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Closed Captions in Google Slides

by Diana Benner November 27, 2018

written by Diana Benner

*Updated 12/2/19

Last month, Google rolled out automated closed captions for Google Slides. Thanks to this exciting update, now when you present with Google Slides, you can turn on automatic captions to display your words in real time at the bottom of the screen.

The Advantages of Closed Captions

“Closed captioning in Slides can help audience members … who are deaf or hard of hearing, but it can also be useful for audience members without hearing loss who are listening in noisy auditoriums or rooms with poor sound settings,” G Suite Accessibility Software Engineers Laura D’Aquila and Abigail Klein wrote in a blog post about the update. “Closed captioning can also be a benefit when the presenter is speaking a non-native language or is not projecting their voice.”

Closed captioning can also be a game-changer for educators in the classroom. Closed captioning can help meet different students’ learning styles. It will also support your students who are second language learners. And of course, always providing access for students with disabilities is a must. Therefore, check out the steps below in order to use closed captions with your Slide presentations.

Steps for Using Closed Captions

Below are the steps for using closed captions with Google Slides:

Step 1: Set up your microphone

Your microphone needs to be on and working in order to use captions with Google Slides.

Step 2: Present with captions

Open your presentation in Google Slides. You must be using the Chrome browser on a Mac or PC.
To start presenting, click Present.
Click CC to turn on captions. You can also use the shortcut Ctrl + Shift + C in Windows or Chrome OS, or the Command key + Shift + C if you’re using a Mac.
Begin speaking. As you speak, captions will appear at the bottom of the screen. Note that captions don’t include punctuation and are not stored.
To turn off captions, click CC.

The captions are powered by machine learning. They are heavily influenced by the speaker’s accent, voice modulation, and intonation. Currently, Google Slides close captioning only supports English. However, Google hopes to expand the feature to be available in other languages soon.

Tips for Using Captions

Before you begin using closed captions, you might want to let your audience know beforehand. Google recommends asking your audience for their preference before enabling captions. Some people find them more distracting than helpful. It’s also worth noting that captions and your microphone automatically turn off if there’s no activity on your computer for 30 minutes.

Put simply, closed captions has many benefits for everyone. When presentations are accessible to learners of all abilities and learning styles, everybody wins. Give it try!

Update

In October of 2019, Google added the ability for users to personalize caption text size and position while presenting in Google Slides. These features can help make captions easier to read, like ensuring all audience members can view captions in a large room. Or, you could make your text smaller to maximize the number of words on screen at once.

November 27, 2018 1 comment

Translate YouTube Captions and Audio

by Miguel Guhlin August 10, 2020

written by Miguel Guhlin

Do you need to peruse foreign language videos on YouTube for class? Perhaps you want to demonstrate how easy technology has made audio and closed captioning for videos. YouTube offers a host of wonderful features such as the built-in editor that makes it easy to trim video. What’s more, you can add attribution and copyright-free audio to enchant the ears. One feature I missed? Closed captioning of audio in videos I had put into YouTube. There’s nothing quite so delightful as to hear your words spoken in a foreign tongue and see your closed captions in another language. In this blog entry, we explore several Chrome extensions that make translating YouTube videos easy.

A Quick Review of Tools

Microsoft’s Immersive Reader has taken digital tools to the next level. With it, you can divide words into syllables, have web pages read aloud. You can even translate the pages into other languages then have them read to you. Find Immersive Reader in popular tools, such as the following:

This integration astounds any educator who had to translate the hard way, one word or phrase at a time.

Source: Explore MS Accessibility for Remote Learning

G Suite EDU is no slouch either when it comes to translating because you can translate documents using Google Docs. Here’s a screenshot showing a handful of languages Google Docs can translate:

translate

You can get to the feature easily enough. Simply go to Tools when in Google Docs, and then click on Translate document. It will generate a separate document with the translated copy.

translate

But what about videos on YouTube? How do you translate the audio found there? Let’s take a look at three Chrome extensions sure to dazzle the eye and ear.

Extension #1: Auto Translate Captions for YouTube

YouTube, as mentioned before, can be quite powerful, but sometimes, those powerful features are unavailable. The Auto Translate Captions for YouTube Chrome extension turns on translation.

You can see it in action via this screenshot. My video is in English, but the subtitles appear in Spanish:

translate

According to their website, it will do the following:

This extension will activate the auto-translate feature of YouTube. It does this even if the feature is not in the menu. The extension activates the feature using a chosen language. This occurs each time you activate the closed captions.

Other solutions exist that allow you to take advantage of subtitle dubbing as well. Here’s a short list of Chrome extensions that I found worked well.

Extension #2: Subtitles Player

Subtitles player Chrome extension allows for reading and translating subtitles. It offers these features:

Instant translation from any foreign language
Score subtitles when watching foreign video files
Choose your favorite voice for voice acting
View lectures with translation
Video picture synchronization and voice track tempo

Although this extension comes close to real time audio translation, it falls short. Listening to it in Spanish, for example, is tough. It is like listening to an English speaker read Spanish with an English pronunciation.

