Ways to Use Google Docs

If I taught in a social studies classroom, one thing I would use Google Docs for would be whenever students were creating papers, reports, or presentations as a group. One of the major benefits of this is efficiency. Instead of all the students in the group crowding around one computer, with one person typing and four different people confusing them with different ideas, the students could work separately on different computers and all be making substantial contributions to the final product at the same time. Although this is somewhat possible without using Google Docs by simply splitting up the assignment into even parts for each group member to work on separately, Google Docs could streamline that process. First of all, students would be able to see exactly what their peers were working on at their own convenience without having to give up their own progress to go look at another computer. For example, if one student says that they just found a few pictures to add to a presentation and wants the rest of the groups to approve them, all the student has to do is make that simple request and each of his or her peers will be able to view the pictures at a convenient break point for them, either all at once on different computers or all separately at different times. Furthermore, it might even be a good idea to have one member of each group, preferably a student with high writing proficiency who also respects the work of other students, take on the role of editor, simply monitoring the rest of the groups' work and providing feedback on every member's contributions.

I also thought about a way to use the Spreadsheet function if I taught math. Since multiple students can edit it at the same time, it would be ideal for a group math inquiry lesson. For such a lesson, students each collect data individually, then combine all the data together, and finally use that data to discuss possible conclusions about math ideas. One example of this would be as an introduction to logarithmic and exponential functions. Each student in a group of five would be assigned a function, three exponential and two logarithmic. However, they would not know too much about how those functions work or what they mean. Instead, I will only show them how to use their calculator to determine points on the function. For example, students may have never heard of ln (natural log) before, but the only thing I would tell them is where the ln button is on their calculators so they could determine ln(x) for any x that I gave them. I would then ask each student to find 10 specifically assigned points on their function and record them in that group's spreadsheet. Google Spreadsheets are so useful for this lesson because they allow the work of data collection on these functions to be split amongst the group, but they would still all be able to input their data into the compilation spreadsheet immediately when figure it out. I would also be able to have them start with spreadsheets that have certain boxes colored in for a specific purpose. Once all the students in the group have inputted their data, the Spreadsheet will look something like this:

Then, the group would have a chance to brainstorm answers to the question of why Mr. V highlighted certain boxes different colors. They could all combine their suggestions easily in a separate document on Google Docs and then discuss them as a group, asking for clarification and pushing each other's thought processes. Hopefully, some of the groups would come up with some of the patterns indicated by the color coding, such as the ideas that e^x and ln x are inverses and the pattern that any number raised to the 0 power is equal to 1 while any logarithm of 1 is equal to 0.