Grading Google Classroom assignments

I’m using Google Classroom and was just wondering if anyone else has experienced this - I have the students work in groups (such as this lesson) and have one student be the “scribe” and turn in one doc for the group with everyone’s name on it. When it comes time to grade, I have 8 docs “turned in” and 20 docs “not turned in”, since only one out of 4 students turned it in. Now I have to open up every doc and read the names to give credit, and it takes forever. Is there an easier way to grade group assignments like this? Should I every student submit their own doc?

@agrant

I have used or heard of a number of best practices on how to use Google classroom with group assignments. With all the upgrades to Classroom, I am curious how others deal with this situation.

Disclaimer: According to the grading policy, I was not allowed to give grades based solely on group work. So, I would share the document with only the scribes using Google Docs or an ungraded assignment for just them. Each scribe was then responsible for sharing the document with their team and completing a table at the top with the names of every team member. The assignment in Classroom would be to respond to some reflection question AND provide a link to the shared document for their team. Every student had personal responsibility to complete the assignment. The reflection was usually a question or two on how they contributed to the group process and/or an formative assessment of the learning objective(s). I would check the shared document once for a team and then grade each team member’s reflection. Sometimes when pressed for time, the question was just - who was your scribe? - with a multiple choices.

Hope that helps,
Andrea

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@agrant I did a similar assignment. But I noted down the scribes and opened only the docs they had submitted for the assignment. Ignored the others.

I have had all students mark the assignment as complete–the scribe turns in the document, the others don’t attach anything but comment either with a link to the doc or with the name of their scribe.

(This was last year, so I assume the can still “turn in” without a file, but I haven’t actually tested it yet).

I have the groups share the doc among themselves and only the scribe turn in the doc. I just have to click on share to see who was in the group. I still need to enter the grades for the students who the assignment was not turned in for.

For all of the conveniences of Google Classroom, I have also been frustrated by its rigidity. I have settled on just having students email me their assignments. In the case of partner or group work, one document with all group members’ names on it may be sent to me. I will score the assignment and reply to all group members to give them the score. I then file that email in a folder (aka label) called “assignments received”. That takes it out of my inbox, but makes it easily accessible for reference.