5 Ed-Techs Tips to make your time in the classroom easier!

Thank you to Alexis for this guest post!

Hello! Alexis from Science Beans here! I wanted to talk about some technology resources that all teachers can use to make your time in the classroom easier (and a little more fun!). Technology has changed my classroom in amazing ways. Here are some tools I use in the classroom that have transformed learning and saved me time ;)

Common Curriculum (CC)

Common Curriculum has saved me a tremendous amount of time when it comes to lesson planning. I wanted to find a way to make lesson planning easier and completely online rather than creating word documents for my weekly plans. It was getting tedious and very annoying having to type and retype the plans to place them in my lesson plan binder! I did a little research and after testing some online lesson planning sites out I fell in love with CC. The service is FREE for teachers but of course has upgrade options as well. The site gives you the option to plan for multiple classes in whatever format or template you like. One of my favorite options is being able to collaborate with colleagues making common planning time a piece of cake! The PRO version is completely worth it because you can plan by units, track standards in your lesson plans, export your plans as PDFs in different formats, and have a class website! No matter what version you decide to use, the lesson plans are all saved online. If someone needs to see my lesson plans, I share them (email, pdf, etc.) no need to print! For more info, see my previous blog post here.

This is what the lesson plan page looks like & the standards listing:

Edmodo

This for me is not only fun but extremely useful! I am pretty obsessed with it (I even have an Edmodo cape that I won at an online seminar – nerd alert!) Edmodo looks like Facebook but for schools and classrooms. The transformation of Edmodo over the years has been incredible. There is so much you can do and learn about on Edmodo that different PD’s and Seminars are given to teach you the various tools. Put simple, you make a class page, the kids sign up, and you get to collaborate! You can post notes, create assignments, create quizzes, you can create a poll, or use a ‘Snapshot’ (series of benchmark questions in math and reading that will show you which standards students need help in). I like to use mine as an online classroom platform.
All of the notes, assignments, handouts, you name it, are in folders on the class sections. One of the best additions to Edmodo has been the linking of your Google Drive or Office 365. It’s not only good for students but a great way to collaborate between teachers locally or around the world. I can probably write a book on everything you can do on Edmodo, trust me it’s awesome! Check it out!





Remind

This is a cool site/app that allows you to send out text message reminders to students. When I first started using remind (when it was remind101) it was simple. You received a unique phone number, the kids would subscribe to the text messaging service with a class code you created, and voila! They would receive text reminders every time you sent out a message. They could not answer and did not have access to your personal information. Over the years, the site/app has changed its name to Remind and has some amazing features. Now you can:

The number to sign up is the same for all teachers (81010) and the class code is the only thing that changes or is unique

• set office hours where students can respond back to questions
• students can “stamp” messages using the app
• Add pictures, sounds, links, to messages or set the delivery time
• receive the messages by email
• post a widget on your school website for the messages to be displayed
• send messages to a small group of students in a class
• download a pdf of your message history in any class…..

…..and so much more! Parents have signed up and love knowing what the students should be working on. My school has also moved to using a school wide remind where school announcements are sent out.



Kahoot & Quizlet

I don’t know about you, but my students love to play games (and so do I). No matter what the age or grade level, turning an assignment into any form of competition is usually a good idea. Kahoot is a free site that creates a game out of a set of questions created by the teacher. Once the game or ‘Kahoot’ is made, students answer the questions on their own devices. The question and answer choices are displayed on the screen in the front of the class and the students can choose their answer on their devices. It tracks the points and gives you data at the end with the questions the students did well on and what they need help with! Real time data! There are tons of way to use this resource: pretest style to see what they know, review game, bellringer, as a brain break, etc. Pressed for time? Many Kahoots are shared and you can use games created by others around the world. You can also create a discussion Kahoot and a survey version.

A similar option is Quizlet where you can make flashcards virtually, which seems cool enough, but it’s not just about the creation of the cards that’s awesome, it’s what you can do with them! Students can again play games using the cards and one of my favorites is Quizlet live. Students are placed on random teams and asked questions that match a set of cards. They need to figure out who on their team has the correct answer in order to win the race! Check out the video of students playing.




Discovery Education #SOS – Spotlight On Strategies

I am an extreme science nerd, which means anything Discovery or Discovery channel related is cool to me. I had
the opportunity to spend the last 3 years as a Discovery Education Leader and learn a huge amount of resources to help change the way students learn and how they create things. One of the resources we were taught focused on the use of something known as SOS (spotlight on strategies). Discovery came up with creative ways to use various media sources and formats to engage students in any subject or concept you are teaching. Here’s an example of one known as “take a Walk”. They come in pdf format and give you step by step what you need to do to complete the strategy. I love the last part with more ideas which is one way of extending any lesson. Click the link about to check out the Discovery Blog focused on all of their SOS strategies.




Thanks for having me and I hope you enjoyed these Edtechs!

Socrative quick Questions

Socrative is a site that I like and have written about several times before.  I've talked about how to use it and some fun quizzes that you can do with your students.

When I go over homework assignments or an assignment like a practice test I like to switch it up every once in a while.  It can get a little boring just calling out numbers and having students give their answers.  Recently I  used Socrative to go over a practice test and my students (and I) liked the change of pace. Socrative has a few different modes, but I like quick questions because it doesn't require any set up from you ahead of time.

