Google Classroom sucks
September 23, 2020 10:18 AM Subscribe
I'm trying to help my fifth-grader through online learning. Life right now is just filled with too many bloody applications to manage. How can I stay on top of things in Google Classroom? I'm losing my mind.
Unless I'm missing something, it's too non-centralized. Every subject is in a different classroom. The assignments are hard to recognize as assignments Worst of all, there are about 15 emails a day to weed through - because the app sends an email for every single goddamn event that occurs. Teacher makes a comment? Email. Teacher assigns something? Email. Teacher returns something? Email. I'm sorry this is so incoherent, but I'm just. so. tired. If your child is working in Google Classroom, please please tell me how you are managing things.
Unless I'm missing something, it's too non-centralized. Every subject is in a different classroom. The assignments are hard to recognize as assignments Worst of all, there are about 15 emails a day to weed through - because the app sends an email for every single goddamn event that occurs. Teacher makes a comment? Email. Teacher assigns something? Email. Teacher returns something? Email. I'm sorry this is so incoherent, but I'm just. so. tired. If your child is working in Google Classroom, please please tell me how you are managing things.
We have the kid's classes all blocked out on google calendar with the appropriate meeting link. Alerts are set to two minutes before the class starts.
I have 50 minutes (10 minutes per grade level) scheduled for homework time with him nightly. We begin by going to the "to do" in the top left of classroom.google.com when you log in. Assignments with a due date get worked first.
If we finish before the 50 mins, we go through the classes one by one. I review the stream for any blog-style notes on assignments or extra to-dos. Then we scroll through the assignments page looking for anything with a returned status.
It does take the full 50 most nights. It's hard on me. It's hard on the kid. I play baseball with him afterward to include a reward. Email is the absolute worst way to manage it. We mark email as read every night just so he can spot any last minute link changes.
Print out any assignment that's happening over multiple days. Being able to reference dead tree rather than juggle tabs is tremendously helpful as it gets buried behind other new assignments.
Do the best you can. We are not even close to having this be easy. But a routine and a process helps.
posted by bfranklin at 10:46 AM on September 23, 2020 [11 favorites]
I have 50 minutes (10 minutes per grade level) scheduled for homework time with him nightly. We begin by going to the "to do" in the top left of classroom.google.com when you log in. Assignments with a due date get worked first.
If we finish before the 50 mins, we go through the classes one by one. I review the stream for any blog-style notes on assignments or extra to-dos. Then we scroll through the assignments page looking for anything with a returned status.
It does take the full 50 most nights. It's hard on me. It's hard on the kid. I play baseball with him afterward to include a reward. Email is the absolute worst way to manage it. We mark email as read every night just so he can spot any last minute link changes.
Print out any assignment that's happening over multiple days. Being able to reference dead tree rather than juggle tabs is tremendously helpful as it gets buried behind other new assignments.
Do the best you can. We are not even close to having this be easy. But a routine and a process helps.
posted by bfranklin at 10:46 AM on September 23, 2020 [11 favorites]
I also have a fifth grader, also using google classroom, with multiple classrooms. At a very high level how I am dealing with this is by having extremely low expectations. I’ve decided not to really care if he misses assignments here and there, as long as he is showing up for his live meetings and getting most of his work in. I mention that only to make it clear that I am not a parent who has a highly organized system.
Specific to GC, turning off the notifications as others have suggested helps a lot with the email. When in a classroom you want to go to the classwork tab at the top NOT the stream. Much easier to track the assignments in the classwork tab.
Individual items that are gray in the classwork tab are complete and submitted, black items have yet to be submitted. Once I realized that it made it much easier to see what needed to be completed.
posted by scantee at 11:04 AM on September 23, 2020 [6 favorites]
Specific to GC, turning off the notifications as others have suggested helps a lot with the email. When in a classroom you want to go to the classwork tab at the top NOT the stream. Much easier to track the assignments in the classwork tab.
Individual items that are gray in the classwork tab are complete and submitted, black items have yet to be submitted. Once I realized that it made it much easier to see what needed to be completed.
posted by scantee at 11:04 AM on September 23, 2020 [6 favorites]
Turn off notifications and prioritize checking the "to do" list.
posted by betweenthebars at 11:20 AM on September 23, 2020
posted by betweenthebars at 11:20 AM on September 23, 2020
Response by poster: Question: Do returned assignments that need to be corrected and resubmitted appear in the "to do" list?
posted by kitcat at 11:27 AM on September 23, 2020
posted by kitcat at 11:27 AM on September 23, 2020
Unfortunately there's no way for a teacher to mark assignments that way, so they appear under the "Done" heading. If the grade is missing or low, you would have to click on the assignment to see if the teacher is asking for it to be revised and resubmitted.
posted by betweenthebars at 12:20 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by betweenthebars at 12:20 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
Question: Do returned assignments that need to be corrected and resubmitted appear in the "to do" list?
Just a quick note here- make sure the teacher actually wants corrections with a “returned” assignment (especially if kiddo has multiple teachers). This is one of the more confusing things about GC- some teachers “return” assignments (mostly so their own GC list is less overwhelming) just in the sense that you would hand back a graded assignment to a kid and have no need or intention for a kid to resubmit.