Extension #3: Caption Speaker

Wow, this version of a subtitle translator and player is fantastic. Caption Speaker astonished me with its high quality. I do recommend this particular one above all others for use with foreign languages.

translate

As you can see from the screenshot, the options for the Chrome extension are simple. I would not bother with testing the speech sample text. It is nowhere near the quality you will experience when listening to a video with this feature turned on.

Here’s a quick video of Caption Speaker in action with two videos. In the first example, Mariah Carey’s Hero (one of my favorite songs for ed tech campus tech specialists), you’ll note that the captions are in another language. That language reflects the video uploader’s language preference. Mariah’s words do get translated into Spanish, the language I set in Caption Speaker. In the second example in the video, Food of the Gods, I have to refresh the page for Caption Speaker to kick in. Watch me go through this below:

Auto translating a YouTube video is something I have long wished for. Anyone who speaks more than one language, or would like to, will find one of these extensions useful.

August 10, 2020 0 comment

Microsoft Tips and Tricks

New PowerPoint Translator Makes Captioning Possible

by Miguel Guhlin August 16, 2017

written by Miguel Guhlin

New web-based translation services make captioning easier. Microsoft now includes captioning in its Office suite as Powerpoint combines with Microsoft Translator to create powerful learning opportunities for students.

Why Captioning Matters

While Powerpoint Translator has great features, let’s reflect on the reasons why captioning is a PreK-12 education necessity.

Captioning is required by law. Relevant law includes Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act . Both require captioning on student-available educational video. This can be critical for hearing-impaired learners. For PreK-12 public school students, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires equal access to education. This makes captioning educational video a requirement. (source).
Captioning helps non-native speakers. There are 4.6 million English Language Learners (ELL) in public schools.
Captioning improves reading comprehension, retention, and focus. Same language subtitling can improve student attitude, engagement, and reading proficiency levels (source).
Captioning makes your presentation more searchable. Adding subtitles to your work makes content searchable on the web as search engines index your subtitles. This makes it easy for others to find ideas matched to their search terms.

Let’s discuss the changes Microsoft has made to PowerPoint.

Key Features

The PowerPoint Translator add-in has these features:

Subtitles

Real-time subtitles to presentations in any of the 10 supported speech languages. Supported languages include Arabic, Chinese (Mandarin), English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.
Subtitles can be shown in the presenter’s language. This supports accessibility scenarios.
Subtitles may be seen in any of the 60+ languages.

Audience Interaction

The audience can use their own device as long as it is equipped with the Microsoft Translator app (Android | iOS).
The audience can follow along. Presenters can use a QR or five letter conversation code. This allows them to participate in a multi-language Q&A.
The add-in learns technical terms, acronyms, and special names. It does this by scanning the content of slides/notes. The add-in presents jargon to the audience.
Up to 100 audience members in the room can follow along in their own language. They may use their own phone, tablet, or computer.

Translation

Translate the text of PowerPoint. This preserves the original formatting,
Languages (left-to-right, right-to-left) can be translated from one to the other.

Make Learning Accessible

Powerpoint Translator makes subtitling automatic and closed captioning possible. How will you use these Microsoft tools to transform learning in your classroom?

August 16, 2017 0 comment

Equity, Diversity, Inclusion Good Teaching Planning and Preparation

Five Strategies for Equitable Lesson Plans

by Ashley Harden, M.Ed November 8, 2022

written by Ashley Harden, M.Ed

Take a moment and look at ALL the things around you. Pause. Now take a moment and look at EACH thing around you. What’s the difference? For me, there are three distinct differences. First, it took more time to look at each object around me. Second, I noticed the details I would have normally ignored or not noticed at all. Third, I was more intentional in understanding the importance of what was around me. Let’s apply this to what we do as educators. Because, whether you are a classroom teacher, administrator, or other staff member, we all must take the time to notice the details and importance of the students we serve. This requires us to take an EACH approach rather than “all” to achieve equitable educational.

When we plan for all of our students and not EACH of our students, someone is bound to be forgotten. Most educators would agree that equity should be something that we strive for when educating students, but may struggle with how exactly to execute it. How do you turn a theory or educational belief into an actuality? Break down the components of the theory and develop an individual action plan for each. This is exactly what needs to be done for teachers to create lesson plans that will lead to equitable education and increased academic success.

When thinking about lesson plans, we can categorize our plans as input (content instruction) and output (evidence of student comprehension). Let’s go over five strategies for creating an equitable lesson plan that can meet the needs of EACH student you serve.

