Lessons Learned from a Collaborative Google Slide Project

When I started this blog, I promised to share the good things that happen when teaching with technology as well as the bad.  Here is a chance for me to share a lesson that went horribly wrong.  Luckily, my mistakes will help you teach your collaborative learning lessons better.

Last week, we completed our first collaborative Google Slide Presentation making a class book entitled Snowman Building.  Each student created a snowman and wrote at least 3 sentences about their snowman.  The students started with a slide that looked like this:

The Google Slide Presentation was assigned using Google Classroom.  This time, instead of making a copy of the presentation for each student, each student was allowed to edit the same presentation.  Therefore, all of the students were working on one Google Slide Presentation at the same time.

The students in my classroom are assigned numbers.  I told the students to work on the slide that corresponded with their number.  The only exception to this rule were numbers 1 and 2.  I assigned these students numbers at the end of the presentation because slide one was the title page and slide two was the page that I used to model the project.

Once everyone had found their slide, they were allowed to move the different shapes around to build their snowman.  The students were given strict instructions to only work on their slide.  Once their snowman was built, the students were supposed to delete the snowman parts they did not use.  This is where the problems started.

If a student did not select an item correctly when they were deleting the snowman parts, they would delete the entire slide.  This would cause a panic in the classroom because not only did a student loose their work but all of the slide numbers changed; therefore, some of the students were no longer working on the slide number that they were assigned.  The deleted slide can be easily fixed with an undo as long as you can figure out who deleted the slide.  However, once a slide is deleted, it is best to have all students stop working until you can fix the problem.

The instructional technologist on my campus completed this same project with another first grade teacher's class.  Her solution for recovering a deleted slide was to have all of the students stop and press undo (control + z).  The missing slide would reappear, and it saved her from having to find the student who deleted the slide.  Thanks @RichesonEmily for this quick tip.

Another thing I would do differently to help ease student panic when a slide is deleted is for each student to type their name on their slide as soon as they start working.  With their name on the slide, the student is no longer depending on the slide number to identify their slide.  I would only use the slide number as a tool to help each student know which slide to begin working on.

Another problem that arose was a mischievous student who thought it would be funny to change another student's work.  At first, I heard some students complaining that things were happening on their slide that they did not do.  It is hard to catch a student who is being sneaky by just walking around the room.  Luckily, Google has built in ways in which you can see where other collaborators in the document are working and what they are doing.  Here are some tips on how to monitor your students in Google Slides:

1.  At the top of each page, there is a list of who is working in the presentation.  When you select a collaborator, it takes you to the place in the document where the person is working.  Therefore, you can quickly see if the student is working in the right place.

2.  You can also move your mouse over the slides to see who is working on what slide.  In the image below, you can quickly see that Student H is working on slide 5.  It sticks out like a sore thumb if more than one student is working on the same slide.

Even though this lesson caused a lot of frustration for me, it still turned out to be a very positive lesson.  Not only did the students learn something new, but I also learned a lot of things about working collaboratively on the same Google Slide Presentation together.  I hope you can benefit from my mistakes.  Here is a finished slide completed by a student:

Click here to see the completed class book.

*I would like to give credit to whoever created the original snowman presentation, but I cannot find the source on the internet.  I will continue to look and update this post when I find it.*

Collaborative Problem Solving Using Digital Manipulatives on the Chromebook

In math, students are working on writing their own math problems.  Sometimes, the students struggle with coming up with ideas.  To help the students generate ideas, we used digital manipulatives with partners to practice the process of creating word problems.  Students were asked to create a math problem and model the problem on the screen.  Their partner was to say the answer and tell the number sentence that they used to solve the problem.  Partners shared one Chromebook to complete this activity.

The digital manipulatives that we used were from McGraw-Hill Education.  We began the lesson with students using the playground as their background and modeling their problems with bears.  Once students were comfortable using the program, they were allowed to pick their own background and manipulatives.  The baseball field was a popular choice for the boys.

There are two important buttons on the toolbar that the students need to use.  The most important button is for the students to clear objects.  For some reason, the students always try to cover the screen with as many bears as possible.  Instead of removing the bears one by one, the bears can be removed with one quick button.  The other important button is to remove the background.

Students enjoyed exploring the different options that the program had to offer.  One group even set the timer for each other when it was time to solve the problem.

Reflection
I should have modeled my expectations for creating word problems more for the students because there was a lot of off task behavior.  The students were playing with the digital manipulatives more than creating word problems.

About halfway through the project, I stopped the students and changed the directions.  I told the students that one student should have the Chromebook to themselves while they were designing the problem.  When they were finished setting the problem up, they should return to their partner and explain their problem to them.  This allowed the student to focus more on creating the problem and less time playing with their friend; however, the other student became bored while they were waiting for their partner to create the word problem.

Next time, I will allow both students to have their own Chromebook.  Each student can create a problem of their own with their own background and digital manipulatives.  When both students are finished creating, they can share their word problem with one another.

What is Inside Your Head? An Introduction to Inserting Pictures into Google Drawings

This week we talked about schema.  Schema is the background knowledge that we use to make connections.  We use our schema in both reading and writing; therefore, it is important for students to recognize their own schema.

Usually, I introduce the topic of schema by asking students to reflect on what is in their head.  This project includes a picture of a large head in which students draw pictures of things that they are "experts" on.  I thought this would be the perfect opportunity for students to learn how to insert pictures on the Chromebook.  Therefore, I assigned the students a picture of an empty head in which they could fill with pictures of things that were important to them.  This template was created in Google Drawings.

One of the best features of Google Drawings is the ability to search for images without leaving the program.  When you insert an image, choose the search tab, and you are able to search through a large amount of images.  Students love this feature because they are able to pick the picture that is best for their project.

Here are a few pointers when teaching students to insert pictures into Google Drawings:

1. Spelling is important when searching images.  Sometimes if the word is close to the correct spelling, it will work.  However, students usually have to spell the word correctly to find their image.

2. Students struggle with resizing the image.  When you insert an image into Google Drawings, the image is usually very large.  Resizing the image is a task that needs to be modeled constantly for the student.  However, by the end of the lesson, the students are successful with this task.

3.  The undo button is your friend.  Sometimes I would check in on a student and the head would be missing.  Usually, we were able to undo enough times to find the head again.  Sometimes I had to restore the project to the original version if using the undo feature was not successful.

You can download a copy of schema template here.