Awesome Math Assessment

I really loved using this self-grading test.  During my graduate class last weekend, we discussed retention and how we should periodically assess students understanding of previously taught material.  So I used this GoogleDocs self-graded test to assess my enriched students' retention of all marking period 1 material.  The students took the test today (in about 25 minutes) and I got immediate feedback from a 20 question test.  The students were able to see their score immediately.  I also had time to view the summary with the whole class and reteach questions that many students got wrong.  This is a great tool, especially for math!  This test not only identified students who continued to struggle on previous content, but gave me valuable feedback on the types of questions and content that my students were struggling on.  It provides more feedback then I get from a traditional paper and pencil test and it was immediate.  This is such a useful tool for assessment and I plan to incorporate it as often as possible.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/a/eisenhowerms.org/viewform?formkey=dEJ1TEFZbVdxWlRHVk5fNEdqWEhGZFE6MA

Technology - Self Grading Quiz

This is cool stuff. Here is the quiz I created for the 6th Grade Technology class on Hardware and Software. I will probably use it in the next cycle as a pre and post test before a related project.

https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/eisenhowerms.org/viewform?hl=en&authkey=COmR1RI&formkey=dHg5cnJMZ0ZUZ2FpdHJxeE94Njd0QWc6MA#gid=0

An Amazing 30 minutes

I gave my students a self-graded quiz on Wednesday using a Google Form. When the students completed the exam and submitted the form I immediately got their answers and grades on the form's spreadsheet. I was able to tell the students their grades as soon as they completed the test.

When all of the students completed the exam, I used the Summary of Responses to show the class how everyone did and we reviewed the questions that students did not do well on. I could easily see what percentage of students didn't know the answer to a question. To download a pdf of the Summary of Responses click here.

This all took place in the span of one 30 minute period! I was psyched! To be able to have the students take the quiz, get their grades and review the answers in the same period enabled the students to get immediate responses and helped me address the questions that students did not answer correctly.

As an educator I felt that my time was not taken up with the grading of tests. I was able to use the data from the test to address student's learning in a timely manner and help them better learn the material.

Self-Grading Test

Setting up a self-grading assessment/test is easy with Google Apps. The three videos below will show you how to do this. If you are in the EisenhowerMS domain you can take the Quiz by going to http://bit.ly/d6WImC I have also shared the results of the quiz in our Google Docs Class Folder.

You may also want to download Chris Clementi's handout which is based on the videos.

Setting Up Your Test Part 1 - Writing the Questions

Setting Up Your Test Part 2 - Posting the Test and Setting Up the Answer Key

Setting Up Your Test Part 3 - Getting The Grades

Forwarding Gmail

At Eisenhower we have our FirstClass email accounts and we also have our EisenhowerMS Google Apps accounts. This means that you may have to check email in two places. There is a way to forward all of the email sent to your Google Apps Gmail account to your FirstClass account.

The video below shows you how to forward the email from your Gmail account to your FirstClass account. Note that while our Google Apps domain is closed to outside email I did allow the sending and receiving of email from our FirstClass accounts.

At the end of the video I did not show the final step - in order to confirm the forwarding address you will have to go to your FirstClass email account and get the confirmation email from Google. In this email is a Confirmation Code Number. Be sure to copy this number and paste it into the box that asks for your confirmation code.

 

What do we really know about 6th grade peer pressures as teachers

https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/eisenhowerms.org/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dDFIanJwMmNlaWlWNjlUX3RDXzhMLUE6MA#gid=0

This was a tobacco survey I used last year posted on my website, answers were anonymous and I asked students to take it, I told them it wasn't mandatory because I couldn't track who took it but that I wanted them to take it and give honest feedback so as the Health teacher I could have a better pulse on issues concerning middle school students and more specifically 6th graders. I was pleased with the amount of students that took it although according to the data I collected we teach in a relatively peer pressure and smoke free town. It was just an experiment to see if kids would take such a survey letting us into "their" issues and they did, now the challenge will be finding out what tools and support kids in our school really need to learn and grow in the context of social/emotional health during adolescence.
Best,
Adam

My Survey

Here is the link to the survey I created for my students to take as part of tomorrow's homework.  I can use the data collected to better plan and incorporate activities that students enjoy and reflect on the amount of time students are using to study and complete daily homework.

http://spreadsheets.google.com/a/eisenhowerms.org/viewform?formkey=dDcxQVZjZzhXRHJrT3JlVW5hM1I5VWc6MQ

Sample Student Created Surveys

Google Forms has several applications (pun intended) in our classrooms. One is for us to survey our students, but we can also create projects in which students use Google Forms to survey their peers about various topics. The cool thing about this is that the kids find a direct connection to the data that results from the survey because they supplied that data. It's not data from somewhere "out on the Internet", it's data from them and their friends.

In the 7th Grade tech classes, we have the students create surveys that explore how they and their peers use technology. Then we analyze the results of their surveys and generate class discussion about the impact of technology on our lives.

