GAIN spreadsheets

The google spreadsheets are again fairly similar to excel with the main difference being the ability to have multiple people working the project at the same time. Also the fact that it is online, and so can be accessed from most anywhere. One feature that I saw that the google spreadsheet had, but excel did not was the paint feature, which basically allows you to more easily copy and paste the content of a certain cell, including formulas. Google spreadsheets also allows you to format the input numbers as percents or dollars with just the click of a button. Because it is online, google spreadsheets also allows users to insert various gadgets to the document that will use the data given to produce a chart.


I looked at a couple of different lessons that incorporated google spreadsheets. Both lesson plans that I looked at where science lesson plans. in one, the students were asked to conduct a survey and then use the google spreadsheets and input their data into it. The students would then use the data they had input into the spread sheet to create a chart. By doing this the students could see, in both number and char form, the data they had collected and see what the over all outcome. The example the teacher used was a survey on coke vs. Pepsi vs. diet Pepsi. One the data was put into the spreadsheet and the chart was made, it was easy to see that students in the school preferred the taste of Pepsi, but the look and health of diet Pepsi.


The other lesson plan I looked at focused on collaborative lab assignments. Each member of the team did their part of the lab experiment in a different place to see if that affected the experiment they did. The students were required to count the number of bubbles produces in a 4 minuet period. The students then input their number the counted into a google spreadsheet. Google spreadsheets allowed for each team member to input their data on the same spreadsheet while at their various locations. Then, with the data the students input into the spreadsheet they then created graphs to show with locations produced more bubbles, and which produced less.


Google spreadsheets would be a very useful teaching tool, especially in science classes, as you can have students preforming various experiments simultaneously, but they can still input their information into the same spreadsheet. If i teach science in the future I can envision using one or both of these lesson plans. i especially liked the one with the collaborative lab assignments.