Teaching with Technology PPT

Visit this link HERE for the PPT SLIDES.

I am sorry that I am unable to be with you all today. I would much rather be there talking with fellow educators than constantly dealing with puke...but I will spare you the lovely details.

At the end of the PPT I had intended on having you all share your additional ideas on Lino (an online sticky note board). The board is pictured below and please feel free to add your own technology ideas and thoughts for using technology in the classroom! I will check out all of your ideas later today. Meanwhile, I will add a few of my favorites below the sticky note board for you to look at.

I would LOVE to add some images to this blog post, but my Chrome Browser on my laptop seems to hate me! So I will gladly add them later, but for now just click on the links to go to the site.

#1- XtraMath.org- I have always noticed that my students need more practice with their basic math facts. XtraMath is wonderful for helping them practice these facts. It is completely FREE and works on addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. The students are assigned by the teacher a pin and that is all they need to log on. I started this late in the year when I taught second grade and they had the PIN thing down in no time. When I taught 4th grade I made a log-in card for the kids and that helped them. Now that I am teaching 5th grade, I assigned my students multiplication and division and am now requiring them to complete 3 XtraMath sessions each week as a part of their grade. It also gives a progress report each week for the teacher to view. There are APP versions available!




#2- Kahoot! - Kahoot is a fun way to "quiz" your students over any subject. It can even be used as a wonderful group activity for indoor recess days. Each student or pairs of students needs their own device for this. You (the teacher) create your own Kahoot quizzes or choose from the thousands that have already been created and play it for your students. On your projector you will then display the game code for your students. The students will go to kahoot.it and be prompted to enter the simple game pin that you are displaying. They select a username and are ready to be quizzed. You start the quiz and the students view the question on the board and answer on their device. They are "scored" and ranked based on having the correct answer and how quickly they respond. The kids LOVE this and beg to do it again and again. There are some fun quizzes that can be used for indoor recess as well. You definitely need to check this one out!!

 

#3- Lino- This site allows you to create a blank board in which users (who you allow access) to create a sticky note and leave it on the board. I have used this with my kids to define vocab words, share quotes, and to express their own opinions. They update live and the kids love to create and add their own sticky. 

#4- Voki- Voki is a FREE service that lets you: Create customized avatars. Add voice to your Voki avatars. Post your Voki to any blog, website, or profile.

#5- Prezi-  Prezi is a visual and online presentation tool. It allows students to have a presentation that zooms from one point to another and has lots of templates for them to use to create their presentation. They can also add videos from YouTube and images from online to their presentation. They can search for these without ever leaving the Prezi page. This is great in that it keeps them from visiting pages they shouldn't be at and from getting distracted. 

#6- NEWSELA- NEWSELA is a site that provides reading articles for students at various levels of text complexity. You can sign up for your free account and then follow the simple instructions to get your students signed up. Then you can assign specific articles to your students. Each article is available in multiple lexile levels. You can have your students all reading the same article, but at various lexiles that are appropriate for each individual learner. There are also quizzes that your students can take and measure their comprehension with. There are a few parts that are only included in the Pro Version, but it is definitely worth checking out!! 

That is all I can get in at this point...sleeping baby is beginning to wake. I will add more of the things I like to use in my classroom as time allows.

*In addition to these specific sites, we also use the various video-editing and shooting apps and programs to create things. For instance, one of your final book reports in the class is that students must create a book trailer for the book of their choice. They have lots of freedom to create however they feel fit!

We also use PUBLISHER or PPT (could use Google Slides) to create Amazon book listings for their book choice. We just go over what book ads and reviews look like on Amazon and then the students have to create their own for their book *without copying what is already on Amazon of course! 

Microsoft PhotoStory is a free download on Microsoft PCs that you can basically make a video out of still images and text and put a voice over. We use this to create class digital poetry books and even partner up with our 1st grade friends to create a narrative starring their 1st grade friends. Again I will post examples of these in video form as soon as I have another spare moment!

I hope you find these helpful and useful in your own classroom!!