After Josh and I had created our plan we started to put it into action. We had already created our Google Classroom and started to work out the aesthetics of it.  We decided on a bold and colourful ‘Phonics’ for the header, and purple for the background. Secondly, we created a structure for the classroom. We organised the activities for both homework and lessons by separating them into weeks. The ‘Topic’ function allowed us to create folders for each of the weeks, therefore the children won’t need to scroll through the entire terms worth of work to find something, they are able to simply click to the side. The  ‘Parent’s area’ is also included in this list so that they are able to access all of the information that they needed based on Phonics, but it also meant that we could keep the information for them and the activities separate. The ‘Parent’s area’ includes a guide to Phonics and how they are able to enhance the children’s phonics education. We’ve included useful links to websites that they may want to look at, and also to the scheme of Letters and Sounds.

Another important function of Google Classroom is being able to differentiate the type of task, the homework is able to have a due date set, so that all of the children know when they need to have the task finished by. There are also reminders which can be set when some of the children haven’t finished the activity. The teacher is able to view the class list and see the work that all of the children have uploaded, and therefore this makes it very easy to see which children haven’t done the set work. The teacher is also able to mark the work online, which therefore saves the time of looking for homework books or trying to find sheets that haven’t been stuck in. The classroom is useful to have to manage the homework the children are set weekly, through advanced planning, but also allows them to see what they have upcoming in the next few weeks. Announcements can be made for the lessons since there is no due date to be set for them, and they enable the children to comment on the thread. This is an important feature that we wanted to include because the children should be able to share their thoughts and experiences on what they are going to do in the lesson. It also provides them a chance to prepare or practice the sounds before the actual lesson, ask questions if they are unsure or need clarification about something before the lesson happens. However, it also gives the children a chance to share what they have been doing at home, with their parents, based on that lesson. The chance to share their experiences engages the children more with their learning and encourages them to learn through social constructivism.

We wanted to include a range of media when creating the classroom too, and therefore took advantage of being able to attach videos and documents from Google Docs into the activities. We found a range of sources on the internet that we could use, for example Youtube and Vimeo. These videos also help to show the children that there are a lot of things out there that could help them.

We visited Rutherford House School to discuss our Google Classroom with the teachers there. We sat with their English/ Literacy coordinator, and explained all of the tasks, the functions and features of the classroom. She seemed interested in being able to set the due date and being able to mark the tasks online, especially as this would help to cut down her paperwork and provide an efficient record of homework for her class. She also liked being able to use Google Docs to create worksheets and provide the children with the chance to create something together, for example this could be adding something to a story. The school also takes a social constructivist approach to learning, and this was something she was really willing to try and develop for her class. The teacher emphasised that the element of being able to keep the parents involved with the children’s progress was important too. She was struggling to keep in contact with some of the parents, and Google Classroom proves the perfect medium for this, as it is all online and is very easy to access. Although, she said  that we could add more colour, images  and videos to the activities to make sure the children stay engaged with the task. She placed emphasis that the children would be able to understand the images  and videos more than the words. Another improvement that she suggested was adding in more information for the parents, for example how children can use their Phonics to help them pronounce words whilst the parents are reading a story to them or some games that they could play on the way to or from school. This helps to imbed the Phonics into both their home and school life, which will help their development.

The next steps to take are to make the suggested changed from our teacher at Rutherford House School and improve our Google Classroom to ensure that it is the most accessible and user friendly as it can be.