Its Not About the Device!

Last spring, Google in Education did a week long program that focused on Innovative Chromebook Teachers.  Each day they had a Hangout featuring teachers of specific subjects and how they used Chromebooks to enhance students learning in their classrooms.  It was a great series to watch.  Thankfully, they are all recorded and available to view on the Google in Education YouTube Channel.

After I watched them there was one things very clear- these were not commercials promoting Chromebooks!  They were showing all types of tools you could use available to anyone with the Internet.  The device didn't matter!  Also, so many of these ideas could be used in other subjects.  It was worth watching them all to see what similar ideas could be used in other classes as well.

Here are all the videos with a list of  the tools discussed by the teachers.

Before you grab some popcorn you may want to take a look at this AWESOME resource created by Richland School District Two in South Carolina.  They have created a wonderfully organized tool list.  It is definitely worth bookmarking!

Enjoy!

Monday, May 6th-  Mathematics  (recording)

·  Wix (free website builder) - use it as a summative assessment

·  Quia & Quizlet - students can use these for quizzes & review

·  Illustrative Math - complex tasks instead of just 'drill & practice'; also ties into different state/Common Core standards

·  Desmos - online graphing calculator - use it in linear relations unit, also great for plotting circles (and can do it more easily than other graphic calculators per the math teachers!)

·  Manga High - uses gaming for learning math; students can earn badges and you can compete against different schools (Webb City used it for 'integer reviews')

·  Awesome Screenshot -  capture screenshots of kids' works and annotate them.  

·  Geogebra & Geogebra Tube (resources from lots of teachers with little lessons)

·  Lucid Charts with math vocabulary words - have to connect the words, the more connections the better (e.g. 'trapezoid' connected to 'shapes')

·  Socrative.com - quick way to make quizzes and submit homework

·  Schoology - LMS that also gives analytics for quizzes so you can target which students need help on certain concepts (and you can create your own questions, where Kahn academy already has them created for you)

·  Kahn Academy

·  Youtube - bring in movies with math problems' in it, and solve them in class

·  Daum Equation Editor - allows you to use math symbols on the Chromebook (Schoology also allows this; or you can save something as a PDF)

Tuesday, May 7th - Science (recording)

·  Google Drawing - incorporate pictures and words

·  Google Forms - allows students to give their peers feedback on their projects

·  Padlet.com - gives a blank screen where students can post 'stickies' and answer eachothers' questions

·  Google Spreadsheets - organize lab data and use graphs

·  Google Sites - created Sites for different elements (Chemistry)

·  Study Stack & Quizlet - for learning vocabulary

·  Edcanvas - start with a blank canvas, and you can add pictures, videos, text, etc.

·  Glogster - create posters

·  Create your own 20% project -- watch a clip of a video (October Sky), allow students to pick what they're interested in (e.g. mining, rockets, etc.), and then they can start doing research

·  Google presentations - insert images and label body parts, etc.

·  Study Island, Study Jams

·  Evernote - save all lesson plans in this app

·  Vine - can take short videos (like one on the intestinal system), upload them and share with social networking sites

Wednesday, May 8th - Social Studies & Foreign Language  (recording)

·  Google Calendar - sync calendars for students with assignment due dates

·  Prezi - create presentations

·  Popplet - online mind mapping tools

·  Thinglink - take an image and attach tags to the image (e.g. picture of the globe, and annotate parts of that picture)

·  Go Animate

·  Smore.com - make online flyers to create arguments

·  Storybird - create a book to create an argument

·  Animoto - tie text and pictures together

·  [teacher productivity] Doctopus

·  [teacher productivity] Goobric - Chrome extension that pop-ups a rubric over a Google Doc so teacher can grade the work and the grades feed into a Spreadsheet

·  Embed.verite.co - create historical timelines from a Google spreadsheet

·  Wevideo & Youtube - create videos

·  Soundcloud - create podcast of "Radio broadcast" from the 20s

·  TodaysMeet - can create your own chat room, messages limited to 140 characters (like Twitter), students can ask questions and share answers. 

·  Twitter - students assume identities of historical figures and tweet as of they were them;  then they have 'Twitter wars' where they pit characters against each other (e.g. Charles Darwin vs Elizabeth Cady Stanton)

·  Comic Life - comic program

·  Bit Strips - can create avatars for students

Thursday, May 9th - Special Education (recording)

·  Google Dictionary - enables student to define a word on a website and pronounces the word for the students

·  Voice search (on Google.com) - students can say a word and it will help them spell it  

·  Google Voice - use it to text parents to schedule Individual Education Plan (IEP) meetings; and use it for students to call and leave a voicemail to record themselves reading aloud

·  Google URL shortener - makes it easier for students instead of typing entire site

·  One tab - condenses all tabs into one window and saves memory on Chromebook

·  Google Keep - help kids keep track of their tasks

·  Google Chat - keeping in touch with students after school

·  Google Sheets - kids can give feedback on other students' speeches/interviews to keep them engaged; teacher can watch kids add their feedback to make sure they're on task

·  CodeAcademy & Scratch - teach coding to students and the teacher doesn't have to be a coder him/herself

·  Socrative Teacher - able to create quizzes for exit tickets;  also can create a game out of it so students race each other and see who gets the most correct answers the most quickly

·  Quiz using Gmail subject lines -- one of the teachers on the Hangout created this! Creates a game out of quizzes

·  Spelling City

·  Brainpop

·  Voice Comments in Google Docs - allows teachers to highlight text and give a voice comment instead of typing it

·  Flubaroo 

Friday, May 10th - Language Arts (recording)

·  Youtube - create public service announcements and edit on Youtube

·  Google Voice - younger students use the landline at school to call Google voice and record themselves reading outloud.  Then the teacher can refer back to the original text and make notes for them.

·  Mural.ly - can use it for infographics and paste in sources

·  Google forms - for surveys of students' interests

·  Edublog - every student has their own blog and can write on whatever topic interests them

·  NoRedInk - create assignments and quizzes that are grammar-based.  The questions also relate to students' interests (e.g. Justin Bieber; Modern Family)

·  WeVideo - teachers love it even more than iMovie because it's not device dependent; also more collaborative than iMovie

·  Google Sites - ePortfolios

·  Snapchat & Twitter - send out poems via these social media channels

·  Typing Club

·  eBooks that are accessible via their schools' library

·  Blabberize - upload a picture and have it talk; use in language arts to pick a character from a book and give a report on that character