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Content AreasEducational Trends

Create Quizzes, Chore Charts, Spelling Bees, and More with Alexa Blueprints

by Diana Benner
written by Diana Benner

With the new Alexa Blueprints program, Amazon is making it possible for anyone, including educators, to create their own Alexa skills easy-to-use templates. You don’t even need to know how to code or program. Teachers can create quizzes in minutes by filling in just a couple of blanks.

Getting Started with Alexa Blueprints

To get started, go to this website. Log in with whatever Amazon account you use for Alexa. Once you log in, you’ll see a list of possible skills you can customize. To create your quiz, follow the three easy steps below:

Step 1: Pick the Quiz Template

Under the Learning & Knowledge section, select Quiz. Then select the Make Your Own button.

alexa quiz

Step 2: Fill on the Blanks

Enter your questions and correct answers in the template. Note that you can include follow-up facts if you would like. With this in mind, you can enter more details about the question to increase student learning. After entering your questions, select the Next: Experience button.

alexa quiz

Now you can customize the Alexa experience in the following ways:

  • Add you own individualized introduction.
  • Select a unique sound that will play along with your introduction.
  • Customize the quiz responses in order to provide personalized feedback when correct or incorrect answers are selected.
  • Add custom sounds, like crowds cheering, when a correct answer is selected in order to heighten student engagement.
alexa quiz

Lastly, select the Next: Name button.

alexa quiz

Step 3: Use It

Enter the name of your quiz. However, be aware that Alexa is still learning first and last names. For best results, use common words. Now, select the Next: Create Skill button. Wait a few minutes and begin using your quiz with your students.

What’s Next?

To sum up, teachers who have access to the Amazon Echo technology should be creating tons of quizzes with this easy-to-use template. It’s a great way to create an interactive formative assessment and promote student learning through engagement. In addition, some other templates include flash cards and storytelling tools that let you create your own interactive and personalized stories. Give them a try.

If you are interested in learning more about Alexa in the classroom, be sure to check out these blog entries, Make History Come Alive with Alexa and Alexa: Your New Teacher Assistant.

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homework
Content AreasGood Teaching

Help Students Focus on Homework Using Organization Techniques

by Guest Blogger
written by Guest Blogger

Teachers face challenges today that no generation before them has had to address. Thanks to advances in technology, students have limitless resources at their fingertips. For example, they can find the answer to any question by asking their smartphone. However, the procedures used to get the perfect answers are mind-numbing. They often require little thought and no problem-solving techniques.

This puts teachers in a difficult situation. While you would like to take your students to the next level of learning, and their work level indicates that it is possible, you often find that the only thing the student has learned is how to use a search engine.

In order to teach students real-life problem-solving skills, you must sometimes restrict the very tools that could help them.

Where to Begin

In order to teach students to develop the tools they need to succeed in their classwork, homework, and life in general, they must learn a few simple steps. These steps are applied to everything they do. When you teach your students to look at each assignment through the guidelines of these steps, they will complete their work. They are:

  • Prepare for the work ahead.
  • Collect needed supplies.
  • Focus on the job at hand until it is complete.
  • Incorporate focus strategies used in programs like Phyzzle that help children learn how to focus on homework using super-efficient organization techniques.
  • Get the job done. Students are taught to stay with the assignment until it is finished and their materials are put away.

Make It Easy on Yourself and Parents

Teaching a child to be organized takes a little effort. Unfortunately, in the early stages, much of the effort falls on the teacher. This is where the use of technology is helpful.

  • Set up an online assignment calendar. Be specific and spell out exactly what is required. You can let the students help determine what tools they will need to complete an assignment. Be sure to send home notices to the parents advising where assignments are posted.
  • Ask parents if they would like to be included in group texts, reminding them of activities and deadlines.

Make a Homework Kit

So much time is wasted by students searching for a pencil, paper, worksheets, and assignment list. Younger students can be trained to avoid this problem. Using a large ziplock bag, help them make a homework kit. The kit always contains pencil, paper, and other items they need. During the work week (or day) homework sheets are placed in the bag along with any reading assignments. The bag then goes home with the student at the end of the day.

Five-Minute Rule

Before a student begins their homework, they should take five minutes to review what they need to do. They can use this time to organize their work and what they plan to accomplish. How they organize it, is up to them. The key is to be ready to complete their homework in one sitting.

Technology

Technology is a wonderful education tool when used properly. When abused, students can turn it into a mind-numbing, fact-finding exercise. Let your students help you keep your class-site current. Have a way for the kids to ask questions of their peers and of their instructors, and team students up as accountability partners.

