1. Google Forms
Google Forms is a part of Google Drive, it is free and cloud based. You can set up a form so
that multiple people can contribute answers to it at the same time. It is easy to set up, edit
and get feedback from. It can be used on mobile devices making it an ideal choice for
gathering information about enquiries.
Set up a Google Drive account
Go to https://drive.google.com/
Accounts can be set up using existing e-mail accounts and DO NOT need to be gmail
What do you want to create?
Choose CREATE for choices, here you will find Google’s online equivalents to software
found in Microsoft Office
Click on Form to start creating a new form using the wizard
Choose a title and theme for your form
Type in your first question (Question Title)

2. Add Help text if you wish
Choose your Question Type (these are explored in the next section)
Type in possible answers (unless text based answer)
Click Done. Your first question is complete.
Click Add item to write your next question. This will default to the same question type as the
previous question; use either the Edit button on the right to bring up the Question Type
option
Or instead of clicking on Add item to create the next question, choose the drop down next to
it to display the question type options
Question Types
How you want your question answered will determine which style of question you choose.
The options are:
Text is a short text answer
Paragraph text is for a longer text answer
Multiple choice – although there are multiple responses to choose from on this question
type, the respondent can only give one answer.
Checkboxes – if respondents are allowed to give more than one answer, use this
Choose from a list – the same as Multiple choice only in a drop down list format

3. Scale – a 5 option rank, you choose whether you want 1 at the top of the scale or the bottom
by giving a value to 1 and 5
Grid – respondents select a point on a grid
Date – respondents select a date
Time – respondents select a time
Set required fields
Tick required question box
Set up multiple pages on a form
To direct the respondents to a specific page, you need to:
Set up sections on the form by using the Page Break option from either the Add item drop
down or the Insert menu
Direct the answer to a specific page using the Go to page based on answer option.
Choose which page the answer needs to go to using the drop down menu next to your
answer

4. You also need to tell the form what to do after the next question is answered e.g. After Page
2, Submit form
Please note: This option is only available on the Multiple choice and Choose from a list
question types
Responses
Once you have finished setting the form up, click on Choose a response destination, it will
automatically default to New spreadsheet and give the title of your form. By doing this you
create a spreadsheet that can be manipulated to analyse the information more closely than
the form will give you. In order to retain the original data and as a matter of good practice, I
suggest that the form responses are copied and pasted into another spreadsheet before you
analyse them closely.

5. Once this has been done the Choose response destination will change to say View
responses
Sharing the form with other administrators
Choose the Send form button
Add collaborators
In the Invite people box add the e-mail of people you want to share administration with
Click Done / Send (the Done changes to Send when you Invite People)

6. Publish the URL so the form can be populated
Although there are different ways to do this, I find the easiest to view live form and then copy
and paste the URL into an e-mail. Send the e-mail to your staff and ask them to set it up as a
Favourite, so they have quick and easy access on the Internet. I have set up shortcuts on
the tablets we have, so that they are on our home page.
Where to find the feedback
You can View responses to see the spreadsheet of responses or if you want a snapshot
choose Responses, Summary of Responses
If you are in the spreadsheet use Form, Show summary of responses to get a snapshot of
the responses

7. As the responses can be published and printed, they can be used either as they are, if you
need information quickly, or copied into reports to help demonstrate impact. The raw data
can be copied into Excel to allow for filtering, manipulating, further analysis etc.
Reviewing and altering forms
This can be done by clicking into your form
Hover over the question you want to change until the option icons appear
Click on the edit icon

8. Make your changes and click Done
Archiving responses
This is something that cannot be done easily . There are ways to do it involving coding
(see Google Drive’s Help section). Alternatively copy and paste your responses into an
Excel spreadsheet, save that and then delete the responses from the Google Drive
spreadsheet.