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Benefits of Coloring
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Coloring Book Resources to Benefit Children and Adults

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

If you’re looking for ways to practice mindfulness, reduce anxiety, and foster art appreciation for yourself and your students, you may want to bookmark this blog entry. In it, I’ll share some great digital coloring book options that will enable your students to have so much fun. You might even enjoy them, too!

Google Arts and Culture

Reduce Anxiety, Improve Mindfulness

While views on coloring books differ, some studies suggest they are useful and can relieve anxiety and improve mindfulness. And there’s a lot of anxiety going around in the midst of a global pandemic! In fact, one study also touts an additional benefit:

Coloring books can lead children into a deeper understanding and appreciation of art (source).

 

This source refers to the practice of coloring books for adults for the purpose of anxiety relief.

Researchers found that the use of mandalas decreased two types of anxiety. Those types include state anxiety (i.e. contextual emotional experience). Also affected, to a lesser extent, is trait anxiety (i.e. personality characteristic). Reductions occurred in as quick as thirty minutes.

As for children, some people argue against children coloring, while others will suggest that there are several benefits for this activity:

  • Improved motor skills
  • School readiness
  • Stimulate creativity
  • Language development
  • Improved focus and hand-to-eye coordination
  • Spatial awareness
  • Self expression
  • Therapy and stress relief

Here are some additional health benefits (including cultivating executive function), as captured by the ColorPsychology.org video:

Finding Digital Coloring Books and Pages

You may find a rich assortment of coloring books online and available for a price. Some sources for these coloring books include Digital Book Cafe and Numeral Paint. These books cost money, but they offer a great assortment of images to color!

But there are some digital coloring books and pages that are available at no cost. You will find a roundup of a few of both below. You can color pages on your computer, Chromebook, Android, or iOS device. And, of course, you can print images out, as well.

#1- Google Arts & Culture

Google Arts and Cultures
Your favorite reindeer is available for coloring via Google Arts and Culture’s Christmas Edition of their coloring book.

Google Arts & Culture offers a variety of art coloring books. You can find an array of images in the following editions:

Panda
  • Christmas Edition: This includes a series of images such as classic Christmas cards and favorite characters such as Rudolph, cats in the snow, and more.
  • Famous Paintings: You’ll explore a wide variety of images to color such as the Statue of Liberty and other well-known figures and pieces.
  • Hanukkah Edition: Here, you will come across menorahs and tender scenes that delight the eye.
  • Kwanzaa Edition: This features a color-rich set of images, including stamps and logos.
  • Panda Edition: Oh, those most popular of bears! Appearing in a variety of action shots, as well as repose, they are giggle-inducing. Given the birth of panda twins in 2021, these are sure to engage.
  • Ramadan and Eid: You’ll come across beautiful images that are both colorful and insightful.
  • The Diwali Edition: Here it is possible for children to color beautiful Diwali artwork.

These full-color images can be converted into coloring book-friendly images, and you also get a color palette to work with.

coloring book

You can save your completed work of art as a PNG image-formatted file or share a link (e.g., Google Classroom support available).

#2 – 40 Free Coloring Books

coloring book

Looking for free images your child can color? Then you may find this collection of 40 free coloring books of interest. It offers a wide selection of images for coloring, such as:

  • ABCs Coloring Book (58 pages)
  • Animal Alphabet (27 pages)
  • Butterflies (107 pages)
  • Cat Coloring book (150 pages)
  • Christmas Coloring Book (56)

Although these are Adobe PDF files, you can color without printing. These are easily usable in apps like Seesaw or Xodo.com, which you can use for free.

coloring book

#3 – Zen Coloring Book for Adults

Zen: Coloring Book for Adults is an app for Windows devices. You can choose from “tons of gorgeous designs, blending and texture options.”

Mandalas

Some of the images offered are available for free, while others require purchase. These anxiety-reducing mandalas are free, for example.

#4 – The Color

This fun, online coloring space offers a wide variety (4,663) of images for coloring. Organized into a variety of categories, you can find holiday images, such as Dia de los Muertos. You can also find many different categories including Aesop’s Fables, baby animals, dinosaurs, insects, monsters, and much more.

The Color

The coloring interface is easy to use, as you can see above. When done coloring, you can send colored images via email. With a free account, you are able to save images to your gallery feature on the website. Selecting Print gives you an image you can save to your device.