5 strategies for creating equitable lesson plans

Input: Content Instruction

1. High Expectations Paired with Resources

Oftentimes, educators may feel that by lowering expectations and rigor they are helping students that require more support. The opposite is actually more imperative, especially in the case of required standardized exams. Educators that have an academic impact on students need to keep high expectations. The caveat here is that the high expectations need to be paired with more resources in order to be equitable, or it just perpetuates more inequity.

resources and high expectations to create equitable lessons

Resources that support high expectations:

Curated or created videos
Scaffolding to strengthen foundational content
Small or individual study groups
Provide multiple opportunities and avenues for evidence of comprehension
Compassion, or what I like to call “tough love”

2. Accessibility for Disability and Flexibility

Each year, you may have students that require accessibility accommodations or modifications due to a disability. The adjustments needed are often made after you received your roster and SPED or 504 documentation. However, what if you created lessons with accessibility features without knowing who was on your roster? What if those features had the potential to help each of your students? Accessibility is a key component of an equitable lesson plan. It allows students, with or without a disability, to control how they access and digest the information presented.

accessibility to create equitable lessons

Types of accessibility features that provide learner flexibility:

Closed captioning on videos
Provide instruction and information in digestible chunks
Text-to-speech screen reader
Digital notes and text

3. Student Experiential Relevance

What is student experiential relevance? It is the opportunity for students to make personal connections to the content based on their own experiences. Do your lesson plans prompt students to say “I see me,” “I have felt that,” or “I have been through that?” According to John Hattie, there are three main ways to trigger relevance to a student: personal association, personal usefulness, and personal identification. As a former chemistry teacher, I do want to be realistic here; I know that not every lesson lends itself to allow for you to consider student experience. This takes the focus off of cultural, racial, and socio-economic labels while redirecting to the individual’s experiences.

student experience to create equitable lessons

Ways to consider student experiential relevance:

Use current events to parallel historical events.
Develop a science experiment/experience using common household items to encourage understanding of how students interact with science every day.
Diversify readings to allow for both classic and more modern representation.
Create a math experience that allows students to solve real-life problems or that connects to interests like music, sports, careers, etc.
Use real-world virtual or in-person simulations to promote learning and content connection.

Output: Evidence of Student Comprehension

4. Mastery Over Compliance

Before you get nervous about this strategy, don’t stress. This does not remove responsibility from the student to complete work but provides multiple opportunities for students to be successful within the same time frame. Notice I said “over” not “instead of” compliance. Otherwise, we would be lowering expectations, which we already know wouldn’t benefit the student. The goal of educators and students should be student mastery of content more than making sure the assignment is turned in by 11:59 pm on Tuesday and the test isn’t until the following week.

mastery over compliance to create equitable lessons

How to build in opportunities for mastery:

Provide multiple attempts on formative assignments, and take the average or higher grade for the students to demonstrate growth.
Provide meaningful feedback and allow students to make corrections or redo the assignments.
Provide rubrics to guide the students on how to effectively complete a project or assignment.
Allow for peer collaboration for shared responsibility of learning

5. Student Perspective in Learning

This will require you, as an educator, to examine your own bias. Not just your personal bias, but also your content area bias. Allowing students to demonstrate their learning from their own perspective provides them the opportunity to share from their unique lens, so you must be open to receiving different viewpoints on the same topic. Not only do students get to have ownership of who they are but they can learn more about each other. As a teacher, you also have the unique experience of getting a glimpse of the emotions, outlooks, and interpretations of your students.

student perspectives to create equitable lessons

Ways to incorporate student perspective:

Students write an essay as if they were a character in the text based on their experiences.
Provide multiple avenues of expression to demonstrate learning: drawing, songs, movement, writing, etc.
The student applies topics to their potential career field.
Create structured group or paired discussions to allow for personal perspectives.

I hope you’re feeling inspired to apply these strategies to your lesson planning practices. To make it easier to apply these, I want to share this equity check for lesson planning template. It will guide you through each strategy as you’re planning, so you can create an equitable lesson plan without even knowing who is on your class roster.

**Equity Check for Lesson Planning** Template

November 8, 2022 3 comments

Chromebooks

Five Free Tools for Chromebooks

by Miguel Guhlin August 18, 2022

written by Miguel Guhlin

Have a cart full of Chromebooks but aren’t sure what digital tools you can use? Or why? While many use Chromebooks every day, it never hurts to review some amazing digital tools. Of course, you can find a lot of great apps for Chromebooks at the Chromebook App Hub. It offers paid apps for every subject and grade level. But what if you want free, no-cost apps? This is the list for you.

Two New Features for Chromebooks

You may have missed the announcement earlier this summer. Chromebooks are arriving with two special powers. These include built-in screencasting with closed captioning and simple video editing. Check out my infographic for more info.

Now let’s get to a quick roundup of Chromebook-friendly tools and add-ons. Here we go.

Digital Tool #1: Kapwing Video Editor and Creator

Kapwing Pro is now 100% free for students and educators. No longer will you have to pine for some free, high-quality video editor. Kapwing Video Editor, featured in this TCEA blog entry, offers so much. And the Pro version is now available at no charge for educators and students. Isn’t that amazing?

Kapwing Pro for Education features:

Presentation recording
Group projects
Video editing and greenscreens
Template and worksheet design
Video translation
Subtitles
Copyright-free images, music, and templates
Video import from the Internet

Want to know if you qualify for the Kapwing Pro plan? Per their website:

Teachers at accredited K-12 schools and higher education institutions are eligible for the Kapwing for Education Plan.

