Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Thing 15
I really like using google docs. I took a one hour class that introduced it last spring, but haven't had much chance to explore yet. I really think it will be a useful place to have students put their work- over the years, there has always been a problem with forgeting a disk or flash drive, not being able to access email to attach it, forgetting to attach it, and so on. Google docs will definitely help with simple matters like that, plus allow students to work together on assignments and allow me to see what they are doing. A disadvantage I see is, like most other things, time to set it up, teach the students what to do, and implement it regularly. Once it's in place and students know how to use it, as well as my expectations for use, it would be a wonderful tool.
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The beauty of Google Docs is that it is really simple to use. Everything definitely has a learning curve, but I think students could quickly learn how to both utilize Google Docs and share their documents with instructors and fellow students for collaborative assignments. The history feature is what I really like because it allows instructors to track not only changes, but in the case of a collaborative document, see WHO made the contributions to the document, much like what you can do on a wiki.
ReplyDeleteI taught a biology class online a few years ago (pre google, I think). ecollege, the company that managed the courses, timestamped everything, of course, so it made it very easy to see who was working when. Very, very useful! Makes it easy to prod students gently if they need it!
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