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
0 Comments
Enable Live Captions This is a quick and easy accessibility feature, built right into chrome. Takes less than a minute to turn it on. These captions are not stored on the cloud, etc... just appear on your device for any audio or video. You can turn it off when not needed; you can even use it offline on audio or video you have saved. Read a bit more about it here. Tab in the Corner This is a handy little feature to know about. It's new and it is super easy to use. Like Alice, I often have multiple tabs open and at least 3 windows. This lets me quickly and easily navigate between them Flipgrid for Google? This is a new tool from Google to create short videos to share with others, and to have them respond. Richard Byrne does a nice job showing you the main features of the tool in the video below. We have applied to roll this out at HPS but it isn't available on your accounts as of this moment. However, I do have it on my personal gmail account. Not sure why they are asking us to jump through hoops on this one. It's not an IT holdup, it's a Google thing. You can read more about it here. Richard also compares this new tool, Threadit to Loom for recording right in your inbox in this video, which I also found interesting. Slides Toolbox I thought I had enabled this one in the Marketplace a while back, but realized that I was accessing via my personal account. It's available now. It allows you to reshuffle all your slides, to combine slide decks, to add a whole bunch of images at once, download all your slides at once, etc. Another handy tool. Quilgo Adding timed assessments to Google Forms (formerly called Timify Me). This is a freemium product- an add on from Google Marketplace. You get the first 100 tests for free. Each student gets their own test, so the numbers add up quickly. I agree that this is not the time to add more pressure to either students or teachers, however, this may be useful for students who will need to prep for timed testing. Another accessibility feature- the Lexend font. I didn't know that this is readily available to all of our students via the simplify page in Read & Write for Google Chrome. Try it out with your students. Does it help? I know that some kids like the Dyslexie font, others like the BeeLine reader chrome extension. Some need to use a color filters. Add this one to the mix and let students use what works best for them.
Just for fun...
Although I agree that we shouldn't need to have a Black History month or a Women's History month or a Hispanic history month, etc., we still have a ways to go to teach in a more inclusive manner, to tell all the history, of all the people. So, you can click on this link to see past entries, if you'd like, but I pulled together all of the links I had saved more recently into a Wakelet.
Ideas to Share
TEMPLATES
This week I will simply share a few of the resources that have come across my email, twitter, and various pln groups. A couple tools that stood out this week, Pear Deck and using Google Slides to create various games for students. I've also been seeing lots of choice boards, and have included some for math. The lists of "stuff" are, as always, overwhelming.
Don't miss out on Netflix documentaries- now available in "your classroom"!
Here's the info: "For many years, Netflix has allowed teachers to screen documentaries in their classrooms... However, this isn’t possible with schools closed. So at their request, we have made a selection of our documentary features and series available on ourYouTube channel. If you are a parent or teacher, please check the ratings so that you can make informed choices for your students and children. For more information and to download accompanying educational resources please visit the Netflix Company Blog."
One email that did attract my notice was from the UK, a weekly update on keeping kids safe online. I guess this should have been on my radar as we are asking kids to spend more time on screens, but there is a definite uptick in accounts of predators on the various sites that kids have been using more now for socializing. We are often asking kids to post video responses, but many kids, at least in the surveys I saw, are not supervised and are sharing personal videos online, talking with strangers, etc. The esafety advisor also shared links to ThinkUKnow activities for students. These are UK based, but applicable here as well.
Creating your own games? There are lots of ways to do this. Richard Byrne offers 3 ways, in addition to MIT App Inventor to create sorting and matching games in his recent blog post. I think my favorite is Educandy which has recently added a memory game template that you can use by providing a list of words or terms. Check out some of the other options he mentions in his blog as well.
Kasey Bell from Shake Up Learning demonstrated some great ideas for creating Drag and Drop Games in Google Slides. You can listen to thepodcast here, or watch the video below to learn how. The steps are also written out on her podcast/blog page.
New to Google Classroom?
The To-Do List I wasn't going to include this one, but then realized that with everything else that you have going on , you may not know that it is there. Check out theshort blog post and share with your students if you are just starting out in Google Classroom.