Students currently enrolled at accredited K-12 schools who are at least 13 years old are eligible for the Kapwing for Education plan. (Students enrolled at higher education institutions are not eligible at this time.)

Digital Tool #2: Canva for Educators

Canva is an incredibly versatile tool that you can use for everything. You only have to read these TCEA blog entries to see how amazing Canva is. It does everything:

Here’s a quick video overview of how to get started:

Want some help with back-to-school resources? Canva has you covered.

Get verified as a teacher or student to use Canva Pro for free.

Digital Tool #3: Book Creator

If you haven’t used Book Creator, it is an excellent ePub creation tool boasting over 15 million ebooks. It works on Chromebooks, iOS, Android and Windows devices.

Book Creator allows you to create a simple ePub without media. Or you can liven things up with an enhanced ePub. The latter includes video, audio, and more embedded. Read their blog for TONS of ideas. You can also share your creations to cloud storage (e.g., Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, or iCloud). It also supports the creation of digital comic books.

Get Book Creator for free.

Note: You can create one library and store up to 40 books for free. It’s enough to get started. Be sure to explore templates! Then get become a Book Creator Certified Educator via TCEA’s $39 online course with one year membership FREE! Start Your Journey of Creativity and Learning NOW.

Digital Tool #4: Image Capture Tools

Need an easy-to-use image capture and annotation tool? You know, a browser-based add-on that captures your screen, then lets you annotate the image? Lightshot is my all-time favorite tool and works great in the Chrome browser.

Sometimes, you need a tool that can capture a scrolling webpage, not only what appears on the screen. Give Fireshot a try. It’s a great tool to have in your toolbox. Of course, if you need a photo editor, give Pixlr E and Photopea a shot. Need another amazing tool that makes assembling content easy? Try out Sketch.io’s Sketchpad, which I’ve written about before. It offers support for multiple languages, so it’s usable in any space you like.

Digital Tool #5: GIF Cap

Need to make a quick walkthrough of steps to share with students or colleagues? You could record a video. Another popular approach relies on creating animated GIFs for a screen recording. gifcap makes that possible.

It’s so easy to use, that you’ll be creating short walkthroughs of steps for students. If you need a digital tool that takes a series of images and turns them into an animated gif, give EZGIF a try. EZGIF “…is a simple online GIF maker and toolset for basic animated GIF editing.” It makes it easy to “create, resize, crop, reverse, optimize, and apply some effects to GIFs.”

Now that you’ve seen some of my favorite, go-to tools for Chromebook, what would you add? Add them in the comments.

Bonus Tools!

What, you thought I was done? Here are a few more that make my life easier. I bet they will make your life easier, too.

Custom Scrollbars. What a lifesaver. The current trend in browser scrollbars is thin and thinner. But when you’re working on a Chromebook or tablet, small scrollbars are problematic. They disappear, and if you scroll through content (imagine a long Google Doc), whew! It can be tough. That’s why Custom Scrollbars add-on is so awesome. And it’s free!
Icon Insertion Tools: Explore these two tools to get icons you can insert into Google Slides.
- Icons for Slides and Docs
- The Noun Project
Background Removers
- Remove.bg
- Icons8’s AI Background Remover
Classroom Screen makes it easy to share information with your students on the big screen.
Tab Resize. Split your screen layout on a Chromebook, if you need to. Many are accustomed to working on dual monitors, but when you are on the go, you may still need a split screen. This Chrome add-on can make that possible.

Have an incredible year. Use technology to lessen your stress, increase connections with others, and make your life easier.

August 18, 2022 0 comment

English Language Arts ESL/ELL Foreign Language Spanish

28 Free QR Code Read Aloud Cards – in Spanish!

by Emily Horn May 6, 2022

written by Emily Horn

I’m back with more read alouds. This time- in Spanish! These 28 stories are available thanks to Scholastic Storybook Treasures, and they have stories in Mandarin as well. If you’re teaching Spanish as a second language, teaching in a bilingual setting, or if you have Spanish-speaking students in your class, you might find these useful. If you read my previous QR code blog article, I gave some tips for in-class read alouds and listed ideas for using the QR codes in class for independent reading. Those ideas also apply here!

What Works Well

I like these read alouds because they are visually pleasing. The images are animated and interesting, and the speaking is very clear and at a decent rate. They provide a good model for fluent reading and pronunciation in Spanish. No doubt they will be interesting for students!

Even Better If

These videos would be even better if they had closed captioning for accessibility and to allow students to see the words as they were being spoken. This would help with word recognition, vocabulary, and letter-sound correspondence. If you watch these directly on Youtube, be aware– there are a lot of ads. Nevertheless, these do provide a good option for independent Spanish read alouds in the classroom. But there is a trick for eliminating those ads using Wakelet! Don’t know what Wakelet is? No problem. Check out this great article. To prevent students from having to watch ads, I went ahead and placed them in Wakelet for you.

