Keep your classrooms open with remote learning platforms
The Department for Education has announced funding to support schools, so that If you don't have a digital education platform or you’re already using Microsoft Office 365 or Google G Suite but are unable to assign work and communicate with pupils, you could receive up to £2,000 to help you to get set up.
Why use a digital education platform?
A digital education platform makes your pupils’ home learning experience as similar to their classroom learning experience as possible. In these challenging times, it’s as close to being in school as we can get.
The platforms are simple to use and allow teachers to communicate and work with pupils and each other. You can enjoy all of these benefits for free with the DfE’s funding.
We have run through a series of teacher tasks and compared the features of the Microsoft and Google platforms to help you to make an informed decision. Alternatively, contact us for personalised advice.
Task |
|
Microsoft |
| Assigning and receiving work |
Google Classroom: Provides a central hub for learning that can be accessed via desktop, tablet or mobile device. You can set tasks with attached resources for the whole class, groups or individuals. Pupils can complete them using Google Docs and Sheets. |
Microsoft Teams: Provides a central hub for learning that can be accessed via desktop, tablet or mobile device. You can set tasks with attached resources for the whole class, groups or individuals. Pupils can complete them using Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Class notebook. |
| Communicating with staff | Google Meet: Video-call up to 250* staff members at once in your web browser or on the Google Meet app, where you can give presentations remotely by sharing your screen. Google Chat: Send private messages to staff members in your web browser or on the mobile app. You can also have group conversations with multiple staff members. Google Classroom: Create a class and invite your teachers to it to make a virtual staff room. |
Teams Meetings: Set up video and voice-only calls with up to 250 staff members in your web browser or on the Teams app. Share your screen to give presentations, and work on shared documents together. Teams Chat: Send private messages to staff members in individual or group chats, and enable group conversations by creating separate teams. |
| Communicating with pupils |
Google Classroom: Make announcements to a class, groups of pupils, or the whole school and give pupils feedback on completed tasks. |
Class Teams: Make announcements to a class, group of pupils, or the whole school and give pupils feedback on completed tasks. Teams Chat and Online Meetings: Have video or voice calls with pupils |
| Communicating with parents | Google Classroom: Automatically email newsletters to parents. | Teams: Automatically email newsletters to parents. Schedule parent-teacher conferences. |
| Enable collaboration between pupils | Google Classroom: Assign a task to a group of pupils and create a shared Google Doc for them. Google Meet: Pupils can discuss their project on a video or voice call, supervised by staff. Jamboard: Teachers and pupils can work together on an interactive whiteboard and share their ideas. |
Class Teams: Create a private channel for a group of pupils so they can work on a project together. Teams Chat: Pupils can discuss their project on a video or voice call. Class Notebook: Each pupil can use a content library maintained by a teacher, a collaboration space for group work, and an individual area. Teams Whiteboard: Teachers and pupils can work together on an interactive whiteboard and share their ideas. |
| Teaching remotely | Google Meet: Live stream* a lesson to pupils, and save a recording so they can watch it later. Google Classroom: Upload videos you've recorded to Google Drive or YouTube. When you set tasks, you can attach them for pupils to watch alongside any written instructions. |
Teams Meetings and Live Events: Live stream** a lesson to pupils, and record it so they can watch it later, with a transcript for full accessibility. Microsoft Stream: Pre-record lessons and upload them. Link them to assignments and other resources. |
| Test and mark pupils' learning | Google Classroom: Set quizzes, mark them, and make template marking schemes to speed up marking. Google Forms: Test pupils' learning with quizzes and surveys. Class Teams: Set quizzes and mark them. |
Microsoft Forms: Test pupils' learning with quizzes and surveys. |
| Storing resources for pupils and staff | Google Drive: Unlimited cloud storage space for worksheets, videos and any other resources you need. Link them to assignments in Classroom | Microsoft Teams and Sharepoint Online: Upload teaching resources to a team's dedicated storage space. OneDrive: Unlimited cloud storage space for worksheets, videos, and any other resources you need. |
| Safeguarding pupils | G Suite for Education: Disable specific features for pupils. You can break this down by year group (for example, Year 6 pupils can use Gmail but Year 4 pupils cannot). Google Meet: Record all calls* (group and individual) to create an audit trail in case of safeguarding concerns. Set up calls so that pupils can't re-join once they’ve ended and people can only join if a teacher has invited them. Google Chat: Log messages. |
Office 365 Education: Disable specific features for pupils. You can break this down by year group. Teams Meeting: Record all group calls to create an audit trail in case of safeguarding concerns**. Teams Chat: Adjust settings so that pupils can't chat to each other individually. Administrators can view all chat messages. |
| Complying with subject access requests | Google Vault and Google Drive: Audit log, search for and export data on a staff member or pupil. | Microsoft eDiscovery: Content search, search for and export data on a staff member or pupil. |
* Live streaming, recording calls and the 250-participant limit in Google Meet are free until 30 September 2020. You'll need to upgrade to G Suite Enterprise for Education to continue using these features afterwards (note: usual participant limit is 100 with G Suite for Education).
**Live streaming, recording calls and the 250-participant meeting limit in Microsoft Teams will continue to be free after schools reopen.
How to receive support
Once you’ve decided which educational platform to use, simply complete the appropriate form below.
So that we can help you to set your platform up, select Entrust Learning Technologies as your preferred supplier on the Google form or Capita Education Software as your preferred supplier on the Microsoft form.
Why Capita?
With more than 35 years’ experience of supporting more than 21,000 schools, we’re well placed to understand your challenges.
Our education experts, many of whom have been senior leaders in schools, can guide you on how to use Google or Microsoft to provide the best possible outcomes for your pupils at this challenging time.
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