#5 – Coloring Apps

You may be wondering what coloring apps are available for your smartphone or tablet. Below, find a quick roundup of apps. Free apps top the list, but be aware that some may include advertisements.

coloring bookAndroid Apps in the Google Play Store:

Note that you will need to log in with your personal Google account, not a Google Workspace account, to get the Android apps shown above. If you have a Chromebook that can access Android apps, you may be able to load these there.

iOS Apps:

Coloring Book Resurgence

You may find that coloring books are making a resurgence. Aside from reduced anxiety and improved mindfulness for adults, there are benefits to children who find coloring relaxing and fun. I hope you will join us in coloring.

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AndroidiOS Tips and Tricks

Nature Lover Apps: Rediscover Your World

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

As we emerge from our hidey holes, dark spaces, and places of safety, summer feels like spring after a long winter. With that emergence comes an embrace of the great outdoors. But if you’re like me, you have no idea what critters are making beautiful music or the name of the resplendent glories adorning your walk in the woods. Come along, and pull back the canopy of mystery surrounding flowers, trees, birds, and more as we rediscover the wonders of the natural world around us.

Rediscover the Great Outdoors with These Nature Lover Apps

Did you know that exposure to nature results in more community cohesion and lower crime? That’s right, as we embrace nature, it works to instill a sense of well-being. Observing nature helps reduce crime and aggression (source).

In this blog entry, you will get access to a few favorite apps for identifying nature around you and access to a Wakelet collection full of additional nature apps. Now, let’s take a look at some of them! You can find a complete list in the infographic at the end of this post.

Our first three apps focus on bird identification and information.

“The robin flew from his swinging spray of ivy on to the top of the wall and he opened his beak and sang a loud, lovely trill, merely to show off. Nothing in the world is quite as adorably lovely as a robin when he shows off – and they are nearly always doing it.”
― Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

nature lover apps

#1 – Merlin Bird ID

“As an avid bird watcher in my rural back yard, I use the Merlin Bird Identifier app. It resolves disagreements my husband and I have about new avians that appear at our feeders. It’s been a marriage saver!” says Lori Gracey, Executive Director at TCEA.

Only the other day, my family was wondering, “Is that an owl hooting at mid-day?” My daughter and husband, Drs. Aida and Zac Guhlincozzi, whipped out their smartphones. They identified the hooting (it was a dove, not an owl). Listening to bird songs (more on that in a moment) can be so relaxing!

Get Merlin Bird ID

#2 – Audobon Bird Guide

Need to identify a bird? If Merlin Bird ID doesn’t work, try this one. It is a free guide to over 800 species of North American birds.

Get Audobon Bird Guide

“It (is) a precious gift, and rare, to hear birds warbling all year long. ~Desiree Clary Bernadottev(Queen Desideria)”
― Allison Pataki, The Queen’s Fortune

 

Access the Nature Lover Apps, a Wakelet Collection

#3 – Song Sleuth

Need to name that tune, er, bird? Use Song Sleuth! It listens to bird songs and then identifies them for you. And it’s available for iOS and Android at no cost.

Get Song Sleuth

Don’t want to listen to bird outside? For shame! Not every ornithologist can go long without air conditioning and a cool lemonade. Listen to these bird song collections. You may also appreciate the Bird Song Hero, a song learning game from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

nature lover apps 

View Wakelet collection of Bird Songs

Ok, if you’re not a bird fan, or find it annoys you in the morning hours, you might be a tree hugger or plant whisperer. Let’s take a look at two plant apps.

#4 – LeafSnap

Need a quick way to identify trees? Take a close look at their leaves, snap a picture, then let LeafSnap do the rest. LeafSnap offers a handy interface to identifying plant life around you.

“Living on the edge of town with lots of fields around us, the Leafsnap app has been helpful. It has helped us avoid poison ivy as well as discover new, native plants to replant in our back yard,” says Lori Gracey.

Get LeafSnap.

#5 – Pl@ntNET

“What is that?” I asked peering at the plant near the side of the road. At the time, I didn’t have Pl@ntNet loaded on my phone. If you need an easy-to-use plant identifier, give this free app a try.  You can use their app, or access the website.

Get Pl@ntNET.

But Wait, There’s More!

Get this handy infographic with some of the popular nature lover apps and a link to Wakelet collections mentioned in this blog entry.

Get the PDF version of this infographic.

Feature Image Source

Photo by Josefin on Unsplash

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travel
AndroidiOS Tips and TricksProfessional Learning

Planning Your Summer Travel Getaway

by Dr. Bruce Ellis
written by Dr. Bruce Ellis

You have worked hard this year. And with all of the challenges and chaos you have experienced, you may already be dreaming of a simple getaway to reset and recharge you without breaking the bank. Here are some resources to help. Whether you are looking for a vacation destination that isn’t too far away for complete R&R or you are considering a staycation with a some great learning to energize you, check out these resources and start planning for a summer to remember!

