Speed sharing….

Google+ as a classroom

discussion board

Richard Kelleher

eLearning Co-ordinator

Killester College,Springvale, Victoria.

rkelleher@killester.vic.edu.au

Google Apps for Education

• free for all schools

• easy to set up

• can keep current Exchange email server*

Core services in Google Apps have telephone support for administrators.

Non-core services do not have support and need to be added.

Google+ needs to be added as an extraService & it needs to be “turned on” by an administrator.

Users need to set-up a Google+ profile.

This cannot be done in the admin console.

Image source: http://decks.sebastian.tramp.name/2012-10-08-Vorstellung-DSSN-Praktikum/images/walled-gardens.jpg

A “walled-garden” or internal school-only instance of Google+ is not possible. If Google+ is turned on for students then they can interact with the rest of the world.

Each user lands on a page where posts by those they follow appear.

People and organisations have a page where their own posts are collated.

The power of Google+ lies in the communities - excellent sources of professional development.

We advise teachers not to use Google+ like Facebook, but to use their school accounts to develop professional networks.

Google+ recommends communities you may be interested in joining based on the posts you read.

Teachers can set up private communities – students can be invited to join, or can request to join after they have searched for and found the community.

In a private community a teacher can set questions to be answered by individual students, with all students being able to see the answers.

A student can ask a question of the teacher, with all students being able to see the answers.

Avoids getting lots of emails asking the same thing the night before the test.

A student can ask a question of the teacher, but sometimes other students get in first to answer.

In this example two students are discussing how to solve a chem problem.

A student or teacher can post interesting links or other content that students can read and comment on.

So there is no need to regularly check your class.

A notification appears when there is a new post to a community

Click!

Posts can be read and responded to within any Google session (ie without leaving email, for example).

Click to expand if post is interesting

Multiple posts can be read without leaving email.

Click!

Problem #1: profile names.

Students (& teachers) can change their profile names.

This change propagates through all Google products!

Solution = educate users(& ban name changes in your AUP)

Harried admin after kids change their names.

Problem #2 – 13+ restriction

There is an absolute 13+ age limit for Google+.

If Google finds a <13 y.o. account, all Google accounts suspended (and eventually deleted).

Solution – Google+ not activated for Yr 7 & 8s.

Image source: http://www.pouted.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/baby_computer.jpg