Removing Ads and Creating QR Codes in Wakelet

You can place each video link in a separate Wakelet collection and set the privacy for each collection to be “unlisted.” Then, for each collection, click “share” and chose the QR code option. I saved the QR codes as images to my laptop. Here’s a quick one-minute video tutorial.

The QR Code Cards

Download QR Codes to Spanish Read Alouds

I hope you find this Wakelet tip helpful and that you and your students enjoy these 28 FREE QR Code Spanish Read Alouds! Happy reading (and listening).

May 6, 2022 3 comments

Special Needs

Nine Technology Tools for Accommodation, Modification, and Intervention

by Dr. Bruce Ellis October 19, 2021

written by Dr. Bruce Ellis

In a previous post, Make Learning Accessible for All Students: Accommodation, Modification, and Intervention, I shared the differences between accommodation, modification, and intervention. Specific examples were also provided to help clarify and shed light on ways to accomplish these means of support for your students. Today, we’ll identify a few technology tools that can be used by the teacher and the student for accommodation, modification, and intervention. These tools are not necessarily designed as “assistive technology” as defined by special education, but can be used to varying degrees. Some of the tools mentioned below can also be found in our free, downloadable ebook 51 Fun Tech Tools and Resources for Busy Educators. After looking through the list, please be sure to comment below if you have ideas or tools to share.

1. Google Slides Closed Captioning

Even if you don’t have a presentation to show, you can still pull up a blank slide deck. Once opened, go into presenter mode. Then, you can enable closed captioning for your lecture. Google Slides doesn’t display punctuation, but does a great job of displaying what is being said. You can adjust the location of the captioning as well as the size of the text. Google Slides does not translate or save the captioning for later viewing. There is some other good information about closed captioning at Google Support.

Image of Microsoft Word Dictation microphone — Screenshot by author

2. Microsoft Word Dictation

If you have students that struggle to write, this is an option you might want to consider. With Dictation, students can speak into a microphone and have Word type out what they say. Besides speaking the words, students can also say the punctuation and have Word add it as they speak. For example, they would say something like, “Did you go to the park question mark.” Microsoft Office will then place the question mark when spoken.

You can also turn on Auto Punctuation. With this, Word will incorporate artificial intelligence to punctuate as it best understands. A profanity filter can also be turned on. Hopefully, you don’t need this, but if you have a student that has been diagnosed with coprolalia, you may find this is helpful if they also need to dictate their writing. You can also dictate to Word in other languages. This does not mean translating what you say, but instead typing what you are saying using the language you’re speaking. These dictation features are also available in Microsoft Outlook.

image of Google Voice Typing microphone — Screenshot by author

3. Google Voice Typing

Though not as robust as Word Dictation, Voice Typing in Google Docs or Google Slides (speaker notes) does allow you to dictate words and punctuation. This can later be edited in the typical fashion. Google Docs and Slides do not incorporate auto punctuation or a profanity filter. Once dictated, you can translate the Google Doc into another language. To do this, you will use a new document and then click on Tools and Translate Document. Keep in mind that the translation may not be perfect, so it is recommended that you have a native speaker of the language review the translation. Especially if you are creating documents for students, parents, or others using the translation feature, it is important they are correct.

image of recordcast website — Screenshot by author

4. RecordCast

This free and simple-to-use screen recording tool allows you to record your webcam, your screen, or both. This is great for students who need access to instruction multiple times. Utilizing the screen + webcam feature is handy for students who may be hard of hearing and need to see the teacher or interpreter sign. RecordCast also allows you to do simple video editing and sharing. You are limited to five minutes with the free version and up to 30 minutes for the paid version. If you need more robust software that is still simple and user-friendly, consider using Screencastify or Screencast-o-matic. If your students are using an iPad, they can easily create a screen recording (including sound) without downloading any apps. They’ll just need to:

Go to Settings > Control Center, then tap the Insert button next to Screen Recording.
Open Control Center, tap the Screen Recording button, then wait for the three-second countdown.
To stop recording, open Control Center, tap the Selected Screen Recording button or the red status bar at the top of the screen, then tap Stop.

image of classroomscreen — Screenshot by author

5. Classroomscreen

This website has 14 tools to help with various classroom procedures. Several of the tools are great at helping students track their time and manage their behavior. As the teacher, you can pull these up on your computer and have them displayed on the board.

The sound level allows students to monitor their noise level while still being able to discuss and share. The teacher can adjust the mic level and sensitivity. The traffic light is a good way to indicate what task the students should be working on. It can also be used to show how much time is left for the assigned task. Of course, the timer, stopwatch, and clock are all great for helping students pace themselves and manage their efforts in using their time wisely.

Additionally, you can use multiple widgets at the same time. For example, you can use the work symbols so students are reminded what they should be working on. At the same time, you can have the timer displayed on the screen while also showing the sound level indicator. These tools help students practice appropriate classroom behavior and allow you to move around the classroom and assist students with other tasks.

