Gift Cards and Six Great Learning Tools – Week 23

CN Area Elementary Teaching Team:

Week 23 (February 9 - 12)

Weekly Giggles:               Two pickles fell out of the jar onto the floor. What did one say to the other?
                                             Dill with it.

Feedback. Team, please feel free to provide me with guiding feedback to shape how I serve you. How can I do better? Where am I missing the mark? TWO winners will be selected. Take a few minutes please. Tick some boxes, write a few sentences. It’s quick. The deadline is Friday, February 12 @ 2:45 pm. Link housed in email only.

Hour of Code. Heather Rice! Congratulations. Wahoooo!!! Enjoy that Amazon gift card. Thank you for introducing your first grade students to Hour of Code. They did a great job. And, they loved it. Feel free to use that Teacher Dashboard to monitor progress all year long.

New & Different. Are some of your technology tools feeling stale? The same thing again and again? Are you looking for something different? Maybe you have used these before but you forgot about them. See if any of these are helpful.

Legends of Learning. Fugman has shared over 3,800 questions with their site with a strong accuracy rate. These teachers used Physical Science and Earth Science standards in their game-rich learning experiences. This tool is free for this school year. It’s gamified learning with Math and Science standards built in. If you need help getting started or figuring this out, please let me know I am here to help you.

Flipgrid. This video-rich learning tool is great for the classroom. My own children are submitting their science and engineering homework using this tool. Rube Goldberg machine, Paper Roller Coaster, and Simple Machine. Are students designing things at home? Building Native American structures with spaghetti noodles? How do those oral presentations work? Use Flipgrid. What about a biographical sketch of Amerigo Vespucci? Use Flipgrid. How about Student Counsel announcements? Flipgrid. What about staff challenges? You can engage the team with fun challenges. Send them to Flipgirid. Build community. Need more ideas? Head HERE.

Image credits: HERE.

EdPuzzle. Did you miss that EdPuzzle PD? It’s up on the CI&A website. You can find it HERE. Middle School and High School teachers use this a lot. They record their lecture, then distribute it for homework. The students watch the lecture for homework and then receive in-class instruction for any additional help they need. Don’t have video skills? No worries. You can grab online content and share that out. What’s more amazing? You know who watched it, and you know if they understood it with the embedded questions.

Adobe Spark. Need art on your wall from students, and you want to hit learning standards at the same time? Here you go. The Adobe Spark presentation is also on the CI&A website. You can find that direct video link HERE. Students can explore idioms, celestial bodies (planets), habitat, heredity, parts of speech, westward expansion, math vocabulary, Positivity Project, Newton’s Laws of Motion, and more using this free art tool. Schedule a teaching session with me if you would like me to help. I can teach in-class sessions or I can teach Zoom sessions. Use the calendar link below (email only).

Freckle. Do you need supplemental tools for ELA or Math? Freckle is a great learning tool that can support academic gaps, spiral review, on-target practice, and advanced learning for students who have met recent standards. It is adaptive in nature and will target gaps for each learner. Additionally, it has teaching videos that support students who are struggling with a concept. I am here to support you. Please reach out and let me know if you need help with this. (Image credits here.)

No Red Ink. I try to avoid price-oriented teaching tools; most of what I bring is free. No Red Ink will come with a fee at some point, but you can sign up for free. This extraordinary resource can revolutionize the way you grade papers. Peer feedback is wildly simple. Students get writing support easily. Assessments and teaching tools are built in. Dashboard data stores writing gaps for you so you can plan instruction to meet those needs. Curious? Click here to find out more. (Image credits here.)

Kindly,
Melissa Culver