Travel Planning Sites

Road Trippers is a great site if you aren’t really into all the details of planning. Enter your starting location and your destination and let Road Trippers highlight places to stay and lots of interesting activities that are on the way or near your route. Even the look of this site is user friendly, so much so that it looks like it should be in an elementary social studies text book. While investigating along your path, Road Trippers will overlay a pink “route shade” that identifies specific mileage on either side of your route so you can easily plan to jump off the path and explore without completely interrupting the schedule. As you zoom in, you’ll find interesting attractions that include categories such as Outdoors and Recreation, Attractions and Culture, Food and Drink, Camping and RV, Points of Interest, and more. Besides calculating the mileage and hours driving, Road Trippers will also share the estimated gas cost of the trip. It will even generate a trip guide that you can add details to in order to document your memories and fun; you can even share the final document with friends. And if you find that you want someone else to do the planning, then check out their pre-made trip guides for a vacation that is even simpler.

MeetWays is the perfect tool if you are wanting to get together with family or friends, but neither party wants to drive all the way to the other’s place. Just enter the two addresses (or zip codes) and MeetWays will identify the midway point, as well as suggest places to meet. If you are interested, you can specify particular points of interest such as restaurant, hotel, campground, etc.

Games to Play Along the Way

If you need a break from the great learning from TCEA that you can access while on the road, consider checking out a few of these sites that have lots of fun ideas to make the drive go faster.

Helpful Apps for a Smooth Travel Trip

Now that you have your trip planned and know what attractions and cultural sites you are going to see, you definitely want to download this list of apps to make time in the car more enjoyable.

  • Texas Historical Marker Guide – If you’ll be traveling in Texas, be sure to download the great app (available on Google Play and iOS). It is $2.99, but is well worth the price. It works even when there is not internet and shows you information about the more than 16,000 markers in Texas and allows you track which ones you’ve seen.
  • Gas Buddy – Always be in the know of the nearest gas station and the best prices for gas with Gas Buddy. Check out some of their tools to help you budget for gas, improve gas mileage, and even log your gas mileage.
  • AAA – If you are in your vehicle a lot, then you probably already know about the benefits of being a AAA member. While roadside assistance may the be main benefit for most of their customers, you can also get discounts on repairs (parts and labor), hotels, and rental cars.
  • Audible or Scribd – Audible and Scribd are both known for having tons of books for you to read and listen to while traveling or just relaxing at home. Both are monthly subscription services. With Audible, you can purchase one (or more) books a month (based on your plan); you get to keep access to these books even after you end the subscription. For those who aren’t necessarily interested in keeping their digital book, Scribd may be a better option; while a member, you have access to all their books, audiobooks, magazines, podcasts, sheet music, and other documents.
  • WiFi Finder – With real-time updates that are crowdsourced, you’ll find that this app is a great tool to have on hand, especially when you are away from home. A Pro account gives you additional features that you might want to explore before starting off on your extended journey.

Learning Along the Way

TCEA members and enthusiasts have great learning opportunities ahead. Consider checking these resources out for engaging and exciting learning to fit your schedule. You can find more events and activities on our Events Calendar.

Where Will You Go?

Share with us in the comments below where you and/or your family are heading to get away and have fun and recharge. And if you have a favorite app to use while in the car, let us know that, too.

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Zigazoo
AndroidiOS Tips and TricksOnline Tools and Apps

Zigazoo: Classroom Safe Video Learning and Creation

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

zigazooWhen I first started working with video, I remember the joy of the old Flip camera. It was so easy to record a video and then save it to a computer. Prior to that, video recording was so difficult as to be impractical. But that didn’t stop enterprising educators from making student-created videos available. Now, video creation tools abound, but the question has become one of, “Now that we can record videos and share them, should we?” Student safety has become a critical consideration. A new tool promises to close the gap between student-created videos and student safety.

Did You Know?

TikTok has one billion monthly active users, has been downloaded over 2.6 billion times worldwide, and enjoys 100 million active users in the United States where 32.5% of users are 10 to 19 years old. See the chart below for other age groups (source: Wallroom Media).

Zigazoo

Introducing Zigazoo

Zigazoo, available at no-cost for both Android and iOS devices, encourages “short-form video” creations from children. Billed as the “Tik Tok for kids,” Zigazoo offers a variety of creative options and enables children to create video responses to educational content in a safe environment.

