more examples of teachers using it and sharing their reflections, to get a fuller picture of its usefulness. I think it has a place and I hope that some ideas in this post or the Twitter discussion give you something to think about and perhaps try in your class.

How have you used instant messaging in the classroom? What is your opinion about the use of it in lessons, does it have a place?

Online Reporting to Parents using Google Docs: A Proposal Update

Google, Google DocsPublished on18 Comments on Online Reporting to Parents using Google Docs: A Proposal Update

Back in October I wrote a proposal for the use of Google Docs (as part of Edu Apps) to deliver online reporting to parents at our school. The original blog post proved incredibly useful in sparking some debate about the use of such cloud based tools for reporting to parents. It also brought about some challenges and raised questions in the blog comments, again very useful to help me better understand the whole idea.

I have been exploring the resulting responses on and off for the last 9 months or so and this blog post is an update about the project and some information I have discovered along the way that may prove useful.

Just to cover some background once again, here in the UK the government is planning for real-time online reporting by the target year of 2010 for secondary schools and 2012 for all primary schools. According to the previous Schools Minister Jim Knight back in January ‘08:

Real time reporting will deepen the school-parent relations and is not a substitute for regular personal contact with teachers. Effective technology systems can actually significantly cut the staff workloads – but it has to be to be manageable for individual schools and meaningful for parents.

The aim is to develop a real-time reporting system that means parents will be able to access frequently updated information on children’s achievement, progress, attendance, behaviour and special needs wherever, whenever they want.

One of the very first things that people said would be a problem was the location of data centres and where the data is held according to EU law. The second issue that recently arose was the idea of two factor authentication for online reporting.

I have carefully explored and researched these two things and have summarised what I have found out below.
Where the data would be held. In the BECTA document “Keeping data secure safe and legal” it stipulates that organisations must:

Ensure that personal data is not exported outside the European Economic Area (EEA) unless EU Model Contracts or (BCRs) are in place.

However I discovered something called the Safe Harbour agreement which is intended to regulate the way personal data from the 15 EU states is exported and dealt with by US organisations. Safe Harbour ensures US companies can compete within these regulations and that they meet or exceed the stringent guidelines for data storage. This is not referred to in the BECTA document but in my opinion should be as it is a crucial. Google have signed this agreement and so it provides the opportunity to work with Google Docs within the guidelines of EU law and what BECTA have suggested.

Two Factor Authentication. Again from the same BECTA document it states that organisations must protect confidential information with two-factor authentication and some people have said to me that this is needed for online reporting, and as Google Docs does not have this it cannot be used. However I have found that:

The type and amount of data that will be made available online to parents is such that they should not need two-factor authentication for online reporting.

Taken from “Good practice in information handling: Secure remote access” BECTA. Although two-factor authentication may not be needed it is important to consider the types of data that will be included in the online report, this will need to be outlined with my headteacher as we work out the finer details.

Each of my pupils will have a personal login to Google Docs as part of our work in Year 5 which could be utilised for parents to access the report as well. In this way it will foster the sense of sharing the report between parent and child throughout the year. Generating logins for all of the parents may cause some issues with management and exceed the maximum number of users for the Google Ed Apps domain – but it is not out of the question. I am not certain which is the best option yet.

I am pretty confident from my research into these initial barriers that using Google Docs for online reporting is safe and within the guidelines set out by BECTA. Also contributing to this is further conversations I have had with representatives from Google and BECTA. I am yet to get a firm decision from my headteacher based upon the information, but I am hopeful of a full year long pilot beginning in the next academic year.

Alongside presenting my research to my headteacher I also offered three basic options for the layout and formatting of an online report using Google Docs. The structure of the three reports is similar in that they each have a space for the teacher, pupil and the parent to leave a remark or make a comment. I think this is important as it has the potential to build up a great dialogue about the pupil’s learning throughout the course of the year.

We have to make a decision about how the rest of the document will be organised and how the comments will be structured. Three possible ways include: based upon individual primary curriculum subjects, in much the same way the current end of year reports are organised. I have my doubts about just taking this old way of working because the way we are currently working is at odds to pigeon-holing learning neatly into subject labelled boxes. (Google Doc link)

The second possibility is using curriculum topics. We are moving to shorter curriculum topics for each half term next year in Year 5 and so there will be 6 different spaces for comments. As there would be no immediate distinction about subjects we may need to consider how clear the information is. I think this structure would provide parents with good signposts along the year as to what is going on in the classroom and also from a teacher’s point of view a simple structure to follow. (Google Doc link)

The last option was suggested by my headteacher, who said why not use the 6 areas of learning from the Rose Review. (Google Doc link)

  • Understanding English, communication and languages;
  • Mathematical understanding;
  • Scientific and technological understanding;
  • Human, social and environmental understanding;
  • Understanding physical health and well-being;
  • Understanding the arts and design.

