Private Comments in Google Classroom

One of my most favorite ways to give feedback to students is using the Private Comments feature in Google Classroom. Much of my love for them has come from what I've learned from Alice Keeler, both on her blog and from her session at our Tech Kickoff this past August. I like this so much because it allows for personal, instant, and constant feedback to students on an individual level from anywhere, anytime. I know many teachers in my district don't like the fact that they are getting notifications from students at all times of the day, but I think it's great to see that my students are interested in their work for me when they have the time to do it. Plus, it gives me a great way to talk to students about time management, commitments, and prioritizing the things in your life (even if it ends up that my class works isn't the priority, it still opens up that window!).

One quick note: I've found that many people don't see the difference between the Private Comments and Class Comments. Be sure to guide your students to the correct spot so that your conversations stay where you intend them to stay.

Here are just a couple of ways that I love to use Private Comments with students:

Private Comments as an Assignment

If you have a quick check, a short assignment (1-2 sentences), or even an exit ticket, Private Comments is the perfect vehicle. As the teacher, you have quick access to your students' responses and can reply back to each student quickly and easily.

In addition, check out this tip from Alice on how to format your responses so that you know if you need to respond to a student or if you are waiting on a response from a student.

Private Comments for Alerts

One of the other really cool things about Private Comments is that Google Classroom automatically sends a notification email when a student and/or teacher submits a private comment. By leveraging the power of these notifications, a teacher knows when certain things happen with their students in Google Classroom.

Since January of this year (2017) late work and re-submissions of work in Classroom generate notifications automatically, which were things that I used to use Private Comments for before. However, I'm one of those people who feel that the "Turn In" option in Classroom is not entirely useful because it means students lose access to their work. I want my students to always access their work and be thinking about how they can improve it (even if it's after that arbitrary time that I set for them to stop thinking).

You can set up filters for messages/notification from Classroom, check out this other post from Alice on how to do this. This will make it so that these emails can skip the inbox, be automatically labelled, and/or moved to the archive.

My favorite part about Google Classroom is that it can make the feedback cycle in students' work much more efficient and useful than traditional methods. My ultimate goal is that students get the information and help that they need, when they need it, so they can monitor and adjust AS they are learning, not when they are done.