Doctopus: Making Google Doc Management a Breeze

Google Docs are a great way to share work with students, and for students to work on group projects. But sometimes managing docs can be a real pain.  Doctopus is an amazing tool created by Andrew Stillman (a former teacher) using Google Apps Scripts.

Using a spreadsheet that contains a class roster teachers can easily distribute and manage shared google documents. Google docs/sheets/presentations that the teacher creates are copied and shared with the correct students with easy.  If you have already created contact groups for your classes here is an easy way to create the spreadsheet, thanks to one of the great teachers at my school for this tip!

1) export each group as a csv file

2) open the csv file (defaults to Excel)

3) re-save as an Excel sheet (important step)

4) import and convert the excel sheet in Google docs

The scrip even allows for recording grades, and comments that can be emailed to students with one click. If that weren't great enough, Doctopus now allows you to use Rubrics for grading (Goobrics)!

The following video provides a great walkthrough of how to use Doctopus in the classroom.  Below is a video on how to use the new addition to Docotopus, Goobric.





Goobric tutorial