Colgate faculty, staff and students are already familiar with Google Mail, Calendar and Drive, and many use these frequently in their work. These tools are part of the integrated G Suite for Education, and they represent Colgate’s centrally-supported productivity and collaboration platform. While some of the other apps in G-Suite might be less commonly used, they may offer some unique affordances to support remote instruction. Faculty and students value these Google tools for their ease of use, shared access, collaboration features, commenting and feedback options, a variety of web publishing options, and unlimited cloud storage for all files. Brief descriptions and example uses are outlined below:

Docs is the familiar cloud based word processing application that allows you to create and edit text documents right in your browser. Multiple people can work at the same time, and every change is saved automatically along with a version history.

• Create a shared doc for collaborative note taking among students during synchronous class sessions
• Use as part of the Moodle integrated Google Assignment tool to manage assignments and provide feedback to students
• Use commenting and real-time chat to support peer interaction and collaborative work
• Learn more about Google Docs

• Collaborate on data analysis with smart spreadsheets.
• Work directly with team members in the same spreadsheet at the same time.
• Perform calculations with formulas ranging from simple to sophisticated.
• Engage students in collaborative data analysis
• Use in conjunction with Google Forms to engage in distributed data collection
• Learn more about Google Sheets

Similar to Docs and Sheets –  Slides allows for the creation of polished presentations in your browser—no software required. Multiple people can work at the same time so everyone always has the latest version.

• Students collaborate on shared presentations
• Captioning is automatic in Slides, making narration during presentations more accessible
• Learn more about Google Slides

Google Forms provides an easy way to create web-based surveys and forms to collect information and feedback. Forms integrate directly with Sheets sending information directly to a spreadsheet that can be analyzed collectively.

• Collect feedback from students about how they are learning using formative assessment techniques
• Create projects for shared data collection
• Crowdsource resource collection
• Learn more about Google Forms

A messaging platform that facilitates 1:1 chat for a specific group, or an entire class, Google Chat makes it easy to communicate and connect with students in an organized way.

• Share and discuss Docs, Sheets, and Slides all in one place.
• Create a class chat where students can ask questions and get quick responses
• Provide students with a low overhead space to connect with each other
• Hold chat sessions during specific times to complement office hours
• Learn more about Google Chat

Sites supports the creation of websites through easy to use templates and editing tools, that integrate nicely with other tools in the Google Suite. Google Sites can be made public or private, and permissions (viewing, editing) are easy to manage to include access by entire classes or select groups.

• Use Google Sites to showcase student projects
• Collaborate on the development of Sites to share resources with wider audiences
• Learn more about Google Sites

• Email itshelp@colgate.edu or call 315-228-7111
• Schedule an instructional consultation