Students will flourish if they work together with their teachers, parents, and technology. At the end of the day, they learn how to succeed in school, and in life.

This is a guest blog by Ashley Lipman. Lipman is a  lover of psychology whose interests range from the corporate world to self-improvement and self-care to education. Now if only someone came up with a way to extend the day by about 20 more hours, she could dedicate herself to all of these equally and constantly.

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Educational TrendsSocial Studies

Make History Come Alive with Alexa

by Diana Benner
written by Diana Benner

Voice-controlled devices like the Amazon Echo are here to stay, so why not embrace them in the classroom to make history come alive? Studying history is important because it allows us to understand our past, which, in turn, allows us to understand our present. Now with Alexa, Amazon Echo’s virtual intelligence assistant, you can transform your classroom into an interactive learning space so students can learn history in every subject.

This Day In History

The This Day in History Alexa skill has broken into the Top Enabled categories of the Alexa Skills Marketplace. By saying “Alexa, launch This Day in History,” you can hear facts about the top historical events for that day and on any other day of the year. You can also ask Alexa for a historical event for any other day by saying “Alexa, ask This Day in History what happened on May 5th”, for example. The facts come from history.com, which lists dozens of historical events every day.

Getting Started

To get started, make sure you have This Day in History enabled in Alexa’s skills. To do this, launch the Amazon Alexa app and access the menu. Next, select Skills from the menu and search for This Day in History. When it appears, click the Enable button.

When using Alexa, it very important to speak clearly. Many times, students will have to rephrase or repeat what they say. However, this can be great for practicing enunciation. In addition, it’s important to set expectations for using Alexa in the classroom (When can they use it? Are there questions they should not ask?) and practice, practice, practice.

In the Classroom

Aside from learning important history facts, there are other ways to incorporate and expand on the This Day in History skill in the classroom. Below are a few suggestions:

  • Writing prompts
  • Bell ringer activities
  • Study famous scientists, mathematicians, poets, etc.
  • Create classroom timelines that highlight the events and connect them to other historic periods
  • Reinforce routines by using it daily
  • Learn another language by switching Alexa to another language

The Future

Voice-controlled devices are popping up everywhere. In the future, our students will buy homes or rent apartments that already have these devices built in. The cars they will drive will have them, too. Therefore, why not incorporate them into the classroom and start with something that is incredibly important . . . history.

If you don’t have an Amazon Echo or an Echo Dot, you can purchase one at http://smile.amazon.com.  Be sure to select TCEA as your favorite charitable organization so that we can continue to provide benefits to thousands of educators and students across the United States.

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Photo by Anna Demianenko on Unsplash
Content AreasGood TeachingGoogle Tips and Tricks

Creating gBooks, er, eBooks Just Got Easier

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Creating ebooks just got easier with the addition of new tools. If you haven’t kept up to date, you’ll want to read this blog entry. We will demystify key elements such as locating ebooks, ebook formats, converting eBooks, three fun approaches to creating ebooks, and copyright-friendly media. Ready to get started? If so, let’s begin!

1- Locating eBooks

Below, you will find some sites I have used in the past to find non-DRM (Digital Rights Management)-formatted ePubs. Finding non-Digital Rights Management (a.k.a. non-DRM) books can be a challenge for schools. This may be why OverDrive is heavily used in many libraries, and solutions like BiblioTech are quite popular.

As in any library or book store, there exists content that may be inappropriate for younger readers. Have learning conversations with students and parents when counseling that they “find free stuff” to read on the web. With that caveat in mind, I have tried to link to the Children’s/Juvenile section of each ebook distributor below.

Did You Know? You can get free audio versions of traditional books via LibriVox. Why not use a QR Code to link directly to a story’s audio version? Or have students make their own!

2- eBook Formats

eBooks come in a wide variety of formats. Let’s review them, shall we?

ePub

ebooksEPUB is an ebook file format with the extension .epub that can be downloaded and read on devices like smartphones, tablets, computers, or e-readers. It is a technical standard published by the International Digital Publishing Forum. Wikipedia

It is the standard format for these book publishers/sellers:

  • Amazon Kindle Fire (not previous versions of Kindle, though)
  • Apple iBooks
  • Barnes and Noble
  • Kobo

It is easy to make ePub-formatted documents. In fact, many word processors like Google Docs, Microsoft Word, and OpenOffice/LibreOffice support the export of documents to ePub format. Read about how Jonathan Moeller, one of my favorite authors, uses  Sigil (a free cross-platform tool) to create/edit his ebooks.

ePubs come in two formats:

  • Standard (without media like sound/videos) (text/images are included)
  • Multimedia ebooks which feature sound/videos/text/images

Some eBook readers that work well with this format include Aldiko, Lithium, iBooks, Google Play Books, Freda, and Kindle. Some web-based tools include Readium or ePub Reader for the Chrome browser, and ePUBReader for Mozilla Firefox browser.