This would be a bold move and would be a great opportunity to link up the assessment and reporting with what is going on in the curriculum. As a teacher it would make me look at what I am teaching in light of the 6 areas and engage with the concept on a much deeper level.

(Please be aware that these three Google Doc layouts are very much version 1.0 – I have yet to refine them, so go easy on me! But your comments and suggestions for improvements will be really useful to help shape what we might achieve with the docs.)

I have also added into the Google Docs above a simple mocked up comment to illustrate the idea about our healthy eating unit and some images that could be used as well. Nothing spectacular about that, but it would provide a simple way for such evidence to be linked with and sit directly alongside reporting to parents.

The last thing that I want to explore is the whole idea of the “report”. In my original post I said that perhaps we need to unlearn some things that have been in place for a long time. Certainly the whole concept of an end of year report is in danger of becoming defunct. The online version will allow parents access whenever they want to check on updates and progress throughout the year.

With this in mind my headteacher said to me on Friday that perhaps it may become a “conversation” rather than a “report”. I suppose he is right and that we all want to build stronger, more meaningful relationships with the families of the children in our care. Simply put, we know that more easily accessible information about what is going on in school will catalyse this. Does it need to always be very formalised? I no longer want it to be a case of me sitting down and writing some remarks at the end of a year and “reporting” to parents with a few days to go. The ongoing and timely nature of access will help improve communication and along with face to face meetings will keep the children’s learning at the centre of what we do.

The name “report” is contestable and you will see in the basic versions I have submitted in Google Doc form that I have used “portfolio” – which is the closest I can get to what I mean. It has the potential to be many things including that of showing off work to parents, but then maybe there are better platforms for that such as a pupil blog. Although not hugely important the name will set the tone for what is being attempted – a “report” is one way, whereas a “conversation” is a shared experience. Maybe a “Learning Conversation” is what is needed that allows pupil, parents and the teacher to share what is going on in the classroom, both the challenges and successes.

I believe that the research and exploration I have done (so far) does open the door to use Google Docs for online reporting, I feel confident that whatever decision we make as a school will be based upon the best information to hand. Importantly the use of Google Docs does allow us as a school to tailor the report to our exact needs, the needs of pur pupils and parents. Additionally it is free to use and online reporting with Google Ed Apps could be an important part of an open source virtual learning environment alternative.

Aaargh Too Many Google Forms!

Google Docs, MathsPublished on2 Comments on Aaargh Too Many Google Forms!

This post includes some reflections on the use of Google Forms in data handling teaching and some problems we encountered in using them in the classroom.

For a few weeks now we have been exploring data handling in our numeracy lessons – we have included lots of work to allow children the choice of some current tools to use in their own investigations. In separate lessons we have explored how to use Create-a-Graph, Google Forms for collecting data and Excel for charting data. All of this exposure and practice in using these tools was a precursor to the children making some choices in the design of their own data investigation.

The children were working in small groups of 3s (about 10 groups) and the majority of them chose to collect the data for their investigation questions using a Google Form. I directed one child from each group to author the form and to share with all of their peers within the domain. (This was done by clicking on “EMAIL FORM” when editing the form and clicking on “CHOOSE FROM CONTACTS” and choosing “ALL CONTACTS” from the drop down menu)

I decided to build in some time for the children to complete the forms that different groups were sharing with them. And this is where we began to run into problems. The progress of each group was starting to stretch out – some were completing forms and some had lots of data, others had only a few results because the forms had not been completed yet. The difference in what they may be doing was also beginning to mean that I had no way of ensuring a specific group was at a certain stage.

The simple fact is that I had no way of ensuring that every child completed every form. As a result the pool of data was different for each group.

I still believe that using a Google form is a valid way of collecting data – it also organises info and even produces a graphical representation of it. A powerful tool. But it is difficult when trying to collect lots of data from a year group at the same time. If their are lots of forms from lots of different groups it becomes unwieldy and difficult to steer on the right track. Saying that, I still wanted to provide the choice of tools to the children, attempting to replicate what happens in real life.

