New from Discovery Education - NBA Virtual Field Trip

New from Discovery Education 

NBA Storytellers 

All-Star Virtual Field Trip

February 13 | 1:00 PM EST

Join Discovery Education and the Jr. NBA for this exclusive 30-minute program that takes

students behind the scenes of professional basketball and introduces them to some of

its star players.

Meet these NBA storytellers, learn about their careers, and explore how they combine

new media and technology with critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity to share

compelling narratives and capture the game like never before.

Please click here for additional information.

Screencastify

I recently became a convert to Screencastify- I love making quick videos (or screencasts) to share with classes and teachers.  Recently they added more features to the free account (and all staff and students have access- just look for the pinkish arrow in the chrome extension bar).  For information on the new Screencastify features, please see Richard Byrne’s Free Technology for Teachers blog here.  If you would like some general directions, please go here.

Authors from the third grade

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Karen Swierczek’s third-grade class has really embraced their inner author!  Karen shared a few of almost 100 books her students have created on WriteReader.

I’m sure they would appreciate your feedback as they hone their writing skills!

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Extreme Weather- WriteReader Style

 

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Are you interested in extreme weather?  Beth-Ann Bulla’s and Lauren Roman’s third-grade students have become weather experts.  They recently shared their meteorological research by using WriteReader.  This was the first time they had used the application and the students loved it!  We even had some time to record their voices (one student told me that recording his book online was like being an actor with a scrip!).

Please share your comments and I will make sure the authors see your feedback.

NEW SEL information from Discovery Education

Powering SEL Skills in Your Classroom with LaGolda

One of the most powerful SEL resources we’ve used this year is the pro-social, animated series LaGolda. LaGolda is an online educational program that focuses on 8-year-old Latina, LaGolda, who loses her parents and is shuffled from one orphanage to the next. Instead of letting these circumstances defeat her, LaGolda finds friends in her fellow orphans and they travel the world to build a better environment for other children like themselves. The animated series features six episodes that showcase diverse places and children around the world who feel like outcasts but are shown just how special they really are by LaGolda, her group of friends, and the rest of their communities.  Search for LaGolda in your Discovery Education to locate this material.

Famous Person Infographic

(Photo from Sarah Kiefer blog)

Want to create a famous infographic with your students and looking for a place to start? 

Look no further than Sarah Kiefer’s blog post and template.   All you need to do is copy

and share the template and your students will be ready to go!

WriteReader for elementary learners

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If you have seen me in your elementary school in the past few weeks, there is a

good chance I was working with a class on WriteReader.  This is a free easy to

use ebook creation site that offers several features that are perfect for the

grades 1-3 learners.  

These features include:

1. Auto Adjusting font (so the text will shrink to fit on the page).
2. Embedded image library (including some icons making it easier to search) making images searched safe and painless.
3. Ability to restrict page type (I think the image and text one works best)
4. Recording ability (I was in the hall with several students as they recorded page by page- one of them commented to me “It’s like being an actor and reading from a script!”) Listen to Norah's recording by selecting the play button on each page.
5. To share or not to share- the teacher can decide in other students can read the books.  You can easily share the books outside of WriteReader with a link.

If you are going to try this with your students, I would definitely have them

prepare the writing ahead of time.  I would also make a class ahead of time

(while the Google Classroom options worked, I think it was a little limiting for

the teacher.)

Lori Herschkowitz shared the above examples from her second-grade authors. These

are not the ones we made in class- once the students start creating- it is hard to stop them!

If you read their books- please leave a comment on this post.  I’m sure they would

enjoy the feedback.

Tech for Tomorrow

I saw this in a Discovery Education blog post and thought you might be interested:

Tech for Tommorow is an all-new digital education program designed to

highlight the ways technology and innovation can better our world. Developed in

partnership with The Tech Interactive, a family-friendly science and

technology center at the heart of downtown San Jose, CA, on a mission

to inspire the innovator in everyone. 

Below, guest blogger Elizabeth Benno, a digital literacy coach from the

Lovejoy Independent School District in Texas, reviews her favorite

Tech for Tomorrow resources.

Tech for Tomorrow provides lessons and tools perfect for 4th-8th graders. 

The lessons are standards based, detailed, and have so many real-world

connections.  The classroom activities are effective, cooperative and they

infuse the 4C’s (Communication, Collaboration, Critical Thinking and

Creativity) throughout each plan. The students are completely engaged,

while learning so many new concepts and solving real-world problems.

Creative Commons Extension

Creative Commons has long been a useful tool for both finding public domain
images as well as those available for reuse.  Now instead of having to visit the
Creative Commons site, you can use their chrome extension to find, save
(via a bookmark), and download both images and citation information.

Richar Byrne (Free Technology for Teachers) has a great overview as well
as a video tutorial in his blog post here.