Math Choice Boards
Living Maths has posted 2 versions of each grade band. Make sure you go to File>Make a Copy and DO NOT request access.
https://bit.ly/MathChoiceBoardsK-2 https://bit.ly/ChoiceBoards3-5 https://bit.ly/MathChoiceBoards6-8
More K-5 Math Choice Boards
Laura Rogers K-5 Click here Rob Baier from Pennsylvania made:Math Choice Boards K-8! Here is the Crosswalk Document so you can see which CCSS standards these match up with: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1WMVie3DAhf71Wq5Km-HWKUeD9OMI7-qb/view
Problem of the Day
Illustrative Math https://tasks.illustrativemathematics.org/content-standards YouCubed https://www.youcubed.org/tasks/ NRich https://nrich.maths.org/11993 Dr Paul Swan https://drpaulswan.com.au/teaching-at-home/
Manipulatives and More
I was used to using VM for virtual manipulatives, but have seen a lot of posts lately that mentioned Toy Theater. This is a treasure trove of manipulatives, games and so much more. Check it out. If you need printables visit https://classplayground.com/category/math/ This is just a screenshot of some, not all, of the vitural manipulative available. Different WorldsIt's often hard to talk about world issues with students. We all come to school with different backstories, different issues that we have had to deal with in life. As an educator no one wants to make a student feel vulnerable, or uncomfortable. So, how do you talk with kids about first world problems vs the rest of the world problems? Or do you agree with Patrick Gothman that this sort of thinking is divisive and we should stop saying, "first-world"? How do you address the social inequities that we deal with in the US and compare/contrast them to what others face on a daily basis? The video below is made of combined images from artist Uğur Gallenkuş. You can read more about the images here. Coming soon...GameBender By this time tomorrow, we will all know what this magical new product is, but so far Jay Silver is just sending out teasers. For those of you who have loved using MakeyMakey in the classroom, Jay is one of the inventors. Here's a short blurb from a longer EdSurge article. "According to a project summary from the National Science Foundation, which has given Gamebender $1 million to pilot its wares in museums and schools, the product “is composed of a projection system that allows real-time programmable interactions between everyday and virtual objects without a computer screen.” According to Andrew Sliwinski, Co-director of Scratch, “GameBender will bring the power and magic of coding to kids in a totally new way." CopyRight WoesMy Twitter feed seems to be filling up recently with warnings about copyright violations after a school district in Houston got sued- and lost- big time, to the tune of $9.2 MILLION! I know that some teachers are pretty casual about copyright, using the educational "fair use" clause as a reason not to follow the rules. Back when I taught a grade 9 computer class, one assignment was to create a page for a field guide, in conjunction with a trip to the Everglades. The kids were thrilled to see so many hits on their work, over 4000 for one year's version. I explained to them that that meant that any copyright violation was seen by 4000 lawyers. Fair Use is used in a court room- you do not want to go there. Please review the basic copyright rules! You may be surprised that some of the things you take for granted as OK, really aren't. Check out Richard Byrne's blog post about this here, or watch the video of his webinar with Dr. Beth Holland below.Copyright for Teachers. #InnovatingPlay - #iplay019 Creating a Global Play BoxWhen I saw this slide deck from the #InnovatingPlay, Creating a Global Play Box, I knew that many other teachers would love to see this resource. Jessica and Christine's website/blog posts and twitter chats simply contain a wealth of resources that they have created or have been shared through their PLN. So, check out the slidedeck here- Global Play Box. When you have time to spare and you are looking for amazing ideas for Early Childhood or Elementary curricula, just spend the day following the links on their blog https://www.innovatingplay.world/ STEM Lab ChallengesKarly Moura has done it again! She has created and shared an excellent collection of STEM challenge cards and badges. She gives links to all the instructions and has each task clearly defined. I don't have exactly the same array of STEM stuff that Karly has, but now that I have this slidedeck to use as a template, perhaps I can go through and decide to make some microbit or edison challenge cards. It would be a challenge to make some Cubetto or BeeBot cards- using mostly graphics for the non-readers. As always, Karly makes me think of new ways to use materials and to organize lessons, and provides ideas for assessment. Ideas to Share
Math with Bad Drawings
8 Things Every School Must Do To Prepare For The 4th Industrial Revolution
