SeeSaw

Last year, a teacher asked me about a way to create digital portfolios for her Kindergarten class. I suggested Evernote. I use Evernote a lot and I thought this would be if she created notes for each of her students and then uploading pictures of their work to the child's note, the teacher could easily share out the link with parents and administration later.

But now, thanks to Georgia Proctor, I've found an even better tool to use! As soon as I get back to her school, I'm going to show her SeeSaw. This could quite possibly be the best solution for a teacher who wants to utilize student driven digital portfolios in their classroom. SeeSaw works on iPads, Android devices, and Chromebooks. Students can capture their learning by taking pictures, recording videos, taking notes, adding drawings, or posting links to their digital work. Seesaw is free for each year and there is no storage space limit! Students' posts must be approved by the teacher so it's easy to monitor their activity. Students can also like and comment on each other's work to create an authentic audience for your class. One of the coolest features of SeeSaw is that parents can access their child's work and easily see their child's progress. This would also be a great tool to use during parent/teacher conferences. 

There are tons of tutorial videos, tips on how to get started, activity ideas on how to use this resource, and FAQs found on their website. They even have experts that you can contact to set up an appointment to help you get started with SeeSaw in your classroom! You can find their help center by clicking here.

Watch the video below to learn how to set up your class in SeeSaw.

I hope you enjoy this wonderful resource.

-Clint

Piktochart - Create infographics in a snap

It's taken me a while, but I am now firmly on the infographic bandwagon. One of our Hall of Fame DIFs, Lee Ann Holmes, had been singing the praises of infographics for many moons (check out her blog post on Infographics here) and I always pay close attention to the resources she shares but I never followed up to research the topic on my own. After playing around with Piktochart I've seen the light and I am going to follow in Lee Ann's footsteps. Piktochart is awesome! Here's why:

For starters, your students can create a free account with their Google credentials! No creating a username! No creating a new password that they'll probably forget! With Piktochart, your students can easily create visual representations of their information, and your students will need to know their topic up and down when creating their infographic. Your students can use Piktochart to present a lot of information in an easy to understand format. There are 10 free themes that your students can customize by changing the colors, fonts, images, lines, shapes, etc. or they can create their infographic from scratch using a blank template. The interface for Piktochart is very user friendly and intuitive. Students can make their infographics in 3 simple steps (find the item from the menu on the left, drag and drop it to their canvas). To give you an idea of what your students can create with Piktochart, here are a couple student samples on heat transfer:

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/1974347-heat-transfer-infographic-projec 

https://magic.piktochart.com/output/1962316-test


Pretty slick, right? Ready to get started? Check out the video below on where to go from here:

Enjoy,

Clint

Remind

Did you forget to remind your class that they're having a test tomorrow and they need to study tonight? Having a hard time building a relationship with those hard to reach parents? Wish there were an easier way to communicate with your class besides sending a mass email not knowing whether or not your parents even check their email? Well, look no further than Remind to solve your problems. Remind helps you connect instantly with students and parents on their mobile devices. It only takes a few seconds to sign up as a teacher and it's just as simple for your parents to sign up. Your parents can download the app to their phone to avoid those pesky text messaging rates. They can also choose to receive your messages through an email account. Your telephone number and the numbers of your parents are kept private. You can also use Remind to send your students quick notes of encouragement and affirmation of their hard work. You can also schedule your messages to go out and specific times. You can even attach files to your messages, including short audio messages! If you're looking for a way to improve communication with your parents, give Remind a shot. Watch the video below to get started!

- Clint

Thinglink

Looking for a new and creative way for your students to display their learning? Take Will Herring and Kelly Priest's advice and look no further than Thinglink. Kelly has been using this with tremendous success and Will shared this tool during our latest digital smackdown and I thought I should pass this awesome resource along to you. It doesn't matter if you have iPads, Android devices, Chromebooks, or desktop computers, Thinglink is versatile and works on any platform. 

Thinglink is a tremendous tool that allows you and your students to create interactive images that have links to websites, videos, images, text, and more! Creating your Thinglink is very easy and only takes a few moments. Over 100,000 teachers and students have already used this tool to educate, entertain, and engage. You can create your account using your Google credentials (no need to create yet ANOTHER username and password)! Once you're logged in, create your first Thinglink by clicking on the create button in the upper-right hand corner. Upload or search for the image you would like to use as the background, add your interactive tags to your image. Save and then share your Thinglink. It's just that simple.  

You could even go the extra mile and have your students create a collage first and then use that as their image for Thinglink. 

Still on the fence about using Thinglink in your classroom? Check out the video below to learn more about this awesome digital tool!

Nearpod

Ever have give a presentation and you feel like some of your students aren't following along with you? Do you ever wish you could give them a quick test to see if they are paying attention to your instruction without having to stop your lesson and get out the materials? No matter which device you have in your classroom, Nearpod could be your answer! Nearpod allows you to choose from thousands of pre-made lessons that are common core aligned or create your own engaging presentations that include interactive features for your students. With features like quizzes, polls, open-ended questions, and draw-it slides you can use Nearpod as a formative assessment as well. And once your students have completed your assessment, you can download a PDF of the results to drive your instruction for the following days, create your small groups for differentiated instruction, and you'll have data to take to your instructional meetings. You can also include text slides, images, and videos in your presentation. One of the most convenient features of Nearpod is that the presentations are teacher-paced which means that you control what your students see on their device, they cannot skip ahead in your lesson. Simply click the "Sign up with Google"to get started (you don't have to create ANOTHER username and password!)