Zigazoo

Hailed as “a smarter screen-time activity” by TechCrunch and lauded by children’s media advocacy organizations for its safety, Zigazoo enables kids to share video responses to challenges built by leading museums, zoos, educators, and media stars. (source: Zigazoo).

According to Protect Young Eyes, the Zigazoo creation process is straightforward and includes three types of activities:

  • You can select learning prompts and then respond with videos up to thirty seconds in length
  • Share videos with friends (and only with friends you have approved)
  • Watch videos your friends and favorite characters have created

Since child safety is a priority for Zigazoo, the video response platform includes several protocols.

Ensuring Student Safety

One of the ways that Zigazoo safeguards student video creations is through a verified and secure sign-up process. They rely on single sign-on through verified Facebook, Google, or Apple accounts.

To create an account, you must be over 18 years of age. Furthermore, Zigazoo has eliminated private messaging, commenting, and negative emojis. This means that creators and viewers only see videos that survive a “stringent human moderation process.” All videos must undergo content review and be aligned to Zigazoo’s video review policy:

  • On topic: users must respond to the prompt and not be off-topic
  • No personal information: no last names, addresses, birth dates, or personal identifiers
  • Positive, school-friendly behavior: no shoving, throwing, anger, yelling, sarcasm, or sulking
  • Classroom-safe language: no swears or “potty” talk
  • Classroom-safe clothing: every person in the video needs school-appropriate clothes on, including shirts
  • Clear sound and visuals: we want to make sure we can hear and see you clearly

That moderation process makes sure all videos are relevant to the prompt (from museums, zoos, educators, etc.) and that language and visual media is kid friendly. Personally identifiable information (PII) is also locked out. Some of the restrictions Zigazoo has in place include:

  • Only your friends on Zigazoo can see your videos, and friends have to be approved prior.
  • You create videos in response to a question you select.
  • Children must make videos with an “adult presence,” so you avoid the issues (that pop up in YouTube and Tik Tok) that you have with unauthorized individuals viewing child-created videos.

Some of the videos you will see come from Bings & Potts, which will leave you laughing and learning like this one on Gobble Like a Turkey:

There are many other content providers you can assign content from in Zigazoo, as you can see from the photo slideshow below:

Zigazoo

Zigazoo also offers a classroom component known as Zigazoo Classrooms. Let’s take a closer look at that.

In the Classroom

With Zigazoo Classrooms, teachers can create their own private classroom communities that gives them content moderation authority. You can watch a video about Zigazoo Classroom.

Zigazoo

Once you get the app, you can choose to create a classroom or pod, registering as a teacher. This process will give you a code you can share with students.

You’ll be prompted to create a welcome video or explore existing projects that you can assign to students. Of course, you have the option to create on your own.

Zigazoo

Here is a seven-minute walkthrough of Zigazoo and projects available from LaShundra Wigfall:

Creating with the App

You can start your students creating with Zigazoo easily as a teacher. Simply find and assign a challenge that is relevant. The interface is straightforward and you can use the HOME or DISCOVER buttons in the app to find challenges. You can see what that looks like below:

Zigazoo

Give it a try. Here’s another example, this one from Laura Steinbrink, “Can you say hello and goodbye in Spanish?”

Feature Image Source

Screenshot by author.

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converting PDFs
AndroidChromebooksGood TeachingGoogle Tips and TricksiOS Tips and Tricks

Converting PDFs/Images to Digital Worksheets

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

“I need help! PDFs! Parents are frustrated with how we have kids submit assignments,” says Sammie. She left her PDF lament in a popular Facebook group for Schoology. If there’s a question that reoccurs often in any forum, it’s how do I edit PDFs? How should I be converting PDFs into easy-to-edit documents that students can use? This includes exit tickets, assignments, digital homework, printables, quizzes, and more.

That’s the million-dollar question for educators. They are struggling to convert paper worksheets into digital learning opportunities. In this blog entry, we’ll explore a few ways educators are getting the job done.

