Two Ways to Automatically Generate Certificates for Students
It’s that time of year when schools are hosting awards events and similar end-of-year celebrations (most of ours are virtual again this year). Many of these events involve giving students certificates for various achievements. You could manually create those certificates for students or you could automate the process through the use of Google Sheets and Slides.
Creating a certificate template is a fairly straight forward process. You can use Google Slides, Canva, or any number of Word templates for that. Here’s how to use Google Slides for that process. Here’s a video of the same process in Canva. Once you’ve created your certificate template it’s time to automate the process of applying individual names to the certificates before printing them.
The Google Sheets add-on called autoCrat automates the process of personalizing certificates for a long list of students. In the following video I demonstrate how to use Google Sheets in conjunction with Google Slides to create personalized certificates in bulk.
In the video above I used the example of creating personalized certificates that displayed only the students’ first names. To create certificates that have students’ first and last names you will simply need to put first and last names into a column in your spreadsheet then use conditional tags in your slide to match. For example, in the certificate I’d put the conditional tag <<name>> and in the spreadsheet I’d put a column titled “name” and then in that column I’d list my students’ first and last names.
The Certify’em Google Forms add-on is another option for generating personalized certificates for students. With that add-on installed your students will have personalized certificates emailed to them as soon as they complete a Google Form. Here’s my video demonstration of how it works.
Practical Ed Tech Virtual Summer Camp!
Summer will be here soon. If you’re looking for professional development that you can do live or on-demand, sign-up for the Practical Ed Tech Virtual Summer Camp. There are sessions in June, July, and August.