Google Forms


Google Forms is a software provided by Google that allows users to create, edit, and share different types of forms to gather data.

Some of the basic templates offered are:

  • Party Invites and RSVPs
  • Feedback Requests
  • Application Forms
  • Contact Information

and many more...

Creating your Google Form

You can also create your own form from scratch.

  1. Navigate to Google Forms.
  2. Sign in with your Gustavus Account credentials (or another Google Account)
  3. Click the "Blank" sheet with a colorful plus in the center.

You now have your very own Google Form. Here you can add a Name, Description, and many types of Questions to your form before sending it out. You will also see a default "Untitled Question". This will be a Multiple Choice question and can be changed to any of the different question templates found below.

Google Form Blank.png

Based on your intended use for this form, there are a variety of question templates to choose from. You can also create sections to split your form into multiple pages.

Question Templates

Google Form Questions.png

Multiple Choice Questions

These are really good questions for giving users a specific number of options (chicken or fish). You can use these to gather simple demographic data as well as discover preferences of those you send the form to.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question. This will be the default question every time you click the 'Add Question' plus button.

Now you can edit each possible answer or add an 'Other' option to your question.

Dropdown Questions

Dropdown questions are very similar to Multiple Choice questions as they can only have 1 answer selected. They may work better if there are a lot of possibilities that cannot be combined. This may be used for other demographic data that may have more possible responses. This may include: States, Countries, Height, Age, or many others that have a lot of options.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the Multiple Choice box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select Dropdown

You will see a similar format to the Multiple Choice question template, but when sending the survey the user will see a list to select from instead of all of the options.

Checkboxes

These questions give users a chance to select multiple responses instead of the singular answer given with Multiple Choice questions. These are really good for marking off available times or selecting a few options from a large number available.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Checkboxes'

Now you can add, delete, and edit your answers. You can also add an 'Other' option.

Linear Scale

Linear Scale questions are typically used to gather qualitative data as a rating of something. This gives the user a line of choices corresponding to the numbers set (range 0 to 10). You can also name the poles of this response ('Never' to 'Extremely often').

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Linear Scale'

You will now see the numbers used for ranges as drop-downs directly under the question. Below these you can set the names of each side of the line.

Multiple Choice Grid

Multiple Choice Grids give users a chance to select a single column response for each row provided. This type of question may be useful in place of a number of Linear Scale questions for collecting ratings data as well as other objectives.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Multiple Choice Grid'

Checkbox Grid

Checkbox Grids give users a chance to select multiple response within each row or column provided. This type of question may be useful for building a weekly schedule or similar block-type answers.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Checkbox Grid'

Short Answer

Short Answer Questions give users a chance to enter short responses, typically 1 to 3 sentences. Users will only be able to see a small part of their response at a time as the text scrolls, keeping the cursor on the screen. This type of question may be useful for short descriptions of an image as well as many others.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Short Answer'

Paragraph

Paragraph Questions give users a chance to input longer bodies of text while seeing the entire response. This type of question may be useful for essays and explanation questions as well as questions with multiple parts.

To insert one of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Paragraph'

Date and Time

These questions are best for gathering specific dates and times from the recipients. Date questions require mm/dd/yyyy and may be best for birthdays planning future events. Time questions will output as 12-hr clock (7:00 pm), even if entered as 24-hr (19:00).

To insert either of these questions:

  1. Click the plus inside of a circle next to your current question.
  2. You now have another Multiple Choice question.
  3. Click the 'Multiple Choice' box on the right side of your question box to reveal a dropdown menu.
  4. Select 'Date' or 'Time'

File Upload

A file upload question is a good way to connect files to your form. After adding one of these questions, you will see a few options for restricting file submissions.

  1. Allow only specific file types allows you to specify whether you would like a .pdf, .docx, or any other common file type like video and audio files.
  2. Maximum number of files will restrict the number of files able to be uploaded in a single submission.
  3. Maximum file size will restrict files larger than this size. If allowing multiple file types, this maximum file size may need to be larger to accommodate all file types.

The default Total File Size is set to 1GB which may not be enough for larger classes or multiple large files. To change this, click 'Change' and you can select a limit up to 1TB (1024 GB).