Here is a possible solution that we have thought of:

  1. Children work in small groups of 3s
  2. Generate a question for their investigation eg “What is Year 5s favourite lesson?”
  3. Plan for the process and choose from a range of tools that have been covered in previous lessons. The children still have the autonomy to make a choice, which is key.
  4. Draft their investigation question – a single multiple choice question.
  5. Teacher/TA or children from the different groups author a single form including all of the questions from the different teams.
  6. Form is shared with whole class or year group.
  7. Children are given time to answer all of the questions in the form via their GMail- this way you can guarantee that all of the groups have responses.
  8. Once all of the responses have been submitted then the resulting spreadsheet can be shared with the whole class. Children would then be able to view a single column of information for their own question.
  9. Further graph work could be completed from then onwards.
I think this method provides children with access to a guaranteed set of data from their peers (which was lacking before) and their progress in terms of analysing the information is much more easily tracked by a teacher. I would recommend such a method in the primary classroom and perhaps look to do larger numeracy groups if you did want them to create their own forms. The process outlined above does allow you to still utilise the power of Google Forms, and worry less about the collection of data and more about the analysis, questioning and representation.

Using Instant Messaging to Engage Children with Reading Comprehension

Google Docs, Literacy, My classPublished on11 Comments on Using Instant Messaging to Engage Children with Reading Comprehension

I recently had a great conversation with my teaching colleague Rick about the use of technology to engage children with reading comprehension. This post is about my lesson I taught today as a result of that brief yet productive talk.

Although we have been reasonably successful in addressing how we use our available technology to support the development of times table knowledge, reading comprehension has been much more elusive. This afternoon both Rick and I explored two different ideas we had, regarding the use of technology to engage and support the practice of comprehension skills. 

Rick was using the Flip Cameras in his lesson, he had about 3 available to him and was looking for the children to generate their own questions about a text. After talking with a partner and drafting the question on small whiteboards they recorded the question to camera. When there were a few Rick showed these to the class and worked on modelling the answers and then setting the children off to find the answers in pairs. By all accounts an engaging way to explore text.

Google chat feature in GPres

We have used the discuss tool in Google spreadsheets and presentation chat before to peer review presentations. 

I worked with a Google Presentation and wanted to engage the children with the text through the use of the instant messaging window that is available. All of my children love using MSN and Google Talk/Chat, it is the one application that they all use very regularly. For two years now both of my Year 5 classes who have been using Google Apps discovered Google Chat in GMail by themselves and have got busy using it.

So how was this all setup? There are some things that we have in place that have helped. Firstly the children are using Google Apps for Education and have a unique login. Secondly we are working in my classroom on laptops.

  1. I created a presentation, which is in effect our text, in my Google account.
  2. I shared the presentation with the class as VIEWERS. This is important as it will mean that the children will immediately see the file in presentation mode and not in editing mode. Loading time was slow today, although once all loaded we had no other problems.
  3. The instant messaging window will open when they click “View with others” (Bottom right hand corner) you will see their names appear in the “VIEWING NOW” box on your own presentation.
  4. We then did some shared reading of the text about Spies and Gadgets. I used the “CONTROL THE PRESENTATION” tool available to me as owner of the document. As I clicked and moved through the presentation everyone’s laptops updated. This was immediate in every case, not bad for sixteen wireless laptops and proved useful for whole class work.
  5. Once we had a good look through the text as a class, and some initial discussion, I then explained the question answer process. I would add a question in the IM window and they needed to navigate to the correct page and respond with their answer, also in the IM window.
  6. As I typed I muted the projector image so kids didn’t get a head start, that was helpful.
  7. The children answered in the IM window and I could see their name with the response showing ownership.

You may be thinking that some children may just look at other people’s answers. I talked to the class about this and encouraged them to engage with the text themselves, nevertheless seeing their peers answers proved a valuable function of this group IM session. Children were commenting on other answers and it caused some to question their own accuracy if they saw something different.

Of course there was the odd smiley! But that is what the children do when they IM, I was kind of entering their world. It is a delicate balance. I want to harness the engagement that IM brings and yet not make it too schooly so they switch off. I ensured that when they answered anything all of our usual literacy standards applied and the class responded well to that.

We worked on about 10 questions together and all of the children were totally engaged and motivated to find the answers and use the IM to form their response. They also maintained this engagement for considerably longer then when we work with paper and pencil.

As the answers rolled in I was able to immediately give feedback to different children, asking them to look again at what they had written. One particular question about the reasons why we use tables to present information caused the children to respond about the content and not the purpose. I discussed with the whole class what the correct answer might be, gave the children the start of the sentence in the chat window and asked them to answer again.

Beyond this one lesson I think that if the children were to use the Google Talk client then we could be looking at a variety of different texts and not just something created in Google Presentation. With the chat window open and a website or film playing it would allow us even more flexibility. In fact it could work with any other type of available application.

My target in the lesson was to engage the children with reading comprehension using technology we use in our classroom. I think we did that. It is taking what the children enjoy doing and harnessing that engagement, attempting to merge and utilise the skills they use outside of school to impact on their engagement with their learning.