Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month
With the focus on racist attacks on Asian and Asian Pacific people of late, and being that May is Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month, Learning for Justice referenced this lesson plan, posted last fall that you may find helpful. PBS, as well as many others offer great resources as well.
Great ideas from Dr. Torrey Trust's Students
UMass's Dr. Torrey Trust always shares the best stuff! She recently shared this great collection of final project ideas from her students.
Enjoy!
Seterra Geography Games
Not sure where I saw this link recently, but Seterra is a really neat site to customize and play geography games. Check it out here.
New Text Overlay Options in Google Docs
Finally! This just came through my feed this morning... you can now position text over an image in Google Docs! Here's the update from Google Workspaces, Richard Byrne over at FreeTech4Teachers is on top of it and already has a post on how to use it.
Virtual Libraries from @msmteaches
There are some amazing teachers who freely share their work and one that I would like to call attention to is @msmteaches. She has created an amazing amount of great material that she shares on her web site. Check out her virtual libraries!
https://sites.google.com/view/msmteaches/virtual-libraries. Seriously- check this out: 186 slides of more than 4,100 books and nearly 300 drawing tutorials News from Alice Keeler
Alice Keeler's knowledge and enthusiasm are always welcome in my email feed! This morning she not only shared about Automagical Forms- a really cool way to take your worksheets, pdf, docs and flip them right over to Google Forms with no copy/paste, but she also created a short little video to show how the new Auto-save feature works in Google forms. See below.
Caveat on Automagical forms... it is free to try- only 6 pages. Then it's something you or your district has to pay for. Check the pricing structure here. Here's thehow-to guide. Marathon Kids Connect
I was looking through the EdTech Digest lists of winners for this year and saw this one for runners- Marathon Kids Connect. I wonder if it would be useful for Girls on the Run club or at the MS/HS? It says it's free. I did not investigate the data collection side of it.
Crayola Video Series
Shannon McClintock Miller shared some great info about the Crayola video series recently. It looks like it's on Facebook- not YouTube. Here's Shannon's post to tell you more about it.
Matt Bergman - Infusing Tech
Nice interview of Matt Bergman on tech integration. Made me remember to post a link to Matt's post for this cool puzzle maker. "I'm a Puzzle is a great site that you can use to piece together a custom puzzle for students. Whether you are giving students a preview about a topic or want to put together a clue for a scavenger hunt, this a great free resource for you to use!"
Google TakeOut
Still not sure about how to get your data from Google Drive? Here's another video to show you how.
Scratch
Last week was Scratch week! There were so many amazing projects posted online. Scratch just keeps getting better and better! Mitch Resnick posted this fun project. Try it out.
Wakelet
Wakelet community week is right around the corner. If you haven't checked out Wakelet yet- there's lots of great opportunities. Check it out here.
Tech Tips
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Google Take Out- choices
Before I forget... if you are leaving your district, retiring or graduating- you can transfer your Google docs, etc. to a new personal account. You have a couple options, which Jenn Judkins explains in detail. Please check out her post here.
Richard Byrne also posted on his blog about this topic this week. He has similar ideas and included a couple short videos. Check out his post here.
Schoolytics
Schoolytics is a data dashboard that integrates with Google Classroom. It is free for teachers. I know that "data dashboard" may not sound really cool, but this one is! The information is presented clearly. The graphics give you tons of information at a glance. I can't see why any teacher or administrator would pass this one up.
In an interview last fall, Erin Sailor, Director of Professional Learning for Eduscape, stated, “Schoolytics provides the data insights needed to integrate educational technology and understand how to support students in any type of learning environment. Administrators and student support teams can identify learners in need of remediation and determine trends in technology use. Educators can access their Schoolytics Google Classroom information to gather insights on student progress and make informed instructional decisions." Check out the live demo of Schoolytics Keen
Keen... Google's answer to Pinterest?
I saw a post aboutKeen this week; I hadn't heard of it. I am not a Pinterest fan, as I get lost within seconds just about every time I use it. Yes, great ideas, etc... but I generally find a whole page of cool stuff to check out, click one link and can't get back to the rest... So, check this out, see if it makes you happy. It's another way to organize your favs, to share and collate collections. Wakelet for Students
Graspable Math
Graspable Math allows you to "Assign algebra tasks to your students and see live feedback of their step-by-step work. Discover, create, and share engaging math activities for 4th to 12th graders.