Require 'Valid Responses'

For most of the question templates, you will be able to restrict the answers provided. This is found within the Question Settings menu (three dots in the bottom right corner of the question box). This will allow you to set minimum and maximum limits on the Short Answer and Paragraph questions as well as response minimum and maximum limits on Checkbox questions. Here, you will also find the ability to customize an error message if the user response is not valid. ("Sorry, the character limit on this question is 500. Please refine your answer and try again." "This question requires 3 boxes to be checked. Please review your selection and try again.")

Sections and Subsections

Google Form Section.png

Sections allow you to split your form into multiple pages. This can be done to show progress on longer forms as well as tailoring one form that covers multiple sections of users (student, faculty, professor).

How to Create Sections

To create a section, select the Create New Section button on the right side of the screen. This will be found in the same menu as the New Question button. You will now have created Section 2 which will be blank. You can also duplicate a section to gather data separately (resident hall of student juniors). To do this, you can create a section to separate students from faculty and staff. You can then link this 'student' answer to another section.

Linking Questions and Sections

You can create links between sections and answers to send users to a specific section of the form based on their answer to a question.

Linking by answer

Certain questions allow you to link a section to the user's response. These can be found in Multiple Choice questions as well as a few other basic question formats.

To link a section to an answer:

  1. Navigate to the question that you want to use.
  2. Click on the three dots in the bottom right corner of the question box.
  3. Click Go to question based on answer.
    You will now see all answers have Continue to next section to the right of them. This drop-down will also contain Submit form as well as each section of the form.
  4. Behind each answer, click the drop-down.
  5. Select where you want the question to send the user.

You will now be able to send users to different sections based on their answers!

Example:

  • If the user picks the 'Student' answer:
  • Send the user to the 'Grade' section.
  • If the user picks 'Junior' in the 'Grade' section: *Send user to 'Junior Residence Halls' section

This will give you data on the residence halls specifically selected by Junior Students.

Linking by progress

You can also specify where to send a user after each section. To do this, navigate to the bottom of the section that you would like to link. You should see a small drop-down with Continue to next section. After clicking this, you will see all of the places that you can link this section to.

Example:

  • After 'Student Information' is complete:
  • Send the user to 'Emergency Contact' section.

Finish Form

If you would like to specify final pages and sections to your form, you can do this by selecting Submit form at the bottom of any section. You can also select Submit form in any of the questions that allow Go to section based on answer. Selecting this will submit the form and give a thank you message. This may be useful for sections pertaining to specific users.

Example:

  • If 'Faculty' answer is selected, send the user to the 'Faculty' section.
  • After completing the 'Faculty' section, submit the form.

Data Collection

Google Forms allows you to collect the data from the responses. You can receive an overview of this data by clicking on Responses. This will give you an overview of the entire form. You can also view the data for each question or from each respondent by clicking Question or Individual respectively.

Data Output

Data from questions will be represented in the Overview as follows by default:

  • Short Answer and Paragraph will be shown as text.
  • Multiple Choice and Dropdown will be shown in a Pie Chart.
  • Checkbox questions will be shown in a bar graph (horizontal bars).
  • Linear Scale and Grid questions will be shown as a column graph (vertical bars).

Exporting Data

In addition to this visual approach to the data, you can export the data for easier analysis as well.

to Excel

To export the data to an Excel file:

  1. Click Responses.
  2. Click the three dots (Settings) on the top right side, next to the green box.
  3. Click Download Responses (.csv).
  4. Open the .csv file.

Excel may not be able to edit the .csv file and may need a compatible file type. To change this, simply:

  • Click File > Save As
  • Save the file as .xlsx.

to Google Sheets

To export you data to a Google Sheet:

  1. Click Responses
  2. Click the Green Box on the right side of the screen.
    (This will create a new Google Sheet and export the Form data to this Sheet)

Demo Form

This form will demo all of the steps listed above. The form is anonymous and is meant to show what the user will see when filling out each question. You are able to change your answers after submitting. You are also able to see a summary of the results (including one stock response to show the output), this will be what you can see from your own form. Selecting the best question template for the kinds of data you wish to collect is important as different question templates will produce different graphs and data. Hopefully this demo will help with that decision!

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