Step #1: Digitizing Content with an App

Need to digitize that worksheet? In previous blog entries, we’ve covered some quick tools you can use to digitize content. How do you digitize that paper worksheet in your manila folder? One easy solution is to convert documents to PDF. Use Microsoft’s Office Lens app on iOS and/or Android. You can snap a picture and convert it into a PDF you can put anywhere.

edit easy

Photo Credit: Windows Community

Need another choice? Give my favorite app, Fast Scanner, a try for free,or get the pro version ($4.99). This app makes saving black and white, color, and greyscale images/PDFs to Google Drive easy.

edit easy

Now, remember that there are many websites online that share worksheets in PDF. For example, GreatSchools offers worksheets for all ages. Other sources of worksheets include:

And let’s not forget Seesaw’s Activity Library. With a free Seesaw account, you’ll be able to take advantage of the Activity Library they offer. What’s more, with a SeeSaw Plus or for Schools account, students can edit and annotate those PDFs and turn them in.

Did You Know?

Get up to speed with all that SeeSaw offers via the TCEA SeeSaw Educator self-paced, online course. Learn more online.

Step #2: Converting PDFs to an Easy-to-Edit Document

Making PDFs into an online form boggles the mind. How do you take images and PDFs and then turn them into something students can type on or draw on? And, is it possible to track assignment completion on a PDF or image? The answer is, “Yes, but it depends on the tools you decide to use.” Each of these tools has its own advantages and disadvantages.

You can use a popular PDF to JPG/PNG website (e.g. PDFCandy, PDF2PNG, ILovePDF, SmallPDF.com). Each of these websites makes conversion a breeze. If you need to install a PDF tool on your Windows computer to split PDFs, get PDFsam Basic. It makes splitting, joining, adding, and deleting pages in a PDF easy.

edit easy

But what do you do afterwards? It all depends on what you need students to do and where. Let’s explore what’s available.

Step #3: Convert PDF/Image into Learning Activity

Let’s take a quick look at the tools available, from free to more expensive:

My favorite tool is the one that does the most and costs the least. For web-based users, free Google Slides/Microsoft PowerPoint, or OneNote work great. Need scoring? You will need a tool like TeacherMade.

How To: Google Slides/PowerPoint/OneNote

Import a PDF into Google Slides and/or PowerPoint. Set it as the background, then add text boxes on top. Assign it to students to complete. OneNote users also have it easy.

Other tools, although they offer a trial or lite version, like Wizer.me ($35.99 a year) and KAMI ($99 year), cost money. My least favorite tool is the PDF tool built into Canvas because it is quite limited. Erin Hartman does a great job exploring it in this blog entry, “Edit PDFs in Canvas Assignments.”

edit easy

Note: Only a portion of the chart is shown.

The above comparison chart may assist you in deciding which is the right tool for you. I’ve made the chart easy to edit if it needs correction or additions. What do you think will be your go-to tools?

New Tool Spotlight: TeacherMade

Since I hadn’t seen Teacher Made before, I thought I’d do a quick walkthrough. I was able to create my free account with my G Suite EDU login credentials. Two seconds later, I was working on creating my single page worksheet. (Of course, TeacherMade supports PDFs up to 12 pages long). Since I didn’t have one handy, I saved one from the Great Schools website mentioned earlier.

edit easy

For fun, I decided to turn this into a matching activity rather than a circle one. I inserted color blocks to cover the words and turned the line border to transparent. Then I set up matching pairs, drawing boxes and then linking the two matching items. It was easy. Finally, I revised the instructions.

edit easy

You can see a worksheet preview here:

Once you have customized the worksheet for students, you can assign it to them, as you can see below:

edit easy

Start your journey of TeacherMade.com discovery with Kimberly Jacquay’s video series:

Lean into TeacherMade with these two follow-up videos:

And don’t forget that TeacherMade is free.

Now You Know

Get started soon transforming paper worksheets into digital learning opportunities. Use tools like PDFCandy to convert anything into a PDF or JPG/PNG. Or, get a PDF worksheet from a free online source. Then, make it interactive and scorable with an available tool.

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unfollow
Android

Unfollow and Declutter Your Twitter Account

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

“How many Twitter followers do you have?” That’s a question that some people lead with at conference events. While many of those events have shifted online, the question remains. One of the questions that comes up as well is, “How can I better manage Twitter followers and who should I follow?” You might think it’s irrelevant. But if you follow too many, you may miss out on important updates and shares. That’s why it’s important to periodically unfollow people who haven’t followed you back.

But Twitter doesn’t make it easy to unfollow in bulk. In this blog entry, we’ll explore three tools for your Android device that make it a little easier to dump unfollowers.

unfollowers

A Twitter brawl between educators seeking relevance and engagement

Wait, Before We Start, How Many Do You Have?

It’s not the number of people following me that bothers me; it’s how many people I follow that fail to return the favor. That’s right, when people don’t follow you back, what’s the point? There’s a better way to deal with people you want to follow than to follow someone who doesn’t reciprocate. We’ll explore that as well.

