Google Tools

At Horizon we frequently use Google tools to collaborate on projects. In fact, we find them so useful that we ask everyone who takes Designing for Online Learning to sign up for a Google account if they don’t already have one. Here are some of the Google tools we have found most useful for collaborative activities in online courses.

Google Docs (docs.google.com)

Google docs can be easily shared with anyone and allow for multiple people to edit the same document in real time. For example, you could ask students to ideate (generate ideas for) a topic and they could all contribute, either synchronously or asynchronously, to the same Google doc.

Google Drive (drive.google.com)

Google Drive is a convenient way for your students to collaborate because they can upload entire files to a shared Google Drive folder as opposed to listing several articles they find in a Google doc.

Google Forms (forms.google.com)

Google Forms is a practical tool that you can use if you want to survey students about a particular issue. After you conduct the survey, student responses can be collected in a Google sheet.

Google Sheets (sheets.google.com)

Google Sheets is the Google equivalent to Excel and offers a convenient are a great way to collaborate when you have a schedule or a lot of quantitative data to share.

Google Slides (slides.google.com)

If you want students to create a presentation about a topic, you could ask them to make a Google Slides presentation. This tool is  the Google equivalent to PowerPoint and allows students to collaborate on a presentation of a group project.

For more ideas about tools you can use for collaborative assignments, check out the post about Google Hangouts.