Here is the link to the directions for this project. The top part of the page is directions for creating a survey, which you might find useful. Near the middle of the page is where the students share their survey by posting a link into a teacher created form. Then all of their survey links end up in a spreadsheet, where they can go to take each other's surveys.

See Some Examples
You can check out these examples of student surveys.

Another number question

I made those changes to the column and did a test and it worked. But I have one question still. I gave a multiple choice question that the answer was 2:1. They did not have to write this in since it was an option to click on. Some of them came up 2:1 in the spreadsheet but some came up as a time. Shouldn't they have all come up the same? Most came up as a time, but some were a ratio as I typed. Doesn't seem to make sense to me.

Jen,

What happened was I checked your spreadsheet out and noticed the problem you mentioned. Then I changed the column to text only. It did not affect the information already in the spreadsheet but all of the answers that came in after I changed the format of the column changed. I found this out by sorting the entries by time.

Harold

Format for Numbers

I had my students take the survey and as I was looking through their responses I realized that some of the numbers automatically formatted in certain ways. One question was on ratios and it was multiple choice. The answer was 2:1 and in the spreadsheet it turned them into times. I also realized that when students tried to type fractions they came out as dates. I guess I could have said in the question to express them as decimals. I am wondering if there is a way to change these default formatting issues? My surveys would involve numbers most of the time, so that would be important for me.

Jen,

Spreadsheets are set to look for certain kinds of symbols like / which means divide if you put an = sign in front of it - so 3/4 becomes 3 divided by 4. If you do not put an = sign in front of it the the spreadsheet treats the number like a date. Once the data is in the cell it cannot be changed. The next time you do a survey like this select the column by clicking on the letter title of the column and then use the format button which has the numbers 123. This is just below the  Format and Form menus. Select plain text, the choice at the bottom. Be sure to do this  BEFORE the students respond to the form. See image below.

Another thing you can do is use the help text just under the question. You can put an example of the format you would like the students to use.

Harold

What do we want to learn?

In the comments section please list what you would like to learn about in coming lessons?

Ideas for Using Google Apps

Here are some online resources for ideas on using Google Apps in the classroom:

Google Apps in Action

Lesson Plans

Google Apps Education Community

Ways to get people to respond to your form.

Harold,

I read what Annie wrote re: her form appearing as a spreadsheet. Mine does as well. I did go to forms, as you suggest, but then what? How do I keep it as a form for viewing by others who wish to respond to it?

Grace,

When you are looking at the form's spreadsheet you go to the Form menu, select see live form. Then copy the url of the form. You can paste that link onto a web page but it is rather long, https://spreadsheets.google.com/a/eisenhowerms.org/viewform?hl=en&formkey=dEpvMjV1cjFvTnFFb0pSVTBrZTdpNlE6MQ#gid=0

You can also create a link so that you don't have to paste in a lengthy url - Click here to see my form. Or you can embed the form on a web page by getting the embed code and pasting it into the html of a web page, see below.

Harold

Creating the form turned out to be easy! I can see uses for it with my students. Please take my survey on the form I created.

Thanks,

Grace

Using Google Forms

You can easily create a form to collect data. This week's lesson will focus on using Google Forms and the spreadsheets created by the form. Please review the videos below.

Creating a Form

Viewing the responses to your form

In ETV we use Google Forms to collect student project information. The form is posted on the ETV website along with the results of the form. By doing this students can view the projects that have already been selected before they decide on a project. Since our Google Apps domain is private only members of the Eisenhower community can see the form results after they have logged in to their Google Apps accounts. To see the Form and the Results click here to go to the ETV projects web page. Then, click on the links on the page.

Week 1 Assignment

Develop a Google Form and get data from one of your classes or from the members of this class. To get the url, address, of your form just copy the url from the bottom of your form, see image below.

You can email the url of the form or post the link on a webpage. Then, add links to your form and the responses to the comments section of this post. Please write about the process. Also, please comment on the surveys that the other members of this class have posted.

Also, all documents created for this class should be shared with the class by adding them to the Google Apps Class Folder in Google Docs.

If you have any questions about the process post them to this blog. All of us should monitor the blog and respond to the questions on this blog.

Response to Annie's question:

Your form looks like a spreadsheet when you first look at it in Google Docs. To see it as a form or to edit the form:
1. Open the spreadsheet
2. Go to the Form Menu and select from the choices. You can view, edit or embed the form in a webpage. See the image below:

 

Show Summary of Responses

From the Form Menu you can select Show summary of responses. If you have used multiple choice or choose from a list type questions you can get a nice graphic summary of the responses to your form. See image below:

Introduction - Class 1

Google Forms are a great and easy way to collect information. Click on this link to get to the introductory form. Please answer all of the questions on the form.

To see the results of the form click here. Now that we have the data we can decide on the focus of this class.