Updates to Google Classroom

Yesterday brought down some more updates to Google Classroom, which I thought I would take the time to make you aware of just in case you haven't seen them.

1. Supposedly it's easier to invite students. Given that I am a big fan of using the class code instead, I'm not sure how noticeable this change really is. In fact, I couldn't tell at all. But you can judge that for yourself. It looks as if it is most noticeable for districts that set up groups of students (such as a group of all seniors, juniors, etc.) and it therefore doesn't have much effect for us since we don't utilize groups with students.
   
   
2. On the student's side, they can now mark an assignment as "Done" even if there is nothing attached to it. I could see using this method if your students had to complete the assignment by filling in a Google Form through a link on the assignment. In the past, they've had to create a document to turn in for it to show as being turned in, which meant extra documents for no useful reason. So this is a nice feature to have that is easy to overlook.
   

   

   As a student, they can now see a button to "Mark as Done" even if there isn't an actual document/file to turn in.

3. This one appears to be a past "new" feature that I've already mentioned on my blog before. Basically, you now have the ability to turn on/off comment, posting, etc. for each student individually or for the class as a whole. Click here to read my past post about it.
   
   
4. For those of you who are new to the online learning environments or just want to be sure you backup your grades at the end of a class, the new ability to download ALL grades to a spreadsheet will be a welcome addition. You can find it my clicking on the download button when looking at the grades for any assignment.
   
   
   
   
5. This is a simple one, but still very handy! Now you can sort your students by first or last name to match whatever method works best for you.