7 Things You Need to Know about Google
Calendar
At a Glance:
A white paper from Teaching and Learning with Technology at
Penn State
• Easy to create and share with others
• Includes task features to create and share
to-do lists
• Create, publicize, and manage event
invitations
• Various levels of permissions for different
users
Who to Contact:
Education Technology Services Allan Gyorke:
e-mail: [email protected]
1. What Is It?
Google Calendar is a web-based time and task-management web application that allows
for access to calendars via web browsers to computers & mobile devices. Calendars can be
created and shared easily with others. Meeting reminders can be customized and send via
email, text message, or pop-up messages within a web browser. Users are allowed to create
as many calendars as they choose, and each calendar’s privacy settings are set individually.
So, for example, a calendar listing household chores may be set to “private,” but one that
contains a list of classes or a work schedule might be shared with others. In addition to
calendar functionality, Google Calendar also includes task features that allow users to create
“to-do” lists that can then be shared. Finally, Google Calendar’s event tools allow users to
create, publicize and manage event invitations. Items can be listed on a public calendar as a
way to promote an event. For non-public events, Calendar allows for RSVP management as
well as the option to allow guest to edit the event details.
The Scenario:
2. Who’s Doing It?
Sarah is teaching an entrepreneurial leadership
course, and the mid-term exam is this Thursday.
At the same time, Sarah has agreed to serve
as a guest judge for a student product design
competition sometime this week. Finally, the
research group that Sarah is a part of has a
deadline for a grant submission, and she has to
have her section completed and sent to her
co-authors by the end of the week. It’s a busy
time of the semester.
In addition to individuals using Google Calendar for their personal time management,
many organizations use Google Calendar to manage time, coordinate projects, and share
events with others. In higher education, academic departments, student clubs, and study
groups can create and share Google Calendars. For example, the Information School at the
University of Washington uses a public Google Calendar to share college events with their
students and the university community. Because Calendar tools are online and authorship
of individual calendars can be shared with others, events can be added, edited or removed
by multiple people. At the same time, access can also be limited for internal uses. Individual
faculty members can use Calendar to publicize office hours and assignment due dates.
Departments and labs can utilize Calendar’s scheduling tools to manage room and
equipment as well as meetings.
Sarah’s students are feeling nervous, so she
decides to add some extra office hours this
week. She opens Google Calendar on her
laptop’s browser and adds two additional office
hour sessions to her course calendar. Now all of
her students will be able to see the new
information on the calendar, which she’s
embedded in her course ANGEL section. While
she’s adding the new events, Sarah notices that
there’s a new meeting for her research group
that’s been placed on their shared calendar. She
notes the time, but decides to have a reminder
notification emailed to her an hour before the
meeting just in case she gets lost in her work.
Later that day, Sarah receives an event
invitation to the student design competition;
the date and time has been finalized, and the
other judges have already RSVP’d. Sarah accepts
the invitation, and with a click the event is
added to her calendar. She decides to have a
reminder sent for the design competition as
well.
3. How Does It Work?
Google Calendar allows users to view and add events from a Web browser or mobile device.
Calendars are stored online, and can be accessed at any time from any location with Internet
access. Using the “quick add” feature, events can be added to a calendar by simply clicking
on a day and typing a name and time into the text box. Something as short as “department
meeting 1pm” will add the event to the calendar. Users can drag-and-drop events from one
date to another, create reoccurring meetings, and add edit meeting details. Shared
calendaring allows for various levels of permission by individual user; sharing a calendar
with another person generates an e-mail invitation for that person to join.
All calendars can be seen in the same view; in other words, a user could have their personal
calendar, study group, and soccer team calendars all showing simultaneously in one place.
Within the calendar, users can customize views, create “to do” tasks assigned to specific
dates and manage event invitations and RSVPs. In addition, Google Calendar allows for the
setting of two time-zones. All meetings can be seen simultaneously in both zones, making it
easier to plan and coordinate meetings with collaborators from a distance.