Chrome Extensions: ProductivityThis week I whitelisted a few more chrome extensions for our students. As most are aware, having too many extensions up and running can really suck the life out of performance, so it is best to use something like Extensity to manage them. The extensions I added are Save to Google Keep, Internet Abridged and Reader View. Google Keep is becoming more and more robust, a great place to take quick notes, an easy way to collate ideas and save to Drive; it has the ability to OCR text in images, etc... I have been using it more and more of late and like to be able to right click on a web page and Save to Keep. I can add labels as I go. I was trying out new summarizers. When looking for resources, I tend to skim through articles to weed out the fluff before settling in to actually read something closely. Summarizers can be tricky, as I am never sure of the algorithm used and so many times, they simply don't work. This one, Internet Abridged, seems to work and the summaries actually makes sense to me vs. some I have tried which seem to simply leave out 50% of the words. Another extension added this week is Reader View. For many who regularly use iPads you are used to seeing those little lines that indicate a web page can be viewed in Reader View- cleaned up, minus all the distractions. Now, you and your students can do the same thing in Google Chrome. Try it! Some of the other extensions I recommend include: OneTab, SpeedDial2, and Mercury Reader, along with AdBlock and TextHelp's Read and Write for Google Chrome. . Honestly, I do have at least 150 extensions, but I regularly use a very small percentage and leave the rest off until I need them. Science Games That Give You SuperpowersH/T to Fred Delventhal for sharing Larry Ferlazzo's post on this science games site. It does appear that Legends of Learning is really free. "Over 1000 curriculum aligned science games for elementary and middle school students within the Legends of Learning adventure. Legends of Learning is always free for teachers and students in school." Here's a review of the site. Fake News- again...Here's another resource, new to me, Mind over Media, from the Media Education Lab. I first met Renee Hobbs years ago at Educon in Philly. She is an internationally-recognized authority on digital and media literacy education. Ten years ago we all thought that the CRAP test would be all the students needed to help them verify web sources. Needless to say, times have changed as evidenced by Alec Couros' recent article for EdCanNetwork: How do we teach students to identify fake news? In a world where it is increasingly dangerous to simply trust what we read and see... The other thing I am excited about this week is finally getting my Breakout Edu box in the mail. Now this whole Breakout Edu craze has been building over the last year or so. I initially decided that it was just a fad and that the box was too pricey- $99. But, you can put together your own box of tricks for a lot less money and this phenomenon is growing- not fading into the edu sunset. Over the last 6 months I have seen post after post online about how teachers are using this in their classroom, about how engaged their students are, how it can be used across all disciplines, across all ages… ad infinitum. When I was at edcamp Boston recently I asked others how they are using it and once again, heard great things. So…what the heck is this Breakout Edu thing? It is simply a series of mystery puzzles… think " Escape the Room". Here’s an overview http://www.breakoutedu.com/ Once signed up you have access to tons of game and there is a very active facebook group with teachers posting all sorts of clever ideas. If you want to give this a try on the April PD day... let me know and we can figure out a time in the afternoon for all brave souls to try one, or make up our own. Below is one example-an overview of a "sandbox" game. Over the weekend I was listening to several SimpleK12 webinars on Google Tools. One presenter showed a Jeopardy like game, made with Flippity.net. Now if you've ever used the online templates, PowerPoint, etc. to make Jeopardy quiz games for your students, you know that can be a pain in the neck. This looked easy. So, I checked it out, and not only was it easy to do, but their flashcard maker would be a great way for you/your students to collaboratively study for exams. Just download the templates, open in Google Sheets and follow the step by step instructions. The quiz show game.. Here's a short video from Richard Byrne to show you how to do it and there are also complete directions on the site as well. The Flash Card Generator What I really like about this 1. You can add images 2. You can add video 3. It can be collaborative! Because it is made from a Google Sheet, you can share the sheet to your entire class, assign each student/group of students one section and they make the cards for the group...remember to update the link when adding to the published card deck 4. Options- card, list, cloud, quiz
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AuthorMaureen Tumenas Archives
June 2021
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