Posted by Jack Fermon, Technical Program Manager, Google for Education

(Cross-posted on the Google for Work Blog.)

Educators across Latin America are changing what it means to “go to school” by introducing new learning models that prepare their students for real-world problems. Inspired by their ambitious goals and innovative approaches, we’re highlighting a few ways that schools in the region have made strides with the support of technology, including Google Apps for Education.

Building the groundwork for equal access
The Municipality of Vicente Lopez (MVL) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, created a program to give all students the same access to technology, regardless of socioeconomic background. All students and teachers use Google Drive to share worksheets and presentations, provide immediate feedback on shared documents, and work in teams while in class or at home. Teachers now learn from students, who have become experts in technology and taken ownership of their education.

Going digital without an IT staff
Colegio Banting in Mexico City has equipped its students with the best tools for success, even without resources to spend on staffing for IT. By introducing Google Apps for Education, they’ve interested students in educational technology, helped boost test scores, and improved communication between teachers, administrators, students and their families. Google Classroom makes it easier to assign homework, helping teachers and parents keep track of student work and progress.

Connecting face-to-face across many miles
Argentina’s San Andres University (UDESA) adopted Google Apps to encourage flexible learning through virtual classrooms while replacing their unstable email solution with Gmail. While Gmail was the initial reason for the switch, UDESA uses the full range of tools in the Apps suite to bring learning outside the classroom. Students use Hangouts to present their thesis projects remotely, and teachers invite outside experts, no matter where they’re located, to present about different topics.

Involving parents and teachers
In 2007, The American School Foundation (ASF) became the first school in Mexico to use Google Apps for Education, moving its 3,000 students to Apps while introducing weekly “technology office hours” for parents and teachers. As an early believer in the power of cloud-based technology, ASF wanted to equip its students with tools that would prepare them for the future. Beyond simplifying day-to-day processes and administrative workflows, ASF has created a supportive environment for all members of its community.

As schools across Latin America continue to develop and integrate technology into their curricula, they’re exploring ways to build learning spaces for curious minds both in the classroom and beyond. We look forward to seeing what the future holds for schools in the region.

Posted by Pepita Gunawan, Google for Education Indonesia Lead

From downtown Manila to the remote reaches of West Java, technology is transforming education in South East Asia. A summit in Manila last week brought together over 400 principals, teachers and students who are using technology to enrich education in the Philippines. Meanwhile at the Jakarta Google for Education Summit, we learned how educators across the archipelago are creatively applying technology to engage students and run their institutions more efficiently.

A glimpse at the Google for Education Summit in Indonesia 

In Indonesia, dentistry students in Bandung no longer have to miss out on learning from the best teachers. Since implementing Google Apps for Education they now take lessons with the top lecturers over Hangouts and get feedback on their work in real time with Google Docs. They have also been able to work with students at other campuses in real time—drawing dentistry models using Google Draw and sharing them with Google Drive.

We heard from veteran math teacher, Tauhid S.P, who makes math more appealing to public school students in East Jakarta by bringing his teaching methods online. Instead of running traditional exams, Tauhid uses Google Forms to create digital quizzes, making tests a bit more fun for his students.

Technology is also helping these Indonesian institutions run more efficiently at an organizational level. Since moving to Google Apps, teachers at the Singapore International School have been better equipped to engage parents in what their children are learning. Instead of posting parents letters and forms, they can use Google Forms to get instant feedback and data, saving the school reams of paper and countless hours. Moving to Google Apps has also helped the Institut Teknologi Sepuluh Nopember in Surabaya go paperless, not to mention $200,000 annual savings on storage, electricity and manpower costs.

Educators at the Google for Education Summit in Manila

We've been working with schools and universities across the Philippines since 2007, and the Manila Summit was a great opportunity to hear directly from educators and students about some of the impact to date. We heard from The Mindanao State University Iligan Institute of Technology who has saved substantial IT costs since moving to Google Apps. Students at the Xavier School in Manila tell us that doing their homework is more enjoyable with Google Apps. After hearing about some of this positive impact technology is making in the classroom, members of the Philippines’ business community pledged to support more schools’ digitization process so that more students can experience the benefits of the web for learning.

We’re humbled to be working with schools, teachers and their broader communities to equip students across Indonesia and The Philippines with the skills they’ll need to thrive in the 21st century. Who knows what they'll come up with next.

Posted by Michael Bolognino, Product Marketing Manager

(Cross-posted on the Google Drive Blog.)