Free Clip Art

Here’s a blog post from Educational Tech Guy on ClipSafari.  This is a site of free clip art- no need to cite! 

Making a great speech

I was just sitting down to work on a presentation when I saw this article in Vicki Davis’ newsletter:

​What It Takes to Give a Great Presentation from Harvard Business Review (credit to Larry Ferlazzo
for finding this gem). This is a brief article that could be useful to both teachers and students
as they develop presentations.

PDF my folder

Many of you know that I am not a big printer fan- yet I understand the need for educators to print student work.  If you have several documents in a folder, you can print them one at a time. Of use this script from Alice Keeler (PDFmyfolder) and convert your documents in a PDF that you can print all at once.  Please see her blog post here for step by step directions.

So what can you do with a slide?

Alice Keeler has shared three of her favorite Google Slides tools in this blog post. After you read this, you will see why she is such a slide fan!

Templates

Here is a great resource for a wide variety of Google related templates. Sarah Kiefer has shared her resources here.

Duplicate your tabs

If you are working with Google Classroom, sometimes it can be annoying to keep switching back and forth between screens.  Alice Keeler suggests duplicating the tab and being able to look at two parts of the same classroom without waiting for the page to load.  Please see her directions here.

When you use Google Forms as a quiz

As Alice Keeler points out in this blog post, certain questions in a Google Form default to zero until manually graded.  The prime example is probably the short/paragraph response. You need to manually grade these responses to over the zero.  This is one reason I don’t have the responses sent immediately (upon submission) to the students- that grade will reflect the zero and not your scoring.

How Google Forms can improve student learning

Alice Keeler shares 5 specific steps to help student learning via Google Forms.  From quickly identifying reteaching opportunities, retakes, and branching forms- you will find all the details here.

Talking steps (one at a time)

In the new year, many of us are looking to make changes (diet, exercise,
mindset, etc).  The other night at a spin class, the instructor mentioned taking
one step at a time. If you are interested in applying this method to your Google
skills, check out this weekly Google project:

Getting Started with Google for Education

New, basic G Suite for Education trainings are hot off the press. Register to receive bite-sized, interactive video tutorials emailed to you weekly. Each lesson takes less than 15 minutes to complete and provides you with the skills to get started using G Suite in your classroom. Sign up today!

Creative Google Templates

In this blog post from Kasey Bell, she shares some of the Google templates from Lisa Johnson.  I thought the reading log one might work for some folks. Please use the link and then scroll to the bottom of the post to submit your email to obtain the templates.

New tools for Google Sites

Google is always changing and adding features.  In this brief blog post, Alice Keeler shares new features for Google Sites.  Please see her suggestions here.

Chromebook App Hub

Timing is everything- I came across this blog post while I was reviewing Google updates for a recertification exam.  The Chromebook App Hub allows you to search by the audience and content area.  See the blog post here.

A research template for elementary students

Sarah Kiefer recently shared a blog post on research strategies for younger learners (her daughter is in 4th grade).  I like the template she included (which you could copy and modify for your students.). She is on the right track- breaking things into smaller units should make it easier (and more organized) for our students.  Please see her blog post here.

The question that always makes me crazy!

Can you guess? It’s “What do I do now- I’m done!”. I always plan extension activities but still sometimes need other options.  Matt Miller (Ditch that Textbook) shares 20 options for students.  My personal favorites would be #8 (which wasn’t working a year ago, but I just played it today) and #18.  #6 is good for young learners.

STEM (and the argument)

I found this site on Facebook (posted by the NJ Science Teachers Association) with suggestions on how to teach critical thinking re: arguments in engineering. “Engineers use argumentation to weigh the merits of possible designs and to evaluate their success.” 

To Do List

Alice Keeler shares her shortcuts to reviewing student work in Google Classroom in this blog post.  What I always enjoy about her post are the step by step (along with images) directions!  Use the Ctrl key to your advantage!

Google Sites (Hide and Seek)

Alice Keeler shares her suggestions for hiding specific items in the Google Sites navigation menu.

EVERFI

Fran Maye shared this resource with me,  EVERFI is a free site with a variety of learning options. (Look for the K12 tab and create a free account).  I found the hockey program interesting- a combination of math and science. They also have programs on SEL, Economics, Health, and Wellness.  If you don’t want your students to create an account, you could display it on the board.

Looking for STEM ideas

If you need some STEM suggestions, check out this site from Siemens. 

Make a color change

Here are the quick steps on changing the background color of a doc. Special thanks to Alice Keeler.

Google Keep (the podcast)

Google Keep is the tool that keeps all my work organized!  Not sure if this if for you, please check out this podcast from Kasey Bell  (Shake Up Learning) - you will find something that will make your life easier!

A clever idea for managing sub plans

This blog post from  Amy Roediger had an interesting way to use version history while creating sub plans.  It would certainly make your life easier and more organized.