Shaping Google Classroom into a Student-Centred Experience

Google Classroom software has quickly become an instrumental remote learning tool worldwide in the past few years. Bloomberg News (2020) reported that the number of Google Classroom users doubled to 100 million since early March 2020. While there are dozens of other learning management systems (LMS) like Blackboard, Edmodo or UiTM’s own UFuture, Google Classroom seems to be the most popular choice, as it is fairly easy to learn and use. Most importantly, Google offers its products for free, whereas others charge a fee for certain features.

Nonetheless, Google Classroom is not without its criticisms. Khoi Vinh, a principal designer at Adobe, thinks the platform is unappealing, slow, not learning-oriented, and not optimised for people. He argues that these gaffes reflect how broader society undervalues education, comparing it to a workplace activity app called Slack, which he describes as “incredibly feature-rich and filled with small features that let people express themselves”.

While I agree with Vinh on the plain interface look of Google Classroom, I would like to point out that the simpler the app is, the more accessible it is for students and staff, especially those with limited Internet connectivity. Its sophistication does not lie within its appearance. Rather, it lies in its ability to complement other tools educators already use, such as Gmail, Google Drive, Google Docs, and so on.

Remote learning was quite a novel idea to most educators just a year ago, in March 2020. With the government’s decision to make all classes online during the Movement Control Order (MCO) period beginning in early April 2020, we had very limited time and resources to prepare all our materials online. Still, this platform can be learned quickly.

In addressing Vinh’s claim that Google Classroom is not optimised for people, I think this platform should be treated as a means to an end, not an end in itself, in our respective classrooms. If the app had been used merely to store materials, it would have been fair to consider it not ideally suited to students' learning. However, educators can choose how they use the platform by integrating it with different tools. I want to share some ways to make Google Classroom more student-centred by combining a few basic Google tools.

A. Follow These Tips! Solutions

a. Group Presentation Using Google Meet and Google Slides

For this activity, the students and I first met on Google Meet to discuss what makes a good presentation. We talked about a few speeches they enjoyed in their lifetime and what made them like them. I briefly reviewed the day's subtopics before assigning the students to groups, each with a subtopic to present. The notes and instructions were uploaded to Google Classroom before meeting the students online.

Then we all left the Google Meet session because they had to join again, this time with their group members. During activities like this, I wish Google Meet had a breakout room feature like Zoom's, so I could easily monitor each group’s discussion. During the debate, the students worked collaboratively on their Google Slides as they discussed on Google Meet. Google Slides allows simultaneous editing by different users, making it very convenient for in-class group work. After the allotted time, everyone rejoined my Google Meet session and presented their topics by sharing their Google Slides on screen.

b. Paraphrasing Practice Using Google Docs

One of the writing skills I teach every semester is paraphrasing, as students must know how to avoid plagiarism before we get into full swing. While most students have been exposed to this skill, many still cannot paraphrase. Ample notes and examples should be provided before this activity is carried out.

To check students’ understanding, I prepared three sentences in three columns and made as many rows as there were students. Everyone would get the same Google Docs link and work on their paraphrases simultaneously. Each student could see their friends’ answers as they typed, which could help weaker students see different responses from their classmates and aid them in their paraphrases. After all the students had finished, we would then go on Google Meet and discuss which paraphrased responses were acceptable and which were not.

c. Video Review Using YouTube and Google Docs

I try to expose students to as many speeches as our time (and Internet data) allow in oral presentation classes. This activity, adapted from the TED-Ed website, helps to bolster students’ understanding of the theories presented in class with real-life examples.

For this activity, students were asked to:

• Download or open the TED Presentation Rubric. Look at each skill across the top and imagine what it would look like.

• Turn off/mute the volume and watch the Bill Gates presentation for about 3-4 minutes, focusing only on the physical movements (the skills at the top) without listening to the content. Stop the speech and score Gates using a 1-5 rating (1=bad, 5=excellent). The students can discuss the rating with their friends before giving it, but they don't have to give the same rating. The students were reminded to be as unbiased as possible, since they might already know some of the speakers.

• Do the same exercise with Lomborg and Oliver.

• The students were to choose one speaker whose body language they preferred most and one they preferred least. They had to give reasons why for each. The answers were typed in the table.

Students were also informed earlier that their answers would be shared with everyone during class discussion. During the class discussion, students were given room to debate, as some of their answers contradicted one another. There were no right or wrong answers, but we tried to find the best explanation. A simple class survey I conducted at the end of the semester revealed that 9 out of 15 students who responded said they enjoyed this video-analysis activity the most.

d. Group Presentation Video and Peer-Teaching Using Google Meet

For this activity, students were asked to form groups and prepare a presentation based on assigned short stories. As a group, the students needed to delegate the task of finding the following information: character(s), plot, setting, theme(s) and moral value(s), and they were given two weeks to prepare. As the students were presenting,

I recorded their presentations on Google Meet and later posted the videos on Google Classroom for everyone in the class to re-watch if necessary. After each group's presentation, a Q&A session was held to help enhance their classmates’ understanding of the short stories.

e. Role-play Using Google Docs and Google Meet

My main obstacle in synchronous speaking activities with students was their limited Internet connectivity. Therefore, I provided notes and examples before any speaking tasks so we would not waste time reviewing the notes while on Google Meet.

For example, the students reviewed notes and example dialogues in a two-hour class in the first hour. Students were asked to choose a situation for their role-play and prepare the dialogues with their partners. In the second hour of class, everyone went on Google Meet, and the students presented their role-play. Feedback on students’ language was then given immediately after their respective turns.

B. Let's Ponder...

A year ago, I would not have thought about the activities we have carried out the past two semesters since the start of MCO. It took a lot of discussions with colleagues and students, online research, and late-night brainstorming to be where we are now. Google Classroom has provided that avenue for me to implement activities for students of different backgrounds, provide immediate feedback synchronously and asynchronously, share course materials and resources, and make learning more interesting despite our circumstances. Despite its limitations, Google Classroom will not disappear anytime soon, at least until the next improved app. The pandemic has forever changed the world of education; whether we like it or not, online education is here to stay.

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This guest post was written by Aileen Farida Mohd Adam, a senior lecturer at the Academy of Language Studies, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Cawangan Pulau Pinang, Malaysia.

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