In my professional account, @mguhlin, when I began this blog post, I followed 13K people. Twitter makes it easy to follow people, but you can’t remove them so fast. Over the past week, I’ve been using three apps to help me remove people who I follow but who don’t follow me back. Known as “unfollows,” they are hard to dump. What I need to do is follow only the people who engage with me.

Let’s take a quick look at three tools you can load on your Android phone that will clarify Twitter.

Tool #1: Follow Checker for Twitter

This nifty tool, Follow Checker for Twitter, makes it easy for you to see your stats. Here are my stats after a week of unfollowing people who don’t follow me back:

unfollower

As you can see, I have 1,905 followers who don’t follow me back. That’s down from the almost eight thousand earlier this week. So, I made progress with shedding my “unfollows.” Follow Checker makes it easy to remove my unfollowers via an “Auto” button.

unfollowers

Follow Checker for Twitter  does something else that’s interesting. It tells me how many users that I don’t follow back. Those 7,596 people represent an audience I could be engaging with, but I’m not. This could have happened because they followed me, but I was too busy to follow them back. Follow Checker will do its best to unfollow as many people as it can, more than other apps on this list. This makes it my favorite tool.

Tool #2: Follow Back

unfollowersFollow Back is another tool that does the exact same thing as Follow Checker. The interface is a bit different and you have to suffer through boring ads (which you can turn off after three seconds). Aside from that, the app works in a similar manner. In spite of the ads, I found Follow Back to be a bit more endearing. One of its distinguishing characteristics is the timer.

You see, Twitter doesn’t like it when you unfollow people in bulk. So it sets limits on the interface that allows that. You can only unfollow so many people before Twitter holds up a STOP sign. Follow Back tries to avoid that problem. It stops after fifty unfollows, then sets a timer with a notification. When the time expires, getting you past Twitter’s guard dog, you can unfollow another fifty.

Tool #3: UnFollow Today

If you don’t mind tapping an “x” next to the name of the person you want to unfollow, UnFollow Today is the tool for you. You scroll and tap, tap, tap to unfollow people. While not my favorite of the bunch, it works to get a few more people unfollowed. I like to think it sneaks in and pushes a few more names off. That said, if you have LOTS of unfollowers, this may not be the tool for you.

Now, I’d be remiss if I didn’t point out there are MANY apps that get this job done. You can also find a few websites (Unfollowers) where you can spend your cash. Skip that and use tool #1 over a couple of days.

Making Lists

unfollowersEarlier, I mentioned that there are people you want to follow who will NEVER follow you back. Those could be news organizations, magazines, non-profit organizations, and others. Instead of following them, add them to a Twitter List. Here’s Twitter’s set of instructions:

  1. In the top menu, tap your profile icon.
  2. Tap Lists.
  3. Tap the new List icon
  4. Select a name for your List and a short description of the List. List names cannot exceed 25 characters, nor can they begin with a number. The default setting for your List is public (anyone can follow the List). To make the List only accessible to you, drag the slider next to Private to on.
  5. Tap Done.

You can see my lists online. Well, you can see most of them. Some are private. In this way, you can add people or organizations you want to follow to a list. They may never follow you back, and you can only view them when needed. Better yet, you avoid cluttering up your Twitter. Isn’t that worth some Marie Kondo affection?

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teacher-approved apps
Android

Google Play Store Labels Teacher-Approved Apps

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin
Looking for Teacher Approved apps for your children? Wish you could align Google Play store apps to a teacher-approved checklist? The Google Play store has made them easier to find. In this blog entry, we’ll peek at what you will find in their new section. teacher approved

Did You Know?

TCEA provides you with a list of student-friendly apps online. Be sure to check out the Must Have List of Android Apps. TCEA helps educators find the best apps for their students and their curriculum. Our professional development team tests and reviews apps, sharing recommendations in curated lists that are helpfully categorized by subject and purpose, so you can find exactly what you need. See more apps for your device.

Finding Kid-Friendly Apps

Are you at your wit’s end, keeping your children engaged? You are not alone. Some parents toss their children an Android tablet to buy time while they try to prepare a meal, care for another child, or get a moment of peace and quiet. But how do you know that what you are encouraging children to “play” is educational? That’s where Google Play Store has taken some steps.

Did You Know?

Sign up for one of our Google Certified Educator certifications. You’ll learn about more than Google Meet, as well as earn 12 CPE hours per course. Use these courses to get Google Educator certified. Find out more online.