6. Doozy

You’ll find plenty of fun on this site, as well as helpful tools for activities like short-answer or multiple-choice quizzes. You don’t have to register to use the site. It may take you a while to explore and see which features you like the most. It may also take time to determine when to use them, so plan ahead and explore now. Besides quizzes, you can have games, icebreakers, and more! Some activities have a limit of 25 students while others can have up to 100, so be sure to pay attention to the limit as you select and design.

7. Immersive Reader

Immersive Reader is a free tool that employs effective and proven methods to enhance reading skills for individuals of any age or proficiency level. Students have the ability to have text read aloud to them, enlarge font size, modify the spacing between lines and characters, alter the background and text color contrast, access a picture dictionary, translation, and more!

Microsoft Immersive Reader is available on the following platforms:

OneNote Online
OneNote Universal App
OneNote for Mac and iPad
OneNote Desktop (as a free add-in)
Word Online
Word Desktop
Word for Mac, iPad, and iPhone
Outlook Online
Outlook Desktop
Office Lens for iPhone and iPad (iOS)
Microsoft Edge browser
Microsoft Teams

image of cloud stop motion tool — Screenshot by author

8. Cloud Stop Motion

If you ever wanted your students to do stop motion videos but didn’t have the “right” devices, this is the site for you. Stop motion is a video in which each frame is shot individually, with the producer (i.e., student) moving something a tiny bit between each shot. If you are looking for alternative ways in which students can communicate their learning, then think about this method. Here are some short stop motion examples on YouTube. Note: These are not necessarily educational examples, but just search results examples.

You can use Cloud Stop Motion on any device, laptop, tablet, or smartphone. And, to make it even better, there is no cost. You will need decent WIFI since everything is done in the cloud, but that also means you don’t have to download any software or have a specific plug-in installed. Yay! And, if you have created stop motion animation before, you will be happy to know that Cloud Stop Motion incorporates onion skinning, which makes the process much faster and more accurate. You’ll have up to 2GB of cloud storage and all the features, though the paid version also provides you with up to 1T of cloud storage.

image of infogram website — Screenshot by author

9. Infogram

This site is great for instances in which students need to create infographics and reports. The free version has plenty of features for your students to use. You can make up to 10 different projects, with each project containing up to five pages. You also can use any of the 37+ interactive chart types, including infographics, reports, slides, dashboards, posters, social media posts, email headers, and YouTube thumbnails. When creating infographics, you can import data and then easily manipulate it. The project you make will be public on the web via a publicly viewable URL that can be indexed by search engines. To have private (invite-only) projects, you will need to upgrade to a paid plan.

What Other Tools?

What other tools (websites or apps) would you recommend to a teacher trying to help with accommodations, modifications, and/or interventions in his classroom? Drop us a line below in the comments and let us know.

October 19, 2021 2 comments

Google Tips and Tricks

Updates to Google Workspace

by Miguel Guhlin December 24, 2020

written by Miguel Guhlin

Powerful new updates for Google Workspace are now available. In this blog entry, you will find out about a few of those that impact how you interact with Workspace tools.

Google Classroom Rosters and Flipgrid

Before we jump into Google Workspace’s updates, let’s take a moment to celebrate. Flipgrid has a new feature to add class rosters directly from Classroom. That’s right; you can now add Google Classroom rosters to Flipgrid discussions. This facilitates student access and saves time for busy teachers. Click the image below to watch Flipgrid’s video introduction.

Another Flipgrid update is the ability for students to be able to record video AND audio. Flipgrid keeps making astounding additions to their product. Not only do you have closed captioning possible in Flipgrid videos, but now there’s more. You can take advantage of microphone-only mode, which makes audio recordings easy.

Two other neat features include Flipgrid shorts camera updates and nametag cover images. One feature I find exciting is how you can create a mixtape of student videos recorded in Flipgrid. Imagine how easy it is to create a summary of exciting learning happening in your learning space.

As amazing as Flipgrid’s new integration is for Google Classroom teachers, there’s more.

Did You Know?

Explore Google Classroom in more detail via TCEA’s online, self-paced course. The purpose of this course is to assist educators in becoming more comfortable with Google Classroom. Participants who successfully complete this course will receive a TCEA Google Classroom digital badge and completion certificate.

Google Workspace Updates

There have been a host of updates for Google Meet recently, as well as other nifty editing features. Let’s take these updates one at a time.

Google Meet

If you blinked, you may have missed Google Meet video call link’s appearance in a classic space. That space? Google Hangouts.

According to Google, face-to-face video calls have these limits:

10 people for Gmail and Google Workspace Basics
25 people for Business and Education

Google Meet settings are now changing, gaining a “sticky” feel. That is, if you turn off certain features in your settings, Meet will remember those and they will appear in future meetings. Of course, those sticky settings will only appear for meetings that use the same meeting code. Sticky settings are associated with specific meeting codes, not people. That means you can set custom settings for each meeting you are in.

