by Cait Ferguson

Digital lessons for students to practice with tech skills. 

Are you looking for a practical digital curriculum for your students? Google's Applied Digital Skills curriculum may work for you. With a library of over 50 lessons and projects, you can hopefully find materials that are relevant to your student's life and needs. 

You can check out the library and get started with the curriculum by following the steps below. Click here to access the home page. 

To learn more about this curriculum from a teacher's perspective, visit the "For Teachers" page, which includes a quick start guide. Check out the lessons available here, or start by clicking on the featured lessons below. 

Have you used this curriculum? Share your experience below!

by Cait Ferguson 

A free resource library of thousands of audio clips and activities for students to practice listening comprehension.

Are you using Listenwise or other listening comprehension exercises in your classroom? Share below! 

by Cait Ferguson 

According to the InsertLearning website, this tool helps to:

• Differentiate for Every Student: Easily scaffold text with questions and media that help all of your students become more successful learners.
• Use Authentic Sources to Build Lifelong Learners: Utilize primary sources and supplement current curriculum with high interest content that your students can connect with.
• Ensure All Students Have A Voice: Embedded discussions help all student share their ideas while reading. Students can annotate any web page and share what they think is important.
• Engage All Readers: Keep students engaged and active learners with interactive questions, discussions, videos, live annotations, and a collection of tools you can embed in lessons.
• Provide Real-Time Assessment and Intervention: Monitor student responses and annotations during class. In a blended or flipped classroom, you can respond when students need help the most.

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If you want to see the process of creating a lesson with InsertLearning, check out the following video! 

If you are interested in using InsertLearning, visit the website to add the extension to your web browser. If you use InsertLearning, please share your tips below!

by Cait Ferguson 

A YouTube channel with recommendations for using tech tools, including tutorials on the Google Suite and Microsoft Office. 

Technology for Teachers and Students is run by a veteran teacher who provides helpful tutorials on many tech tools for the classroom. These tutorials can be useful for teachers to learn about a potential tool they may want to implement in class, and for students to learn about a tool to create a project, or prep for a future career.

​The channel offers a dedicated playlist to Google, including the google docs tutorial below. 

The channel also offers playlists for "Student Tools" and "Teacher Tools", which covers an array of sites with different functions, including tech to create presentations, podcasts, maps and more! An example of a teacher tool, ThingLink, where you can create interactive images, is covered thoroughly in tutorial below. 

You can search on the channel page for a specific website or tool, or browse to find a cool tech tool that is new to you! If you find a site or app that you find useful, share below!

by Cait Ferguson 

Have you used SlidesCarnival? Do you want to share any tips? Share below!

by Cait Ferguson 

Are you looking for a digital forum for discussions? FlipGrid is a video sharing platform that can be used to encourage participation from students wherever they are. Teachers can create prompts, share a "Flip Code" with students to invite students to the discussion, and the students can upload a video from their computer or phone to respond. 

Typically, students will respond to the teacher's question or prompt with a short video up to 90 seconds in length. As long as the students have access to a device with a camera, recording and uploading is as easy as pressing a button. For a complete demo, check out the "FlipGrid Tutorial" video. 

FlipGrid is straightforward in its purpose: encouraging students to participate in digital discussions. The platform has one central goal, but there are multiple features available to make the platform accessible and workable for different environments.  

Features:

• free!
• includes 'resources' page, with guidance for both teachers and students
• library of prompts available from other FlipGrid teachers
• ability to create custom prompts
• ability for 'teacher review' to vet student videos before they are posted
• ability to respond to videos with videos
• emojis for students to customize their contributions
• 'gridpals' program if students would like to discuss prompts with students outside of Five Keys

If you would like suggestions for using FlipGrid beyond the usual format, check out the "Fabulous FlipGrid Ideas" video. One suggestion is to invite guest speakers to share thoughts with students through the platform!

If you would like to learn more about FlipGrid, Ok2Ask has a webinar available to watch, and they have upcoming offerings that include more ways to integrate FlipGrid into the class. Ok2Ask webinars are free to attend, offerings are listed here. 

Ultimately, if you are looking for a way to encourage student participation, wherever they are, FlipGrid may be the tool for you! If you use FlipGrid, please share your tips and tricks in the comment section.   

by Cait Ferguson 

Imagine you are working on a group project. Your fellow team member, Common Sense Education, is a rock star. They took on the task of doing the research for you, found a bunch of useful resources, and even categorized the resources to easily find what you need!

If you could use a website that finds, categorizes and reviews educational content, including websites and apps, for you--your new tool is Common Sense! From content playlists that highlight tech tools for learning everything from math to Shakespeare, to playlists that outline resources for learning about social-emotional learning and mental health, Common Sense will save you time through providing overviews, quality reviews, recommendations, and information about pricing and alternative options. 

For example, the following review outlines two options for studying Shakespeare, helping teachers decide what might work best for their students. 

In addition to tech recommendations, Common Sense has a Digital Citizenship curriculum with free resources for all grades levels. Check out the resources here. 

Visit commonsense.org for access to all lessons, recommendations and reviews, and check out the list below to get started with a few exciting resource playlists!

by Cait Ferguson 

This article will provide a quick "how-to" for getting started with Google Sites, and recommendations of how this tool can be used in your classroom. 

To start, if you prefer to learn through video, check out the TeacherCast beginner's tutorial:

To read more about Google Sites, a step-by-step "Get Started with Sites" is provided through the G Suite Learning Center. The full article will walk you through all of the steps to create a site, as well as tips on how to customize and personalize the site to your vision. 

Creating a site only take a few minutes; for an abbreviated "how-to" click through the steps below. 

dNow that you know how to create a site,  here are few ideas for using Google Sites in your classroom:

1. Have students demonstrate their learning through creating a site

Instead of an essay, consider Google Sites for your student's next final project. Students will gain experience with a valuable tool and demonstrate their learning in a new way. Laying out information in a website format, deciding what pages to create and what content to add, encourages students to think critically about what is important about their learning, and how that information is best communicated to a wider audience. Student will still use skills needed for essay writing, like outlining and revision, with Sites providing an additional visual element that can enhance creativity. 

2. Create a "class"or "teacher" site to build community and centralize information 

Google Sites can be used to create your own teacher or community website with important info unique to your classroom and students. The type of content on the site can be completely personalized to your class, as well as the contributors. You can run the site yourself, or run it as a community, having your students contribute relevant thoughts, pictures, and possibly encouragement for their peers. 

3. Discuss the reliability of content found on "Sites" when conducting research 

With the benefit of creating a personalized website within minutes comes the disadvantage of...creating a personalized website within minutes. Using Sites can provide a great opportunity to discuss the reliability of internet content, including a potential debate on whether "home-made" websites are more or less reliable than content produced by organizations or corporations. Within this discussion, teachers can highlight useful vetting strategies, like checking for corroboration and sourcing.  

Do you use Sites in your classroom? Do you have an idea for using this tool with your students in the future? Please share in the comment section below! 

by Cait Ferguson 

This month's recommendation is a resource that fosters access to text for students who need or enjoy a text-to-speech tool. Voice Dream can be downloaded on Apple and Android devices, and offers a variety of helpful tools to make reading a 'dream'!

Features of the app are provided in the graphic and video below. 

In another helpful feature, Voice Dream can import documents and texts from a large variety of sources.

To see an example of the process of importing texts into the app, watch the video 'VoiceDream Features'. A sample of the app in action, reading in one of the many voices that are offered, can also be viewed below. 

Every student should have access to a reading experience that is productive and enjoyable. Voice Dream might just be the app that works for your students! 

If you have used Voice Dream, please share your experience in the comment section!