Webwatcher: Google sites

Advertisment

spot_img

In Issue 113, I introduced you to the new version of Google Sites, which is really easy to use and ideal if you would like to make a school/class website or get your students to create their own individual websites.

While Google Sites can be used to create websites produced by and for individuals, it is also possible for people to work collaboratively to create a shared website.

This can be a very engaging and fun way to work, but it can also create a number of challenges.

In this article, I am going to give you a quick explanation of how you can get your students to collaborate on a website, and then I will suggest some guidelines.

 

How does collaboration on a website work?

The person who creates the Google Site can add collaborators.

There are two basic ways to set this up.

Firstly, if you click on the collaboration tab (the small + sign at the top right-hand corner of the screen), you can add people’s email addresses by keying the address into the ‘Invite people’ box and then clicking on ‘Done’.

An email with an invitation to collaborate will be sent to each person.

A second way is to copy the link that appears at the top when you click on the collaboration tab and share it with your students by email or on an online learning platform.

However, before you copy the link, you need to check that you have the right setting.

Click on the link that says ‘Change’ and then click on ‘Anyone with the link’.

To help make this clear, I have produced a very quick video at www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpltfVsjNwo.

Collaborators do not need to be signed up to Google to access and collaborate on a site.

Collaboration could easily be class-based, group-based or just pair-based.

Here are two examples of projects I have tried out:

 

1 Group websites

Your students could work together to produce a website, which might, for example, contain reports on a recent school trip or be based on a particular theme or topic, such as a city or person.

I have experimented with this idea a few times, so here are a few tips that can really help to make it work:

  • First, be very specific about what content you want the students to create for particular pages. Suppose you have asked them to create a website about visiting Rome. It’s a good idea to specify what you want on each page: the amount of text, the use of video, the number of pictures, etc.Here is an example rubric:

Make a website about visiting Rome. Add the following pages:

1. A home page. This should have a written text about Rome with one picture no bigger than 400 pixels wide. The text should be at least 100 words long and not copied and pasted from another source.

2. A page with one YouTube video about Rome.Please place a text beside the video explaining in no fewer than 100 words what the video is about and why you have included it.

3. A ‘Picture gallery’ page with at least five pictures of Rome. Each picture must be no bigger than 400 pixels wide, and next to each picture should be a 20- to 30-word explanation of what the picture shows.

Basic rules

  • Text size should be set to ‘normal size’ for anything written.
  • Pictures cannot be more than 400 pixels wide.
  • Page names must be clear.
  • All pages should be kept consistent.
  • Your texts will be checked for plagiarism.
  • Secondly, you need to insist that your students write their own texts. You can easily check whether or not they have done this. Simply put the first 30 words of any text they submit into the Google search engine. If they have cut and pasted it, the page where the text was originally from should come up in the search.
  • Thirdly, it is a good idea to get a member of each group to stand up and present their site to the rest of the class.Here are my instructions for this:

Once the site has been produced, at least one member of the group must present the site to the rest of the class.

Please make a presentation on the three pages, explaining what information is provided in the text, why you chose a certain video and what that video contains.

 

2 A class e-portfolio

Instead of getting the students to create a website, you could get them to use Google Sites to create an e-portfolio, either individually or in groups.

Google Sites is a really versatile tool, because it can be linked to other tools in the Google stable, so the students could include a whole range of different things in their e-portfolios, depending on how many of these tools you use.

Here are some examples:

  • Google Slides (just like PowerPoint slides);
  • Any written work, such as letters, essays, reports, etc, which have been created in Google Docs;
  • Questionnaires created using Google Forms;
  • Videos uploaded from the students’ smartphones to a YouTube channel.

Help video

There is a useful video which explains more of the advanced features of Google Sites, including how to set up collaboration, at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dm8nEq4jVJg.

More articles

spot_img

Recent articles