Google Docs for students

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Why Google Docs is increasingly popular among student and teacher communities? Ever wondered why would students love to use such a powerful tool and how easily they learn to use it? For almost any age group, right from primary schools to college students, Google Docs is widely used by students and teachers extensively.

Google Docs For Students

Sharing assignments, coursework, materials, presentations, project reports, and many more are common activities in student or teacher routines. Most choose to get those done with Google Docs, and Google Docs for students is increasingly popular. Know why? Because it can be done easily and completely free. 

Almost all institutes ran mostly under Microsoft’s word-processing software for decades. Of course, it’s a handy tool with a simple interface. But we came a long way from there. We are in the internet era, and almost anything we use today is distributed.

Google Docs for students
Google Docs for students

But, think of any traditional offline installation software like MS Word, PowerPoint, or Excel. They are useful, yet what makes their usage complex is their accessibility. Say, a number of students work on a single document for project work, you would be sharing those and repeatedly editing those with the utmost difficulty.

Imagine your pen drive with an important document getting lost on the day of the presentation. Oh, God! I guess you might have faced this commonly in your school or college work. But with the advancements in technology, there are no longer valid reasons to compromise.

It’s time and money at the end of the day. Invest it wisely at any cost. Let’s dive deep and find how Google Docs for students can serve your educational needs exclusively in this article. 

Challenges in using other offline tools instead of Google Docs for students

As said before, using traditional offline software suites like MS Word can present many challenges. Let’s examine some key challenges a student or teacher might face when using them. 

  • File size – The file size can be quite large. A lot of meta-information gets saved along with such files, which usually bloats its size to a great extent. When it comes to daily assignments/tasks, you may create hundreds and hundreds of files for your needs. Thus, it is too hefty in such cases. Especially in this remote+ age, as we step into the new normal, it’s more evident to see a steady hike in your storage usage, which is possible by using Google Docs for students. 
  • Changes for losing your works –  Imagine spending hours typing a long document for your project work, and forgot to save. So bad, right? It’s usual to get lost. That’s never a thing with Google Docs for students. 
  • Limited collaboration – Only one can work at a time. MSword kind of tools is best suited for personal usage. They are installed in individual systems, and the only way to share those documents is via Email or any other communication software. Thus, more than one person cannot work on such documents at a time, and changes can be extremely difficult to track. Say a student is working on a project report, and he/she wants to collaborate with his/her teammates; he/she’ll be worried. Sometimes, students must submit their assignments and get reviewed by their staff. How would they do this with offline software? Google Docs for students is a reliable solution. 
  • Installation and upgrade issues – It demands installation knowledge and takes considerable space on your disk. Device storage provided at school labs would be limited and thus should be used wisely. Moreover, software installation and maintenance often require an exceptional system admin. You might be in trouble if you don’t find him/her at times when needed. However, this does not happen in the case of Google Docs for students.
  • Version conflicts and document formats – This is one common issue most of us face. There can be several version conflicts and trouble in opening files of not supported formats. Say, a colleague of you shares a document in MS Word 2010 format and you are using the latest version of the software. When you try to open it there you might have some trouble using it. Also, you may face missing font and other formatting styles in certain cases which is very rare in the case of Google Docs for students. 
  • Security – Can be highly vulnerable to viruses and malware as they are shared across multiple devices, multiple times. But Google Docs for students comes with more protective measures already.
  • Lack of backward compatibility – As students, you’ll be often urged to submit your assignments/documents on time. You would be quite unsure about your changes and thus you may end up with multiple iterations in confusion. Thus extraordinary revision history tracking would be of great help. The older versions use .doc extension and later ones come with .docx extension. Thus it becomes highly challenging in accessing earlier version files back and forth. Google Docs for students provide solutions to these problems.
  • Expensive—No students or teachers would like to pay for their simple documenting usage. They mostly work on limited-page documents, and paying a hefty amount for licensing is not a great deal. Unlike Google Docs for students, you can’t just use them without any license for business use cases. Thus, buying the office suite on your own can be quite expensive. 

In addition, there can be few other limitations when it comes to revision history, managing access, and third-party add-ons which are super easy when using Google Docs for students. 

How Google Docs for students is useful?

