All of us organize our Google Drive a bit differently, however there are four simple methods we can embrace to make our Drives easier to navigate.

1. Clean, Clear Folder Structure:
   *This facet of organization is very specific to each individual.  Here are three very different examples of how faculty members approach folder structures:The first example showcases a topic as the top level folder.  Subfolders are then broken down into specific type of resources: (1) student work, and (2) teacher “work” broken down by file type (docs, slides and in this teachers case a specific software used for this course).
   
   The second example showcases the use of  numbers associated with units.  This method also allows you to order items when Googles alphabetized method is working against you:
   The third example showcases the power of a folder structure that embraces top level folders that are shared with students. This individual has clearly structured top level folders for each class to share work with students in an organized fashion.  In addition, clearly labeling folders with the word Moodle let’s both the student and teacher know that the folder structure is linked into their Moodle course.
   

 

2. Use different colors  to quickly distinguish folders from each other.
 

 

 

3. Standardize your naming conventions and embrace numbers to best view items sequentially.

4. Organize items shared with you

Items shared with you can be difficult to locate because these items are not automatically added to your My Drive folder. Using the Add to My Drive function allows you to organize items shared with you.  If the naming conventions of the items shared with you conflict with your own approach to organization consider creating a folder that does and adding the shared file to this folder.