- How Can I Teach with This Tool?
- What Is It?
- Is It Good for Learning?
Teachers can use Google Calendarto help manage their schedules and model for students how tomanage their own. Among school staff,Calendarcan help teachers, administrators, and other support staff set up meetings, keep track of professional development sessions, and coordinate the use of shared spaces such as computer labs or libraries. Calendars could also help teachers communicate with parents, set up conferences, and making it easier for parents to see current homework assignments, upcoming field trips, and other important events.
Google Calendarcan also be used to help students collaborate while working in groups, giving them a place to set up meetings and keep track of the different parts of a project. Also, teachers can schedule officehours,to let students know about the best times to stop by for extra help.
Think of Google Calendar as a digitalupgrade to atraditional notebook-style planner. But as these calendarsare collaborative, groups of users cankeep each other up to date andorganized. While studentswon't needa Gmail accounthere,having one willhelpmake it much easier for them toadd events. Upon opening Calendar, users cansee events listed on a basic calendar page. Display options includedaily, weekly, monthly, or 4-day.An agenda option also gives users the option to see scheduled events listed by date, rather than on a calendar format.
Teachers using Calendarscancreate new events withoptions toselect separate colors for each.Google's Calendar Labs also offersother tools to help users enhance theircalendars, including a variety ofbackground images, the ability to attach documents to an event, icons to help label events, and reformatting options to help make calendarseasier to read.
With Google Calendars, teachers can give students a tool to help keep them organized. Teachers may find students become better learners because they can spend less time trying to remember what they need to do. Features such as the daily schedule can also help students develop their time-management skills. As students schedule their days using the calendar, they can learn where they have pockets of time that could be used for extra studying, or even to havebreaks and bits of fun to break up their work.
The calendar also promotes learning by helping teachers become more organized in a sharable way. Not only can teachers keep students up to date about assignments and activities, but calendarscould help them in the planning process. Calendars could make it easy to track and adjust the scope and sequence of a unit,enabling teachers to plan ahead but also shift along with the needs of their students.