Google Calendar allows for imports of Microsoft Outlook (.csv) and iCal (.ics) files, so users of
these tools can move their scheduling information over without needing to recreate their
calendars manually. Google Calendar can be synchronized with PC applications (e.g.,
Microsoft Outlook) via third-party software, and natively with Apple’s iCal. Mobile devices
(e.g., BlackBerry, Palm, iPhone, Pocket PC) can be synched, and Calendar is natively
Later in the week, Sarah is in office hours
helping students prepare for the mid-term
exam. Based on the questions she’s hearing
from students, Sarah decides to put together a
review sheet covering the differences between
patents and trade secrets. She saves this sheet
as a Google Document and posts it in her
ANGEL course. Sarah also decides to attach the
Google Doc to the course calendar Thursday,
so that any student viewing the schedule will
see it. She notices a reminder email about her
judging commitment and packs up for the walk
across campus. On the way to the event, Sarah
realizes that she doesn’t know the exact room
number she’s supposed to go to. She quickly
checks her calendar on her mobile phone for
the information and heads into the building.
supported on Android mobile devices. Users can also create calendar events or check
calendars via SMS from cell phones.
Google Calendar is integrated with the Google Apps suite, allowing for features such as
“one-click” creation of meetings from GMail, and the attachment of Google Docs files to
calendar items. GMail, Google’s e-mail service, identifies trigger words in incoming
messages (such as “meeting”, or dates/times) and provides users with an “add to calendar”
button displayed alongside the e-mail that allows for one-click event creation. Calendars
can also be embedded into Google Sites for managing schedules for courses or group
projects.
4. Why Is It Significant?
Schedule management is an important part of the lives of both faculty and students.
For faculty balancing teaching, research responsibilities, and departmental service
requirements, a well-kept calendar can be essential to success. The added ability to
selectively share schedule information can allow faculty members to better organize
their professional and personal lives. Course information can be shared with students,
while access to calendars for research meetings can be limited to only select colleagues.
For students, Google Calendar offers a tool for organizing their busy lives. Scheduling
academic, social, and work commitments through personal calendars can help them
manage. Shared calendars for study groups, student organizations, or class projects can
facilitate and invite friends to events.
For both faculty and students, the ability to access calendar information on the go is
critical. Synchronizing schedules with mobile devices allows users to not only access their
calendar information from anywhere, but also add new meetings or events and invite
others while away from their offices, dorm rooms or computer labs.
5. What Are the Implications for Teaching and Learning?
Related Sites:
Google Apps Customer Case Studies
http://www.google.com/a/help/intl/en/edu/
customers.html
Google Apps Quick Start
http://www.google.com/support/a/bin/
answer.py?answer=67775
Google Calendar Research Team
Gary Chinn
Robin Smail
The implications of Google Calendar for teaching and learning have to do with the level
of coordination it affords. Faculty can provide current information on meeting times,
deadlines and office hours with students, as well as post Word or PowerPoint files to their
calendars. These features can ease the management of students by providing timely
information and reminders. Dissemination of readings or homework can be
accomplished via the attached files.
For learners, Google Calendar offers a way to view up to date class information. In
addition, Calendar can be used within student collaborative teams to help coordinate
schedules. For example, all the members of an assigned team could share their class and
work calendars with one another, making it easier to identify an ideal time to meet at the
library. Shared calendars would also help ensure that upcoming deadlines are known
about. When used in conjunction with the task feature, small groups could create project
to-do lists to help manage multiple aspects of an assignment.
6. What Are the Downsides?
Requiring Internet access to a calendar can be problematic. Because Google Calendar
is hosted, the information would not be available on a computer without the ability to
access online tools. Sharing the management of calendars is another potential downside;
while collaboratively managing a schedule can help circumvent a bottleneck in posting
events, there is the potential for a loss of control over what can be posted, edited and
deleted.
Because of the ability to publish calendars publicly, care should be taken to ensure that
users have set the privacy settings to match their expectations. The option for making a
calendar public is one button, so vigilance is essential to ensure privacy.
7. Where Is It Going?
This document is released under the Creative
Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share
Alike 3.0 United States Licence
© 2010 The Pennsylvania State University
Features in development for Calendar include a “year view” to see an entire year schedule
at once; the ability to customize the background of calendars; a “smart rescheduler” that
will scan the calendars of invited participants and try to locate an ideal date and time for
meeting; and a “world clock” feature that allows users to see events in any timezone.
This publication is available in alternative media on request.
Penn State is committed to affirmative action, equal opportunity, and the
diversity of its workforce.
U.Ed. ITS09-7043