GM Activities is free for K-12 school teachers"
Ideas to Share
Many of the resources this week come from recent Twitter posts. Honestly, if you are an educator and you are not on Twitter, you don't know what you are missing. I remember when Twitter first came out and I could not see any use whatsoever for that "nonsense". But that was over 13 years ago! So much has changed since then. If all the political posts annoy you- don't follow those people! I understand that social media certainly has its negative aspects, but Twitter is the primary source of a wealth of information for all educators. There are now "Clubhouse Communities" for educators as well (not Twitter, but a relatively new platform). I know time is scarce, but aside from the few times when I still fall down the Twitter rabbit hole, it's doable.
Pick some educators to follow and see what you can learn. Make a time for this, once a day, once a week- just carve out 15 minutes. To help you out... here's a couple of tweets with lists of K-12 educators and a list of edu blogs to follow.
Google Apps for Primary Educators
I was fortunate to attend Thursday's Napa Learns presentation featuring Christine Pinto and Jessica Twomey. They gave a resource- packed hour with a plethora of tried and tested resources to use with younger learners. You need to check out their blog, as well as follow them on Twitter. They also have a new book out- check that out here. Here are 2 of the fabulous resources shared, Playing with Works Centers- 45 slides with 5 great resources ready to use or adapt on each; and Connected Play Centers, currently with 52 slides and 5 resources on each. Your planning is done for the rest of the year. Microsoft Reading Progress Tracker
I know I wrote about this last week, but I got to listen to Mike Tholfsen talk about this and demo it on Leslie Fisher's Friday night webinar. I love Google for education, but this makes me want to find a really good way to make this work for our Google Classroom students and their teachers. Mike says No, have to use Teams. I want to find a way to integrate this without adding another layer! It is the best Reading progress system I have seen. Check out the walk-through to see how it all works.
Ideas to Share
Amplify STEM is also offering some interesting webinars. Check it out here. http://go.info.amplify.com/getintouch-webinar-fy21_science_lhs_national_springwebinar
As the school year starts to wind down for many, it seems like we are caught in a whirlwind of trying to get "it" all in, trying to finish up projects, tying up loose ends, etc... all while trying to "finish strong". This has been the strangest school year on record for most of us. Hopefully a few of these tips, and articles can help you finish up and have fun doing it.
This has been all over Twitter and FB over the last week.
26 Great ideas for the End of the Year! Click thru to the shared doc and make yourself a copy. Thank you to @candytechideas, @MongelliMegan and @the geoffwagner!
Backyard Bio
BioBlitz is really fun, whether you do it with your class, your school, your club or your family. There's still time (not much) to sign up for this! Check it out here. STEM for ALL Video Showcase
Coming up next week. Check out more info here.
Save the Dates! May 11th - 18th Climate Action Kit
My latest "thing". I love microbits and have tried several types of bit boards to extend the pins and make it easy for elementary kids to use. This one has it all so far.
It has an easy to access Microbit board and an excellent curriculum linking to UN SDG goals with STEM content. I have attended several Inksmith webinars to learn more about the Climate Action Kit, after getting one a year or so ago. It pretty much sat on the shelf for a while, but after the webinars, and building my own plant watering system, I am hooked. These are easy to use, give very clear instructions and diagrams, are inexpensive and are linked to Ontario curriculum. Check out the Climate Action Kit here. Teams scores big on this one!Imagine if the developers of the Flipgrid Shorts Camera, Immersive Reader and Microsoft Teams all sat down to come up with an idea. Well Reading Progress is just that! Learn more about automatic running records and how this new tool can be in used in reading classrooms everywhere!
I drank the Google koolaid years ago and love all of the ways we can connect with our students, collaborate, etc. But- that doesn't mean that I don't love Flipgrid, Immersive Reader, etc- all in the Microsoft realm. So when I saw this come out the other day, I had to investigate. It looks GREAT! Honestly, I am not sure how to integrate it all into our googlesphere, but we should. As teachers and students we can get free Microsoft teams accounts. I don't know how crazy it would be to assign the reading passages in Teams through Google Classroom, but there must be a way. So- check out the videos above and visit the blog post to tell you all about it.
Ideas to Share
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AuthorMaureen Tumenas Archives
June 2021
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