  • Free – It’s free to use Google Docs for students. Why would you pay for a student suite when you are good to go with a completely free suite with amazing functionalities. It’s more enough to get started with free Google Docs software for any sort of student’s educational needs. It works likes magic. 
  • Much familiar interface – Worried about your knowledge in Google Docs? Are you someone planning to use Google Docs as a student for the first time? You’ll be surprised to see that is almost similar to other word processors software you would have used before. Thus, it is extremely easy to learn Google Docs for students. You’ll be ready in minutes.  This is what makes Google Docs a much easier tool to onboard yourself with. 
  • Excellent Revision history support – As said before, as a student we tend not to remember things. It’s ok that we get lost in our changes sometimes. With Google Docs, one can easily view your document’s revision history and roll back to any version at times of need, which makes Google Docs ideal for students.
  • Easy translate – Your regional language can be your strength. Never limit yourself to language challenges for any cost. Your partner could come from a different geography, and thus, you might need to present the same information in their regional language. It’s super simple with Google Docs. Google Docs supports a wide number of languages to translate to help students while using Google Docs. 
  • Export—One of the most common needs of students is to use Google Docs. You can easily export your work in .docx, .pdf, .odt, .rtf, .txt, or .html format. 
  • Controlled access – Most importantly, when you share your documents with others, you might need to restrict access to various users at different levels. Say your teacher should have full access to it. But, your team members can be given just the read access. Likewise, others can be restricted from accessing. Google Docs for students lets you easily personalize access and restrict users as per your choice. It’s much more powerful than you imagine. 
  • Smart suggestions to help you prioritize your work and manage words. It can be very helpful when you work on your assignments and you worry less about grammar and spelling. Just focus on presenting your thoughts. 
  • Storage space – Google offers you 15GB of free storage exclusively, which is best while using Google Docs for students. It’s more than enough to be a student. It also includes other suites such as Gmail, Drive, etc. But 15GB is a really huge space, and you would never use it fully that soon. 
  • Collaboration and autosaving – Easy collaboration among students is the unique benefit of using Google Docs by students. No worries about saving, just use Google Docs for students to support automatic saving. 
  • Add-ons – Comes in-built with awesome and intelligent features. You can add more capabilities with a wide range of custom add-ons. 
  • Complete cloud storage – Fully cloud (Google’s secure and powerful servers). You can access it anywhere, anytime, and device of your choice. It doesn’t assume you own a laptop/PC just to access your document. You’ll be good to go even with your smartphone which is beneficial to use Google Docs as a student. 
  • Instant backup – This can be really handy when you are a student who gets back to your files later quite often. Being a student, you might be required to open a particular document only on exam days or project submissions. But you can’t just throw it away as it is. Sometimes, you will have trouble with your evaluation and searching for its past. In the case of Microsoft Office environments, you are solely responsible for backing up your own files. No external virus/malware could easily penetrate the system. Google Docs for students stands out in terms of security and takes care of it completely. 
  • A wide range of file types—Google Docs supports almost any file type you would work with within the work environment. It offers a wide variety of file formats, such as Doc, Docx, PPT, Xls, Xlsx, etc. Such a list of file choices allows you to work across several platforms without any issues when using Google Docs as a student.
  • Cross-browser compatibility—No matter what browser you use, Google Docs for students works out of the box like magic. You can access your documents on any device—laptops, PCs, tablets, smartphones—all you need is a web browser. 
  • Real-time chat—Collaborate online with your project mate and instant chat with other collaborators via comments/notes, which is more useful for students using Google Docs. You can see edits as others type, which is super cool. 
  • There is a wide range of templates to work with. Say you need a leave letter, a project report, or even a resume. As a student, you’ll find a good list of templates in each category in Google Docs to get started fast. 
  • Voice typing support – Although it’s not used wisely when using Google Docs as a student, voice typing support might be needed. 
  • Offline mode – No matter how strong your connectivity is. You can easily enable offline mode when using Google Docs as a  student and access all your documents completely offline just like Microsoft office software. 

What Is The Use Of Google Docs For Students

Students can use Google Docs in their classroom. Below are some of the key usages Of Google Docs for Students.

Google Docs Activities For Students

Let’s see here, a few key activities for students using Google Docs.

Synergetic Writing

Google Docs is an excellent online word processor where teachers and students can work on the same document. Students can get immediate feedback or comments on their assignments.

Multiple students can work together on the same document for any of the projects or stories, etc.

Collaboration becomes easy for the students with the help of Google Docs.

Drawing Become Easy

Drawing is an important feature that students need for their project activities and other assignments. Google Docs helps students with this excellent feature by allowing them to draw different shapes, arrows, lines, etc.

The drawing feature helps the students in different brainstorming sessions, where they can work together to create Visual maps, etc.

Quickly Create A Table

Students can quickly create tables in Google Docs to help them improve their presentation skills.

Helps the students to organize their information in a proper way.

Free Templates Utilization

Students can better understand by using the free templates provided by Google Docs, such as Class notes, Lesson Plans, etc.

You may like the following Google docs tutorials:

Exciting right? Why would students still stuck themselves with an offline suite when you have a free tool with such colorful features on the fly. Google Docs for students offers really amazing features. Go give a try and you’ll be absolutely amazed. Keep exploring!