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The Power of Google Drawings to Engage Students

Sorry that I’ve been gone so long. I don’t have a real reason why I haven’t shared anything on the blog for so long. I have quite a few posts started, but other stuff keeps distracting me from finishing any of them. Well, that ends today. I’m back and committed to blogging again. I hope you missed me at least a little bit?


Over the years I have become a huge fan of engaging students in visuals. I love to have students create and explore visuals. I believe we learn best when creating is part of the learning process. We need to design activities to get students creating before, during, and after engaging in a learning experience.


I’ve used a variety of different tools and resources to engage students in visual design, but Google Drawings is one tool that I have mostly ignored. I was recently inspired by this post by Tony Vincent to dive a bit deeper into Google Drawings. Tony has started to create and share Shapegrams in Google Drawings. I highly recommend checking out the incredible Shapegrams Tony has shared. 

“Shapegrams are pictures that are designed to be recreated using shapes, lines, and colors. Replicating the pictures helps develop and practice visual observation, spacial awareness, logical reasoning, and critical thinking.” – Tony Vincent 


We work with visuals quite a bit in my Environmental Science Classes. This presentation has some links to activities and ideas that my students and I have enjoyed, but I rarely used Google Drawings. Thanks to Tony, I decided to engage my students in some quick Google Drawing Drag and Drop Activities. My inial goals for these activities is to quickly engage students in discussions connected to essential vocabulary.  Here are my first two attempts.


I know these are nothing fancy, but I enjoyed putting them together and my students seem to enjoy the drag and drop as much if not more than they enjoy drawing/writing in Docs and Slides. 

What do you think? How do you use Google Drawings with your students?

Want to learn more about Visual Design and Google Drawings? Check out these additional resources.