Google Forms Tutorial For Teachers

Let’s dig into what a Google Form is and how you can use Google Forms in your classroom.

This Google Forms tutorial will guide you through the process.

Forms are a quick way to create an online survey. The responses are then collected in an online spreadsheet (Google Sheets). Teachers can use Forms in a variety of ways, such as assessing student knowledge, giving quick quizzes, creating exit tickets, and even receiving feedback from students and parents!

Ready to get started and create your own Google Form?

Accessing Google Forms

How to Access a Google Form

Let’s start with the basics like, “How do I access a Google Form?” First, you have to create a Google account HERE. Techy tip: Downloading the Chrome web browser would be great, since there are tons of extensions and features that work hand-in-hand with Google Drive.

Navigating Google Drive

Once you log on, you’ll see the Drive home page that looks like the image below. It will allow you to pick from a variety of options, like creating a new Google Form, accessing your files stored in your Drive, or even viewing files that have been shared with you!

Creating a New Google Form

Click on “NEW” and then “More” to create a Google Form!

Customizing Your Google Form

Creating a Title for Your Google Forms Tutorial

Now you’ve started a Google Form! Let’s customize it by creating a title for it.

Adding Questions

The next step is to figure out what kind of questions you want to use on it. Are you looking to create a quick exit ticket for your kids? Or are you wanting to create a mini-assessment to see how well your students learned a new concept? Let’s start with creating a Form for a sample exit ticket.

Sample Exit Ticket: Elapsed Time

Let’s say you taught a lesson on elapsed time and wanted to see if your students really understood the concept. First, you’ll have to type in your question in the “Question Title” box. Then, you have to pick what type of question type you’d like to create (i.e., multiple choice, open-ended answer). I picked an open-ended response.

Setting Confirmation Options

Once you’ve created a question on your Form and have picked an answer type, you need to choose what confirmation your students will see when they complete it. Be sure to click the “Required question” option so that an answer must be typed in before students submit their responses.

Making Last-Minute Changes

Before you send out your Form, you can also make last-minute changes. You can go back and edit your questions, change the theme, and much more.

Choosing a Theme

When you pick a theme, it’ll give you a preview of what your Form will look like. I picked a sample theme below!

Sharing Your Google Form

Sharing Options in Your Google Forms Tutorial

Now you’re ready to share the form with your students. You can share the link or share via email. Unfortunately, there are no “share” buttons on Forms…you have to send a link or an email. By clicking “Shorten Url,” you’ll make the link address shorter and more manageable for kids.

Student View

This is what your students will see when they click on your live link.

Viewing Responses

Accessing Responses in Google Forms Tutorial

TA-DA! You’ve created a working (or live) Google Form! The next step would be viewing all the student responses. Simply click on “View Responses” to see them on a Google Sheet. It will generate one for you automatically and save it to your Drive! #GENIUS

Analyzing Responses

This is what will pop up on your screen after clicking the “View Responses” tab. It will show all your students’ answers and let you see who understood the concept, or who still is struggling and will need extra support/reteaching.

Conclusion

And that’s it, my friends! You can play around with Forms to create more Forms for various classroom uses. I like to send out questionnaires at Back to School Night for parents to share their emails/phone numbers/etc. and make it easy for me to have them all in one place without having to transfer their data from a paper sign-up sheet. I’m trying really hard to have a paperless classroom. 🙂 You can also use Google Forms to give quizzes and have all their data in one spreadsheet for easy grading. The classroom uses are endless! I’ll be back soon with another Google Forms tutorial on how I use Google Sheets to create rubrics AND grade writing assignments.

Additional Resources

If you are new to my Google tutorials or want to learn all about Google Drive or Google Classroom, just click on the images below to read those posts.

I hope this Google Forms tutorial will help you utilize Forms in your classroom and help drive your instruction.

Our Guest Expert

Hi! My name is Aris Rossi, and I’m the teacher blogger behind Sailing into Second! Today, I’ll be sharing a tutorial on Google Forms! If you’re still learning how to use Google Drive and all it’s Googley goodness, then check out this getting started post HERE.