Teacher Approved

For parents, seeing a badge stating “Teacher Approved” may make all the difference. Google certifies that apps sporting this label are “enriching and entertaining.” They’ve even contracted with educators to make the decision:
To share the best apps for kids on the Play Store, we’ve teamed up with academic experts and teachers across the country, including our lead advisors, Joe Blatt (Harvard Graduate School of Education) and Dr. Sandra Calvert (Georgetown University). Apps that have been rated by teachers and meet our quality standards receive a “Teacher approved” badge. (Source)
Each app sports a simple badge. teacher-approved apps

How to Find the Teacher-Approved Apps

teacher-approved appsWhile it would have been cool for Google to create a “Teacher-Approved Apps” button, they instead did this:
  1. On your Android phone or tablet, open the Google Play Store.
  2. Tap Games or Apps.
  3. At the top, tap Kids. All apps in this section are teacher approved.
    1. For Movies and TV, tap Family.
    2. For Books, tap Children’s Books.
When you tap on Kids, you will see only the apps that are teacher approved. Go to the Kids tab to see “Teacher approved” content. Google Play Pass subscribers can find it at “Apps and games for kids.” If you are scratching your head and wondering, “Is this that easy to find?” you are not alone. Google could have done a better job for students and parents to locate content.

Selection Process

Wondering how Google decided what is “teacher approved” and what is not? They asked trained teachers to rate apps based on a framework that evaluated things like:
  • Design quality
  • Appeal to children
  • Enrichment potential
  • Ads and in-app purchases
  • Age-appropriateness
Teacher-approved apps appear in the Kids section on Google Play, are featured in banners or collections, and display the badge. Most important, they show what teachers found valuable in the app details page. Don’t be afraid to give this app a try with your young reader. It may be the type of engagement your child needs. Read along with your child to improve engagement.
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socratic
AndroidContent AreasGoogle Tips and TricksiOS Tips and Tricks

Google’s AI to the Rescue: Ask Socratic

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Ready to step into the future? You may find this new iteration of an app worth exploring. It will be even more useful if you are a high school or college student and need help studying. Google for Education announced February 12, 2020 that they have a new tool to assist you. What’s amazing is that it uses Artificial Intelligence (AI) to work. The updated app that Google acquired and revamped is Socratic.

Let’s take a moment to explore the new app.

socratic

Image Credit: Google Play Store

What Socratic Offers

socraticSocratic makes over one thousand high school and college-level subject guides available, relying on artificial intelligence to find and simplify answers to questions. The questions answered come from subjects like Algebra, Biology, Chemistry, Geometry, History, and Literature. Believe it or not, it can also answer questions about Physics and Trigonometry.

Socratic’s main features include the following:

  • Get problems into Socratic via camera, voice, or typed search
  • View online resources, including diagrams and videos, to solve the problem
  • Self-paced instructions and videos with explanations
  • A growing library of content

Getting started is as easy as getting the app and using it. Android users can get the app via the Google Play store. Need the iOS version? Get it here. (If you are clicking on this link to the app via your Chromebook or computer browser, log in with a personal account. The Google Play store doesn’t play well with G Suite EDU accounts and will give you an error.)

How Socratic Works

Wondering how Google’s AI works in Socratic? Google designed the app to assist students who may be studying on their own. You can use the voice search to ask a question. Another way involves students snapping a photo of a problem. Then Socratic  will do its best to find an answer.

Did You Know?

Sign up for one of our Google Certified Educator certifications. You’ll learn about more than Google Meet, as well as earn 12 CPE hours per course. Use these courses to get Google Educator certified. Find out more online.

When you first load  Socratic on your device, you’ll have to sign in. You can try to sign in with a G Suite EDU account. If that does not work, try a personal Gmail account.

Sign-In Screen G Suite EDU Account Not Found,

Use Personal Account Instead

 Snap a Picture of a Problem

Once you have logged in, you will grant Socratic camera access. After that, you can snap a picture of a worksheet with a word problem or type it in, as shown above. Here’s what a solution response will look like:

Some teachers may express concern about an app that can assist students for self-paced learning. Those few detractors aside, this is a boon to independent learners. Take a few steps into the future of artificial intelligence with Socratic.

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tech tools
AndroidChromebooksGoogle Tips and TricksiOS Tips and TricksOnline Tools and Apps

Tech Tools You Can’t Live Without

by Lori Gracey
written by Lori Gracey

A recent Zoom Discussion with TCEA members found us sharing the technology apps, websites, programs, and tools that we simply couldn’t live without. It was such a powerful list that I thought I would share it with you. Big thanks go to all of those members who joined the discussion and shared their favorites!