Editing Office Files in Google Workspace

Are you a Microsoft Office fanatic, but are stuck in a Google world? Then Google Workspace has taken a few steps to make your life easier. Those new features include the following:

Edit MS Office files with Google tools on open
Multi-page orientation now possible in Google Docs
Macro converter for MS Excel to Google Sheets

Let’s dig into these new features.

Feature #1: Default Editing of MS Office

Editing Microsoft Office files is now set by default in Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. This new feature may save you a double-click. In the past, you had to double-click to take a quick peek at the document. Now, you can click and open, going straight to edit mode.

Image Source: Google

Feature #2: Multi-Page Orientation

If you haven’t tried to put a portrait and landscape series of pages in Google Docs, you’ve missed out. Now you can insert section breaks that change page orientation. For example, maybe your first 10 pages are portrait, but for pages 11 through 15, you want to switch to landscape. What do you do? Rely on Google’s new multiple page orientations option.

Image Source: Google

Feature #3: Macro Converter

Oh, I can hear the Microsoft Excel advocates now. They aren’t ready to make the switch from Microsoft Excel to Google Sheets. “The macros never make it from an Excel workbook into Google Sheets,” they cry. Well, those days are coming to an end.

You now have a macro converter for Microsoft Excel. The macro converter does its thing with Excel files as it converts macros to Google Sheets format. Microsoft’s Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) code gets turned into Apps Script code. The Apps Script code works in Google Sheets.

Stay tuned for more updates from Google Workspace.

Feature Image Source

Photo by Mitchell Luo on Unsplash

December 24, 2020 0 comment

ESL/ELL

Five Ways to Support English Language Learners Virtually

by Diana Benner October 21, 2020

written by Diana Benner

Many students, including English language learners (ELLs), have unique learning needs during virtual learning. It is vital that we focus on how we can create a remote learning environment that sets up each student for success and is designed to meet the needs of each student in our classroom. Some students may have trouble articulating themselves on camera during a synchronous meeting. Therefore, some may be more willing to express themselves in another format. Below are a few ways to support English language learners in a virtual environment.

Use Text Read-Aloud Tools

Allow students to have text read aloud to them. Free tools, such as Microsoft’s Immersive Reader, can improve ELLs’ fluency. When using Immersive Reader, students can have text read out loud to them in the language of their choice. Immersive reader currently supports 68 different languages and is available through Microsoft Word, OneNote, Teams, and Forms. In addition, there is a growing list of tools that support immersive readers like Flipgrid, Canvas, and more. If students use the Chrome browser or Chromebooks, they can use the unofficial Immersive Reader extension to help them read text on any webpage. In addition, the When Text to Speech Matters blog offers even more tools.

Incorporate Closed Captioning

When presenting a lesson or recording video content, incorporate closed captioning. Captioning allows students to read along and see the words that are being said. For English learners, captions can help improve vocabulary acquisition, listening comprehension, and word recognition. In addition, using captions in videos can help ensure that these students access important material.

Some tools that offer closed captioning include Google Slides. When presenting with Google Slides, you can turn closed captioning on. For directions on how to do this, check out Closed Captions in Google Slides. Another free captioning tool includes Maestra which offers captioning right from your browser.

Use Recording Tools

Use recording tools to allow students to record themselves. This will help them demonstrate mastery of the content. Encourage them to use digital tools like Vocaroo, Voicethread, or Flipgrid so they can express themselves. You, as the teacher, can also use recording tools to highlight or review important content with students.

Make Content in Their Native Language

If students are struggling with the content in English, make resources available to them in their native language. This can help them overcome barriers to learning. You could always have students review content in their native language and then share their learning in English.

Avoid Text in Images

Avoid including text in images. While this is a good accessibility principle in general, text embedded in images cannot be read aloud through support tools like Immersive Reader or Google Translate. An example is this diagram of the heart.

Additional Resources

If you would like to explore more accessibility tools as well as ways to make accommodations in your instruction, be sure to check out our Special Needs Educator Certification online course. What are some ways you support English language learners in your classroom? Comment below.

October 21, 2020 4 comments

LMS Special Needs

Student Accommodations in the Canvas LMS

by Dr. Bruce Ellis September 11, 2020

written by Dr. Bruce Ellis

I can’t believe it is already September. School has started and some things, though not normal, are moving forward. If you find yourself teaching online in Canvas, you may have encountered the same situation as many other educators. How do I make accommodations when teaching virtually? Traditional accommodations may not translate flawlessly to online learning.

504s and IEPs

Let’s start by clarifying the difference between 504 plans versus IEPs (Individualized Educational Program). Both outline accommodations for students, are provided by the educational institution for the students identified, and have state and federal guidelines that must be followed.

Now let’s try to clarify the differences in simple terms. An IEP is for students who struggle in school and have special needs that qualify them for special services at no charge to their families. The IEP is a plan that identifies goals for the student and what support is needed for the student to achieve those goals. There are many reasons why a student might qualify for an IEP such as physical or learning disabilities, hearing or visual impairment, autism, and emotional disorders.

