SUCCESSES, CHALLENGES, SURPRISES

Google Classroom 2 months on and I am already seeing the benefits. I am including this extract from our Digital 2 Assignment, which really explains our experiences up to this point.

“One great use of Google Classroom is the ability to ‘flip’ your classroom.” (Mercier, (Ministry of Education, 2007)2016, p. 7). To ‘flip’ a classroom is to allow students the ability to view content before a lesson, in order for them to be front loaded and ready to engage in the learning for the lesson. We feel that Google Classroom is a suitable tool to do this. By simply adding a ‘Comment” or ‘Question’ in the stream page we could send out a video, comments, google slides, web link. Students were then able to work at their own pace, therefore self-regulating their learning. Not only do students have the ability through Google Classroom to self-regulate their learning, from our experience there is a huge advantage for teachers. That being, time saved from printing off paper assignments, students cutting and glueing into books (inevitably losing them).  Earl & Forbes (2012) list one of the key advantages of using digital technologies “can help teachers and students work smarter not harder” (p. 227).  This has been our experience thus far, with an exciting promise of more to come.

Pauline Henderson (2016) explains that with the innovation of online environments such as Moodle and Google Classroom, teachers are finding that even though they may only have students for a short time in the day, that with these digital technologies “the learning doesn’t stop after they leave your classroom”. This has been evident in the use of Google Classroom as our innovation, in particular one student (Susan) has regularly completed her work at home to a much higher standard than when she works in the classroom.  Susan has shown that using Google Classroom in this way can give students ownership of their learning,  and that the learning can happen at any time in an ubiquitous environment. “Increasingly, mobile devices equip students to take charge of their own learning in a context where learning occurs anywhere, anytime, and with access to a wealth of content and interactive tools” (21st Century Learning Reference Group, 2014).  

In the same way we have found that Google Classroom allows for rich discussions through the commenting option. “You could provide individual students feedback on how they did that day or let them reflect on their own performance and then give comments. It is a very powerful too” (Mercier, 2016, p. 8). We absolutely agree with this statement. Google Classroom not only allows teachers to communicate effectively and personally with a student but in addition Google Classroom encourages “more specific and descriptive feedback to assessments which lead to greater motivation and achievement. Hill (2012)  reiterates this by adding that “this involvement and understanding about why they are learning gives students more control over the learning” (p. 168) which results in a more positive result.

Learning Goals and success criteria are an integral process when working towards students having self-management. “When students are aware of these important learning parameters before they complete the work, they can begin to consider how to manage and monitor their own learning” (ITL Research, 2012). We used Google Classroom to share this information to each student as part of the learning.  Students had the opportunity to use our pre-made slide with an example of the expectation of the assignment, along with the learning goals and success criteria. Students could then use our slide for their assignment or create their own. In the three assignments given to students during this innovation time, only one student chose to use our slide. The other students chose to create their own presentation. As students were clear on the learning parameters this could have given them the confidence to work knowing how to be successful with the task.

As we seek to motivate students to develop self-regulating skills we know that will be “when learners can make decisions on how to organise and reflect on their learning, they develop the ability to self-monitor. These self-management skills create lifelong learners” (Ministry of Education, n.d.). During these initial stages we have felt that Google Classroom has been a support to enable students to successfully make decisions about their learning. However, Google Classroom alone will not encourage these skills. As a teacher many of these skills are taught and developed in the classroom through all areas of learning. Our pedagogy has had the biggest shift in the past year.  So while digital technologies like Google Classroom can be a tool for teachers to enable students to be able to learn in an ubiquitous environment this is not the recipe to achieving learner agency.

One difficulty when using Google Classroom has been teaching students how to use this digital technology. Although students were familiar with Google Slides, Google Docs, this was a new step in their digital learning experiences. At the same time this was an opportunity for knowledge construction.  Students could use their previous knowledge of Google Apps for education to “develop new knowledge, through integration of prior knowledge with ideas, information and concepts, into a wholly new product, concept, solution or content” (Fullan & Langworthy, 2014, p. 23).  From our observations and discussions students would ask lots of questions about how to get into Google Classroom and how to find what they needed for the task. New learning takes time, therefore much time and effort was taken to support students to develop their confidence with using this tool.

One surprise success for us as the teacher was the ability to view each individual student's progress with an assignment/task in one page under the ‘Work’ tab, in Google Classroom. What a time saver ! Previously using Google slides each student would have shared their slide show with the teacher to view, which meant going to emails for google drive to search for each presentation. Google Classroom has revolutionised this and now with the convenience of one page you are able to view each student's presentation and make personal comments on each one. This is exciting and provides motivation for us to continue to use this digital technology in our practice.

References:

21st Century Learning Reference Group. (2014, May 30). FutureFocusedLearning30May2014.pdf. Retrieved February 29, 2017, from Education.govt.nz: http://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Ministry/Initiatives/FutureFocusedLearning30May2014.pdf

Earl, K., & Forbes, D. (2012). Transforming Learning Through ICT: Swimming with Dolphins. In C. McGee, & D. Fraser, The Professional Practise of Teaching (pp. 224-244). Melbourne, Australia: Cengage Learning Australia.

Educational Media. (2014, June). COLLABORATION = INNOVATION: DELIVERING EDUCATION WITHOUT BORDERS. Retrieved from Edducation Review: http://www.educationreview.co.nz/magazine/june-2014/collaboration-innovation-delivering-education-without-borders/#.WLszi9KGODI

Fullan, M., & Langworthy, M. (2014). A Rich Seam: How New Pedagogies Find Deep Learning. London: Pearson.

Henderson, P. (2016, February 17). Modern Learning Practice in the Secondary School. Retrieved March 1, 2017, from Core Edtalks: http://edtalks.org/#/video/modern-learning-practice-secondary-school

Hill, M. (2012). Using Classroom assessment for effective learning and teaching. In C. McGee, & D. Fraser, The Professional Practice of Teaching. Melbourne: Cengage Learning Australia Pty Limited.

ITL Research. (2012). ITL Research. Retrieved March 1, 2017, from Education Microsoft.com: https://education.microsoft.com/GetTrained/ITL-Research

Mercier, N. (2016). Using Google Classroom to Teach Music. Kodaly Envoy , 42 (4), 7-8.

Ministry of Education. (n.d.). The Learning to Learn Principle. Retrieved March 3, 2017, from TKI: http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-resources/NZC-Updates/Issue-21-May-2012

Ministry of Education. (n.d.). Using digital technologies to support learner agency. Retrieved February 25, 2017, from enableing e-Learning: http://elearning.tki.org.nz/Teaching/Learner-agency