¶ Google Docs, an appreciation
I just finished printing up a stack of happy little quizzes for my class that begins half an hour from now. I have become a big convert to easy quizzes as a way to ensure that my students a) come to class and b) do the reading. They know they’re easy quizzes, but only if you’ve done the reading,1 so they do the reading and, hence, can participate in class. I like them participating.
I used to write the quizzes on my own computer, because it is a gazillion times faster than the hand-me-down thing they’ve put in my office.2 I would write quickly (usually in iWork’s Pages or Mellel) and then export to MS Word format. Then I’d have to copy that file onto a little USB drive and carry it over to the slow-poke machine for printing.3
On a whim, I tried copy-and-paste the document into Google docs. You know what? It was just as easy as Word in which to type my quiz. I’m not saying it was amazing, but it was just as easy.
And then I hopped onto Slow-Poke (I’ve just decided that’s its name: you know, that slow computer. That’s Slow-Poke), eventually pulled up Firefox (faster than starting up Word) and edited and printed from there. Voila. And when I made a change (sometimes happens), I didn’t have to fineagle copying the now changed file back onto my computer. The whole thing was done, as they say in Googleopolis, “on the cloud.”4 And now I have a handy version of the quiz available for future reference regardless of my hard-drive shuffling (that’s a story for another time, friends).
In short, it’s my new go-to method for virtually all classroom related documents: I create on my computer in Google Docs and then print from Slow-Poke from Google Docs. I’ve got this term’s quizzes, syllabus, oral report calendar, final paper assignment sheet, midterm study guide, and more. Handy.
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Footnotes:
1 Sample question: “Why doesn’t Macbeth fear Macduff?” It is supposed to be easy if you’ve read the play (or, heck, watched an adaptation of it in a film or opera or puppet show).
2 I’m pretty sure it was a hand-me-down from an undergrad lab in the engineering or science departments. I can see their thinking, “This thing is too old to be useful; let’s give it to a literature grad student!”
3 University security has made it possible for only machines physically connected to the network to print. There’s only one ethernet jack in my office and it’s connected to Slow-Poke and jammed against the wall. Since I connect via wireless, I can’t print from my machine, alas.
4 On the cloud? In the cloud? Near upon the cloud? It’s a dopey metaphor and the preposition is annoying but not sufficiently annoying to look up.
9 July 2008