Last month, we partnered with National Novel Writing Month to see what happens when three writers come together, online from three different cities, to create a short story in Google Docs. The three authors—Edan Lepucki, Tope Folarin, and Mike Curato—had one hour to create the story, based on an opening line submitted by Docs user Lauren Lopez in Malaysia.

Watch this short (and pretty entertaining) video to see how it all went down:
You can read the final story at g.co/docsnano, and watch their unedited process and Q&A in the original Hangout on Air.

Posted by Cameron L. Fadjo, Computer Science Custom Search Project Lead

Computer Science (CS) is quickly becoming a key component of student learning. From engaging projects and after school programs to robust online educational programs and extensible programming languages, there are a wide range of online resources and materials that make learning how to code even more accessible. As all these new and exciting online CS programs and tools continue to become available, however, finding and exploring new resources can be challenging. If you are a teacher with limited exposure to, or experience with, CS or programming, we know that this initial search experience can be even more difficult.

To help address this challenge, we created Computer Science (CS) Custom Search, a search engine that has been customized with over 550 different CS websites to connect you to CS education-related resources. Because it can sometimes be difficult to find the right CS instructional material and program, we’ve made it easier for you to find instructional materials using common educational terms, such as ‘worksheets’ and ‘projects,’ as well as with queries on more complex search strings.

To help support users with different levels of experience with CS, there are example search terms to provide you with some context for your initial search. The suggested search queries on the landing page are intended to help less experienced users begin their exploration of CS and more experienced users discover even more CS programs or tools.

Research shows that educators significantly impact how students perceive and experience CS. Current employment trends indicate that there will be a shortage of trained computer scientists ready to fill the projected 1 million CS-related jobs in the U.S. by the year 2020 and so you have the opportunity to play an important role in preparing your students for future career opportunities. We hope that CS Custom Search will help you find the tools and programs you need to bring CS to your own classroom.

Please check out CS Custom Search and let us know how it works for you. Our goals are to continue to increase the number of sites on CS Custom Search in parallel with the ever-expanding list of new resources and to ensure that the search experience continuously reflects the needs of its audience - the education community.

Want to share feedback about your CS Custom Search experience? Send us an email at cs-custom-search@google.com

Posted by Jennifer Wang, Computer Science Education Outreach Program Manager

In an earlier post Working Together to Support Computer Science Education, Chris Stephenson describes how achieving systemic change in computer science (CS) education involves a multitude of factors including collaboration among researchers, educators, parents, policy-makers, students and the media. In addition to our own outreach programs and research, we also support organizations and invest in programs that are making strides to increase access to CS education in schools.

In October, we supported the Alliance for California Computing Education for Students and Schools (ACCESS) by convening some of the nation’s leading researchers and practitioners in CS education. The ACCESS gathering was an energetic and action-packed day for developing pathways for K-12 CS education in California, with a particular focus on equitable access for all. With the recent signing of three bills for CS education in California, this was a major step toward making quality CS available in California K-12 schools. The summary report of the convening can be found here.

These efforts in California, a key state in the national education picture, are critical to the forward momentum for CS education across the United States and globally, and they’re just the beginning. The importance of CS is recognized globally, and we aim to take advantage of these opportunities to increase quality and availability of CS education. In England, where Computing was recently implemented as part of its National Curriculum, we have been working in partnership with Code Club Pro to kick start a national program to train primary school teachers across the country and with Teach First to recruit and train CS teachers in secondary schools.

A big part of our focus on CS education is ensuring that everyone, regardless of background, has appropriate access to quality CS education. Issues of equity in education vary dramatically by location and situation. That’s why our efforts are supported by local Googlers in our offices worldwide, from Japan to Spain to Australia. Our global presence means that we can tailor our outreach locally to cultures and customs, because quality education does not have a one-size-fits-all scenario. Driven by data, we can provide strategic and effective support for CS education, in close collaboration with the local stakeholders. For instance, we empower our RISE partners to evaluate their programs so that they can understand what is effective for their specific organization as well as their students. We hold monthly Hangouts on Air to share the latest CS education research and best practices for these partners to incorporate and adapt for their programs.

At Google, we are working to empower the youth today to be the creators of tomorrow. It’s a long and complex journey, but in partnership with local organizations around the globe, we hope to ensure that everyone has equitable access to CS education.

Posted by Alice Keeler, Google Certified Teacher 

Editor's note: Today’s guest author is Alice Keeler, a Google Certified Teacher, New Media Consortium K12 Ambassador and LEC Admin & Online and Blended certified. Alice taught high school math for 14 years and is an Adjunct Professor of Curriculum, Instruction and Technology at California State University Fresno. Alice coaches teachers and administrators on using technology in the classroom.