Think of an IEP as a in-depth plan for students qualifying for special education services that is delivered and monitored by additional school and support staff. A 504 plan can be for both those students who qualify for special education services and those who do not. A 504 plan is monitored by the teacher and can be short term, such as accommodations for a student who is recovering from an injury; the student doesn’t qualify for special educational services, but does need valid assistance in order to succeed academically in their regular education classroom.

Whether the topic is 504 plans or IEPs, the main thing is that you are aware of what is expected of you as the educator if you are involved in adjusting the instructional learning environment for the student. As such, this article focuses on accommodations for students with 504 plans.

Defining Accomodations

One last item before we jump into the meat of the article. That is to define the difference between accommodations (like we are talking about here) and modifications. Accommodations make changes as to how the students learn while modifications make changes to what the students learn. Extending time for a student to take a test is an accommodation; creating a test with fewer questions for the student is a modification. The Understood Team has more information to help clarify the differences if you would like to explore that further.

Let’s take a look at traditional accommodations and how they can be transferred in a remote learning environment if you are using Canvas as your LMS.

Note: When referencing the Rich Content Editor (RCE), we will be referring to the New Rich Content Editor and not the Classic RCE. The New Rich Content Editor will start being pushed out in January 2021, but Canvas administrators are encouraged to go ahead and enable it now. They can do so by going into Admin Settings –> Feature Options –> RCE Enhancements and sliding the button to on.

Reading Accommodations

In the classroom, it may be easy to provide some accommodations for reading, such as allowing students to read aloud to each other or having a teacher assistant read to a student. In Canvas, though, if you find that you need to provide accommodations to help students with reading particular content, consider some of these solutions to help.

You may find that implementing multiple solutions can provide a safety net for those that require accommodations as well as for those that may struggle to read, but don’t yet qualify for such services.

Make use of Microsoft’s Immersive Reader integration that started rolling out in October 2019. Microsoft and Canvas have partnered to better assist educators. The Immersive Reader tool, as described by SchoolsICT, “is a free tool that implements proven techniques to improve reading and writing for people, regardless of their age or ability. Immersive Reader can improve reading comprehension and increase fluency for English language learners. It can help build confidence for emerging readers learning to read at higher levels, and offer text decoding solutions for students with learning differences such as dyslexia.” You will see the Immersive Reader button in the top right when it can be accessed. Note: The Microsoft Immersive Reader is an account feature option. If the Immersive Reader button does not display in your course, talk to your institution’s Canvas admin about enabling this feature. The Microsoft Immersive Reader is being offered in Canvas as a trial feature.
Add closed captioning to videos that you have recorded and include in your course. Canvas shares how to add captions if you have the video uploaded into Canvas. The University of Washington shares several free tools that you can use, as well as the steps required to add closed captions to videos that will be posted on YouTube.
If you find that Immersive Reader isn’t available on a particular type of content (announcement, discussion board, etc.), you may want to record your own audio and include it where unsupported text is given. Two simple choices to consider include Free Sound Recorder (free download for Windows and Mac) or the online Voice Recorder by 123Apps. Click on the image with the rocket to view a brief tutorial on recording and adding audio to a Canvas Page.

Writing Accommodations in Canvas

Here are a few solutions to help you support students who may benefit from writing accommodations.

For Assignments in Canvas, provide a variety of submission types. You can select from the list to allow students the option that best suits them. For a website URL, this could be a link to a recording (audio or video) of them sharing their response verbally and/or in writing. For Media Recordings, students can record (assuming they have a webcam available) or upload their video within Canvas. When allowing file uploads, I recommend that you limit the filetypes so that it is easier to view and support your students. If they are uploading a video, it should be in the Media Recordings tab. Otherwise, a file upload could be a PDF, JPG, PNG, MP3, DOC, XLS, or PPT. Click on the thumbnail to the right to view a brief tutorial on assignment submission in Canvas.
Allow voice typing. If your assignment is to be written and you are using a tool such as Google Docs or Microsoft Word, allow students to make use of voice typing or dictation that is built into each tool. If students are to submit their text or response in another tool or a discussion board, encourage students to use voice typing in Google Docs or Microsoft Office and then copy/paste the text where needed. Be sure they understand that both Google and Microsoft do not edit their text to add correct punctuation. The student will need to dictate the punctuation (comma, period, etc.) or type in the correct punctuation.

Note: Consider embedding a Padlet. Padlet has a variety of ways that students can respond, making it a great tool to support accommodations. Click on the image to the right to view a brief tutorial on writing accommodations in Padlet from a student’s perspective. If you need help getting started, check out Padlet’s YouTube playlist for beginners.

More Accommodations in Canvas

You can find more tips and ideas for making accommodations in Canvas by joining the Canvas Educator online course. Besides the content that is shared in the course, you’ll find frequent informative announcements that share tips, tricks, and ideas to get more from Canvas and provide a deeper, more enriching learning experience for your students.

Regardless of what you teach, consider using these accommodations to support your students, even if they do not have an IEP. What other ways do you prove accommodations to your students in a remote learning environment? Share with us in the comments below. We’d love to hear from you.

September 11, 2020 1 comment

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