Conversely, some teachers never use the “return” button because the language of “return” is confusing and it is hard for everyone when you have kids resubmitting unnecessarily and they *only* use the return button when a kid needs to resubmit.
In conclusion: GC is good for what it is (free, easy to set up) but it’s not designed the way a real learning management system is, so it has a lot of limitations. Be patient with yourself, kiddo and teachers- it’s a lot!
posted by charmedimsure at 12:24 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
Just a quick note here- make sure the teacher actually wants corrections with a “returned” assignment (especially if kiddo has multiple teachers). This is one of the more confusing things about GC- some teachers “return” assignments (mostly so their own GC list is less overwhelming) just in the sense that you would hand back a graded assignment to a kid and have no need or intention for a kid to resubmit.
Conversely, some teachers never use the “return” button because the language of “return” is confusing and it is hard for everyone when you have kids resubmitting unnecessarily and they *only* use the return button when a kid needs to resubmit.
In conclusion: GC is good for what it is (free, easy to set up) but it’s not designed the way a real learning management system is, so it has a lot of limitations. Be patient with yourself, kiddo and teachers- it’s a lot!
posted by charmedimsure at 12:24 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
Ironically, of all the systems Little eirias (3rd grade) has needed to learn, I like Google Classroom the best. But yes, checking to see whether any work has feedback or needs revision is a real weak point of this system.
posted by eirias at 12:48 PM on September 23, 2020
posted by eirias at 12:48 PM on September 23, 2020
One thing that helped me was looking at the things I was doing with my kid on google classroom and saying "wait, some of these are things a kid could manage", and one at a time figuring out how to make them his responsibility.
Eventually you want to be just doing occasional spot-checks of things you know are problem areas.
It's hard, I know.
posted by floppyroofing at 12:58 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
Eventually you want to be just doing occasional spot-checks of things you know are problem areas.
It's hard, I know.
posted by floppyroofing at 12:58 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
As a teacher, I’m not the biggest fan of Google Classroom in terms of submitting work and showing grades and the like. It’s good for showing assignments but it’s not always clear once they’re done. In addition to turning off email notifications, definitely feel free to check in directly with the teacher via email occasionally, like once a week or so. I’m always glad to hear from students and parents who want to double check that they’ve submitted everything and are set on updates!
posted by smorgasbord at 5:55 PM on September 23, 2020
posted by smorgasbord at 5:55 PM on September 23, 2020
This is a very low tech solution, but I just have my kiddo (sixth grade) jot down on a dedicated notebook his assignments. Nothing fancy - "math" is enough. Or "science 2" if he has two assignments that week. Then instead of scrolling through all the classrooms we know exactly where to go to get the details or turn it in.
posted by hapaxes.legomenon at 6:41 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
posted by hapaxes.legomenon at 6:41 PM on September 23, 2020 [3 favorites]
I am a teacher and I loathe google classroom -- it is not set up for students to navigate independently, even when they're older. It's excellent for in-class use, but not great when one expects students to work independently for an entire course like distance learning requires.
One thing I have to remind my students over and over, and then I immediately forget to do when I myself am a student in a google classroom, is that the stream sucks. When you use the stream to navigate posts, it gets overwhelming. (There is a way for teachers to turn off the feature that publishes assignments/materials to the stream, which clears it up for comments only... I think this is super useful, but unfortunately the teacher has to be the one to change that setting.) The first place your kid should always click is the "classwork" tab. Hopefully, the teacher has things posted there in a more organized fashion.
One thing that has revolutionized my google classroom use as a teacher is the Mote chrome extension. It allows for 90 second voice comments, which is excellent and amazing at using things faster. It won't help with organization, but perhaps it can help your kid become more independent -- they can talk faster than they can type, so I bet if your child is confused they can ask a much higher-quality question verbally than in writing. It also feels a bit more like normal school to talk and know someone is hearing your voice. If you install the extension the little icon will appear on every text box in google classroom (and if they ever leave a comment on a google doc).
posted by lilac girl at 8:47 PM on September 23, 2020 [1 favorite]
One thing I have to remind my students over and over, and then I immediately forget to do when I myself am a student in a google classroom, is that the stream sucks. When you use the stream to navigate posts, it gets overwhelming. (There is a way for teachers to turn off the feature that publishes assignments/materials to the stream, which clears it up for comments only... I think this is super useful, but unfortunately the teacher has to be the one to change that setting.) The first place your kid should always click is the "classwork" tab. Hopefully, the teacher has things posted there in a more organized fashion.
One thing that has revolutionized my google classroom use as a teacher is the Mote chrome extension. It allows for 90 second voice comments, which is excellent and amazing at using things faster. It won't help with organization, but perhaps it can help your kid become more independent -- they can talk faster than they can type, so I bet if your child is confused they can ask a much higher-quality question verbally than in writing. It also feels a bit more like normal school to talk and know someone is hearing your voice. If you install the extension the little icon will appear on every text box in google classroom (and if they ever leave a comment on a google doc).
posted by lilac girl at 8:47 PM on September 23, 2020 [1 favorite]
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posted by hurdy gurdy girl at 10:38 AM on September 23, 2020 [6 favorites]