By the way, did you know that you, too, can join in our free-to-member discussions and webinars? You can join TCEA now for absolutely free through May 8, 2020. Stop missing out!

Productivity Tech Tools

Leisure Websites and Apps

  • House Party – allows you to bring in a video with one, two, or more people and then they have several games you can play together
  • Word Stacks
  • Hamster House
  • Free Rice – play vocabulary games to send rice to those in need
  • Skillshare – fabulous videos for learning art, graphic design, painting, photography, etc.
  • Pocket Frogs
  • Libby – read ebooks and listen to audio books from your public library

Add-Ons and Extensions

Smartphone Apps

Did we leave off one of your favorite tech tools? Add it in the comments below.

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background remover
AndroidChromebooksGoogle Tips and TricksiOS Tips and TricksMicrosoft

Background Removal Tools for Photos and Videos

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Have you ever taken the perfect photo until you looked at it later and found that the background wasn’t what you wanted? Would you like to add your own background scene, replacing an existing photo or video’s background? As we work with remote learners, knowing how to remove inconvenient backgrounds scenes is important. This blog entry provides a quick roundup of background removal tools that make this job easy for you.

Note: Do you need some free images/videos, like Smithsonian’s Open Access three million plus images, to work with? Checkout my Copyright-Free Media and Tools Wakelet collection.

Background Removal Tool #1: Remove.bg

My favorite tool in the pack, Remove.bg makes it easy to yank the background from an existing photo.  Remove.bg works great on smartphones and tablets. Even easier is replacing the background with a provided image or your own picture.

background remover

As you can see from the clip above, the original picture appears featuring a character. Flames surround the character. With Remove.bg, you can remove the flames and then replace it. You can edit the image and replace the background using this interface:

background remover

This can result in some fascinating combinations:

background remover

And another example:

background remover

Unfortunately, the images are not layered. This means that you cannot move the new background or original image independent of each other.

Need an alternative? Give Removal.ai a shot as an alternative to Remove.bg. Removal.ai offers standard features (simple editing, background removal) for free. If you want hi-res access or editing, you will need to get an account and pay. Removal.ai also offers a Windows program you can use on your computer. You can add text, resize image to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest standard image sizes. It offers several other editing tools you won’t see in Remove.bg.

Once you have the image the way you want it, you can save it to your computer or device. Remove.bg doesn’t allow you to add text to photos. You can use Picfont to do that (provided you turn off Ad Block Plus):

Background Removal Tool #2: PhotoScissors

Need a way to pluck yourself out of a picture? PhotoScissors offers some ways to do this via their website. Like Remove.bg, it does a nice job of removing the background from a picture. It does have some limitations though. It limits high-quality results to for-pay options ($30 for Windows or Mac). You can see that it offers an almost bewildering set of tools.

background remover

It does allow you to reposition the character in the picture. You can then app smash these tools a bit to get different results. In the image below, I’ve taken the PhotoScissors image and dropped it back into Remove.bg.

The PhotoScissors website offers other tools you can take advantage of (at a slight cost):

  • Inpaint – Remove elements from photos
  • iResizer – Scale an image without changing other visual content
  • PhotoStitcher – Stitch photos together to panorama
  • FolderIco – Customize folder icons and color

Check these tools out.

Background Removal Tool #3: StickerMule’s Trace

Right from the get-go, you will need to create an account to use Trace. This may not be a problem since you can “Sign up with Google.” You can also create an account using a name and email combination. Once you have an account set up, you get access to Trace to remove photo backgrounds.

background remover

StickerMule’s Trace offers a nice interface that looks like the one below. Note that you can’t provide your own background; you must select one from the list. It does offer the option of replacing the background with standard colors.

background remover

One thing you can do is download (save) the transparent version of your image. Then you can load that picture into an online paint tool like Kleki. The advantage of that is that you can import your desired background. After you do that, import your transparent image from Trace as a layer.

background remover

A big advantage is that you can reposition your character anywhere in the new background, as you can see:

Isn’t that amazing? Even if you are a novice at paint programs, this will be easy to figure out. Kleki is NOT Adobe Photoshop (thank goodness).

Those are three powerful tools for removing backgrounds in images. One bonus tool that makes it possible for you to remove backgrounds in videos is UnScreen.com. It makes it easy to remove video backgrounds, which can be handy in a busy environment (like a classroom).

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