Here's a short tutorial video on how to make your own Nearpod lessons:

Have a great day,
Clint

Computer Science Education Week

This is my first year getting my feet wet with coding, but after I realized that I wouldn't drown in all of the computer science programming mumbo jumbo, I dove in head first! I'll admit, I was a little intimidated when I first clicked on http://code.org/learn to try my hand at what over 61,000,000 people had done, learn the basics of coding. I've been a part of meetings with our technology department and looked over the shoulder of one of the lead technicians while he went into the "guts" of some of the programs we use in our county. It wasn't pretty. It was foreign language. So to say I was hesitant to try my hand at coding would be putting it lightly. Then I watched this video from our President and I was inspired to give it a shot. Take a look.

That's when I hoped over to http://code.org/learn to start coding. I was amazed at how well the instruction for coding was organized. You start simple with drag-and-drop coding with blocks to create snowflake designs with Anna and Elsa of Frozen. They even have cameos from Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg. If you really want to challenge yourself, you can even create your own app or game with tutorials to help guide you along. 

By the end of the night (more than just one hour) and with the help of http://code.org/learn's training wheels, I was caught up in the excitement of creating my own code! I was wrapped up in the ability to create something just by writing the code for it. To get an idea of how powerful coding can be, check out this Google Hangout with Jack Dorsey, the co-founder of Twitter.

I want to challenge YOU and your students to make some time for an hour of code. Give your students the opportunity to build something impactful, something meaningful, something they can be proud of. "It helps nurture problem-solving skills, logic and creativity. By starting early, students will have a foundation for success in any 21st-century career path." - Code.org

Here are a few resources to help you get started:

http://code.org/

http://hourofcode.com/us#b11g04t20w14

https://www.khanacademy.org/hourofcode

Mystery Skype/Google Hangout

       

One of my favorite classroom lessons to co-teach is a Mystery Hangout/Skype where two classes join in on a video call and participate in a friendly game of 20 questions to determine the location of their counter-part. Not only does this foster 21st century learners by increasing our students' global awareness, it's always fun to see who can zero in on their partnering class' mystery location first. I worked with Mrs. Luersman, a 2nd grade teacher at Carthage Elementary School, on a Mystery Skype and here's a piece of her testimonial "The learning was relevant to my students which made it much more engaging. We had covered the curriculum in class prior to the activity, but the Mystery Skype gave the students a hands-on opportunity to make the information more meaningful. Choice was a big part of this assignment. The students decided not only what questions they would ask the other class, but we provided the students with a choice of what they were going to be responsible for during the activity. Whether it was being a researcher, a google earth expert, runner to communicate with other teams, or the person who communicates with the other class among other jobs. This also gave my students a chance to collaborate and they had a tremendous role in the learning process, I was just the facilitator. This was a great experience for my students. They knew they were learning, but they loved it! I will definitely be doing more Mystery Skypes next year."

If you're interested in planning your own global connection with another class, I would highly recommend doing a trial run so that your students can practice before it's showtime. Here are some resources to help you get started:

Awesome Mystery Hangout website created by a 5th grader at Vass-Lakeview

List of roles for your students to actively participate in the Mystery Hangout

Possible questions to ask your partnering class

Find a class to connect with

Haiku Deck

Don't get me wrong, I love Google Presentations just as much as the next guy. But sometimes I want to create a presentation that's got some flavor to it. That's when I found Haiku Deck. This award-winning creation tool allows its users to create simple, yet beautiful and fun stories. These presentations can easily by shared, posted, embedded on a website or blog, or viewed on a web-based device. Some of the game-changing features of Haiku Deck include: 

• a range of stylish themes
• the ability to upload images to use as your background including millions of free images
• text that makes your presentation pop
• charts that provide sleek visuals to represent your data

Whether your students have Chromebooks or iPads, this free software will be sure to turn their ordinary stories into inspirational presentations. To learn more about Haiku Deck, including a gallery of featured decks, tips on how to optimize your decks, and more reviews, be sure to visit www.haikudeck.com and begin creating your own engaging presentations. Find even more resources for educators by visiting http://blog.haikudeck.com/new-powerpoint-for-education/.

Animoto

You know that pair of pants in your closet that you try not to wear too much because you don't want to wear them out but you've had them a while and they fit just right and you look really good in them? That's Animoto. It's that go-to tool that you should have in your back pocket and be able to roll out to your students if you're in a pinch and you want them to create professional-looking videos without any hassle on an iPad, Android device, or Chromebook. Just give your students a few minutes and they'll have you in shock at what they can create with Animoto! Check out the tutorial below and start transforming your ordinary pictures and text into amazing videos!

Twitter 101

Twitter is one of my favorite things in life. I love me some Twitter. Almost all of my professional development comes from using Twitter because one of the beautiful things about it is that you don't have to do anything! Let all of the information come to you! You can make Twitter relevant by searching for topics that you are most interested in. You can make connections with other educators and build your own Personalized Learning Network to hone your craft. Keep up with the latest trends in education by following some of the leaders in our field. Participate in digital conversations with people who you wouldn't be able to collaborate with otherwise. I've heard that Facebook is for the people you know and Twitter is for the people you want to know. It only takes a couple minutes to create your FREE Twitter account so take a moment to check out my video to learn more on how to get started!