In my high school and college classes, I’m one teacher working with up to 150 students. With this kind of ratio, I just can’t give students feedback fast enough; but giving that feedback as immediately as possible helps increase their motivation and accelerate learning opportunities. Peer evaluation allows students to get feedback faster, learn from each other, and helps them better understand the grading rubric by applying it to their classmates.

Google Forms makes peer evaluation possible and simple. I collect the names and email addresses of both students: evaluator and evaluatee. I use the “grid” style question type to allow peers to rank each criteria on a scale of 1-5 against the rubric. I can include a URL to the grading criteria in the help text, so all students have access to the standard assessment guide.

To be successful, students must not only be instructed in—but also practice giving—quality feedback. With Google Forms, it’s easy to add help text that tells students what to review and comment on. Peer evaluators can add details to their feedback—such as what they liked or constructive criticism—using the comment boxes. This increases the quality of their feedback.

Google Forms also connects this peer evaluation data to a Google spreadsheet on the backend. This places all of the peer evaluation data in one location that is nicely organized and easy to analyze. With the summary of responses feature in Google Forms, I can see a quick snapshot view of overall student performance. Using the pivot table feature in the data menu, I’m able to quickly find summary data of how students evaluated their peers. I can also create a separate pivot table to tally how many of each rank a peer evaluator provided. This helps determine how fairly the peer evaluator is assessing his or her peers.

To make it even easier to sort and organize data, I format my questions consistently with “multiple choice,” “choose from a list,” “checkboxes,” “scale,” or “grid” styles. To streamline name and email collection, I use the pre-filled URL option, like this.

Rather than creating a unique URL for each student, I have students list their names and emails in a Google Sheet and use a formula to pre-populate their information into the peer evaluation form. And when working on group projects, multiple student names can be pre-populated into the peer evaluation form, too.

Providing students feedback from their peers quickly is essential. After checking the spreadsheet comments to make they are appropriate and helpful, I email them out. Google Sheets Add-Ons provide the ability to use mail merge to send students the peer feedback. Using the Add-On “Yet Another Mail Merge” returns feedback to the students via email in one action.

Google Forms makes the challenging task of managing peer feedback simple and fast. Since peer feedback can be delivered in minutes, I save class time and eliminate handing out and collecting paper forms. Thirty students in a class can generate up to 900 peer evaluations. This data can be analyzed quickly and easily, without manually tallying results. Feedback can be returned to students within a day rather than weeks later. With this process, students can receive feedback quickly, which helps increase their attention and motivation in class.

Posted by Bayo Olotu, Program Manager, Google for Education

(Cross-posted on the Google Africa Blog.)

From preschool through university and beyond, schools across Africa are using technology to enhance learning on campus and online. Here are three examples of schools in Nigeria, South Africa and Kenya that have made incredible strides with Google for Education.

The Distance Learning Centre (DLC) of Nigeria’s University of Ibadan was established in 1988 with the aim of providing Off-campus learning options to students whose schedules and locations make it hard for them to study full-time at the main campus.

Today, the DLC uses Google Apps for Education to run a number of its admissions and study systems for over 30,000 teachers and students from different locations. For example, student registrations, course material distributions and assignment submissions processes are easily managed via Gmail, Drive, Docs and Sites. Lectures and other important university events are live-streamed via Google Hangouts.

The Center recently adopted Google Classroom with very positive impact on assignment management and interaction.
SPARK Schools, an independent school network in Johannesburg, South Africa, implemented a blended learning model using Google Apps and Chromebooks. This model provides students with self-paced learning, allows teachers to create personalized instruction based on assessment data, and also enables SPARK schools to operate at a much lower cost per pupil.

With the plan to open two new schools next year and continue doubling the number of students it reaches each year, SPARK foresees that Google Apps, including Drive, Docs and Hangouts, will enable staff to participate in discussions and collaborate on joint projects across multiple locations.

Kabarak University, located just outside Nakuru, Kenya, uses Google Apps to help students make their voices heard. Students now use Google Forms to share their comments with administrators about all aspects of university life.

The university also created a Google Site to centralize information like term dates, campus news and sporting events. Some lecturers have created their own Sites to store class resources and lessons. “From community outreach to advanced plans to launch online degrees and e-learning, we’re creating a new online learning culture” says ICT Director Moses Thiga.

Many schools like these are eliminating the barriers to quality education using Google Apps for Education and Chromebooks. In fact, new Chromebooks from Acer are now available in South Africa.

If you’re interested in discovering other schools around the world that have gone Google and learning more about bringing Chromebooks to your school, visit our site.