You as the teacher need to create an account, but your students don't.  The first time you log in you'll be asked to choose a name for your room.  The great thing is that your room name never changes.  This makes it super easy for the students to remember.

Once you are signed in, you'll be able to choose one of four modes in the dashboard.  Quick questions allows you to poll your students without any advanced prep.  Click on quick questions and then you'll be prompted to choose multiple choice, true/false or short answer.  In the meantime, your students should go b.socrative.com and enter your room number.  They will see the answer choices as A, B, C, D, E, True/False or a box to type into.

The teacher view will show you the live results and you can stop the data collection at any point.  You can also see how many students are in the room by looking at the top right (under the word FINISH).  This way you can see how many students are joined your room.
When you are done with the question, simply scroll down  to start a new question.  When you are done with everything, click on FINISH in the upper right hand and you will be able to view the data from your session.

Students can access Socrative from any device with a web browser, but there is also an app for Android, iOS and Window devices.

Have you tried Socrative before?  What do you think? 


Are you more a visual person?  Here is a video walking you through the steps.

Google Hangouts in your Classroom - Free Online Conference

How can you use Google Hangouts in your classroom?

Join Simple K12 for their FREE Online Conference on Saturday, June 11th, to discover ideas on ways Hangouts can be used to connect and engage your students.


Learn how to use Hangouts for:

1. Conducting "hangout" sessions

2. Mystery location or mystery number calls

3. Connecting with experts

4. Collaborative projects including peer editing and researching

5. Broadcasting school events

6. Podcasting in the classroom

And so much more!


Click Here to Register

BONUS: Register today and receive their new Free Resource Guide!

Inside you will find a sampling of some of the best Google tools for your classroom...

And ideas on how to use them!

Using Mail Merge with Gmail

If you are like me, you use mail merge when you want to send the same e-mail out to multiple people, but personalize it with some information. For example, you may want to send an e-mail and personalize the name in each e-mail or you have a different word or phrase that needs to be in each e-mail.

 In Microsoft, it's easy to send a mail merge, but it's just as easy to send one via Google.  The first thing you'll need to do is set up a spreadsheet.  In the spreadsheet you need to have headers for each column for the mail merge to work well.  One of the columns needs to be e-mail.  The other columns can be any of the personalizations that you want to much (such as names).

Next, you'll need to go into Gmail and type up the e-mail you want to send and save it as a draft.  To enter personalizations you need to insert a placeholder.  For example, if you wanted to enter the person's name in the e-mail you'll have to use the word that you titled the column.  I probably would have called it name, so then I would find the spot where I want the person's name and type in <<name>>.  Basically you just put the column heading name in between the arrows (<< >>).

Lastly you'll need to install the add on called Yet Another Mail Merge. To do this you can click on this link which will bring you to the installation page. Once you have done this, go back to your spreadsheet and click on the Add-Ons menu and then Yet Another Mail Merge and run the add-on.

You are all set!  The add-on will sent the e-mails to the list of people in your spreadsheet.  It will also tell you who read it and who didn't and even let you target those people will follow-up e-mails.

If you have questions or want more clarification just let me know!

Set expiration dates for access to Google Drive, Docs, Sheets, and Slides files

I just read Google's Blog and they talked about a new feature when sharing files with others.  You will be able to set an expiration date when give someone commenting or viewing access to a file; you will not be able to do this to someone you give editing access too.  It will probably be rolling out around the end of the school year, so you can really take advantage of it next school year.

I like this because I often give students access to view a file of mine for a specific reason, but don't really want them having access to it for an extended period of time.  Yes, they might be able to make a copy of it for themselves, but you can turn off that feature.

What are your thoughts about this update?

Getting Organized with a Planner

I always feel like I have a million things going on and I have trouble focusing on what needs to get done and what is just fun to do.  I now have two planners: one I use for personal stuff that I carry around with me and another I use for school related stuff that stays on my desk at school.  I have recently started decorating my personal planner with some functional stickers that help me organize my thoughts.  I was contacted by the great people at Oh Hello Co about doing a blog post about how I could use their stickers in a school planner.  I love their stickers and use them in my personal planner so I decided that they would be great in my school planner as well.  Below is a quick video on how I plan a week in my school planner.  If you are interested in checking out these stickers, click on this affiliate link that will take you to their shop.  As a thank you, you will get $5 off your first order.

What do you do to stay organized? 

Disclaimer: Links used in this post are afflilate links. 

Amazing Google tips and tricks from the EdTechTeam

Today I spent the day virtually attending the EdTechTeam GAFE summit at the University of Hawaii.  There were four sessions along with the keynote and demo slam that were streamed lived via Google Hangouts.  I consider myself pretty knowledgeable about Google, but I learned so much in the various sessions today.  Lucky for you, EdTechTeam recorded everything and you can go back and watch it.   I highly suggest that you add these to your YouTube watch later list.  You can get to the links for all of the sessions by going to bit.ly/hawaiionair.

If you don't have time, or interest, in watching all of the sessions I highly recommend the Chrome Secrets and Google A-Z sessions.  These are the two session that I learned the most in.

Have you every been to an EdTechTeam GAFE summit?