Mobi

ebooksMOBI is an e-book file format with the extension .mobi that can be downloaded and read on devices that support the Amazon Kindle app. The format, customized by Amazon, is often used by Amazon’s ebooks and on little else. There are various programs for making a .mobi ebook file and Amazon provides some tools you can take advantage of. “You can upload and convert your eBook manuscript file from several supported formats. Before you publish, browse the topics below to learn more.” Learn more at this link.

Some ebook readers that work well with Mobi format include Aldiko, Lithium, iBooks, Google Play Books, Freda, and, of course, Kindle.

PDF

PDF is not an ebook format. Rather, it is a format that seeks to capture the printed version of a document, capturing the look-and-feel of the printed item as if it had appeared on the author’s printer. A large percentage of documents presented as ebooks appear as Adobe Portable Document Formats (PDFs).

The reason PDF is not an ebook format is that it was never designed to appear in eReaders or reshape itself into a format viewable in such a device. It CAN be viewed on most modern devices, however.

Considering what version to publish ebooks to? The best answer is that ePub is the best format to create ebooks in. You can convert most documents into the ePub format and it will work on almost all devices using an eReader piece of software.

3 – Converting eBooks from One Format to Another

ebooksNeed to convert ebooks from one format to another? Use Calibre, the free, open source software that works on any computer (not Chromebooks, though). Here’s how it’s described:

Using Calibre to convert is very easy.

  1. Plug in your ebook reader.
  2. Open Calibre and click the “Add books” button on the top left. Select your book.
  3. Click open. Select your book in the library list. By now, Calibe should have detected your ebook reader.
  4. Click “Send to device” from the middle of the top toolbar.
  5. Calibre is smart enough to know if the book is in a format supported by your reader. If it’s not, it will ask you if you want to auto convert it. Say yes, and it will take care of the conversion and put the book on your reader.

Calibre worries about the formats and converting for you. Auto conversion is the easiest way to go and, in most cases, will be all you need to do. Here is a short video explaining how to use Calibre:

4- Creating eBooks: Fun Approaches

There are several approaches you can take to create ebooks in your classroom. Let’s explore a few, as well as learn about a new one from Apple that just became available.

Approach #1 – Book Creator

If you haven’t used Book Creator, it is an excellent, collaborative ($) 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 an enhanced ePub with video, audio, and more embedded. Read their blog for TONS of ideas.

This versatility means you can create content on an iPad/iOS device and share it with a wide variety of audiences. You can also share it to cloud storage (e.g. Dropbox, iCloud, Google Drive, or iCloud).  It also supports the creation of digital comic books, something your students will love. That’s amazing!

Check out my ebook on App-Smashing, created with Book Creator.

Approach #2 – Google Docs to ePub

EPUB is the most widely-supported file format for publishing accessible documents and digital books, allowing people to consume long-form content in their preferred apps on a diverse range of screen sizes and devices, including smartphones, tablets, and ereaders.

To make it easier for authors, publishers, and academic institutions to create works that can be consumed digitally, today we’re launching the ability to export Google Docs files as EPUB publications. Simply go to the File menu > Download as > EPUB Publication (.epub). (Source)

Here are two ebooks created in Google Docs using the ePub export.

What documents could you take and export to ePub format to make them easier to read on mobile devices?

Approach #3 – Google Slides to PDF

Use Google Slides as a collaborative ebook development tool. Ready to get started? Follow these four easy steps outlined in this TCEA blog entry, Google Slides Ebook Creation in Four Quick, Easy Steps:

  1. Customize the slides
  2. Add content
  3. Download as a PDF (or publish online as a Google Slides)
  4. Share the ebook

Here’s another guide to ebook creation from Texas’ Kasey “Shake Up Learning” Bell.

Use one of the many available ebook templates available in PowerPoint to create your own Google Slides ebook.

Tips for PDF eBook Creators

Here are some tips from two ebook authors, Erfili Davis and Jennifer Gonzales. Check out Erifili Davis’ blog entry on the topic of ebooks with Google Slides. She’s created some great video tutorials and a free template packet (click link to make a copy) you can start with. Read Erifili’s six tips to help you (or your class) create your first ebook using Google Apps for Education. As she points out, “These techniques are just as useful to anyone looking to self-publish an ebook, including general users of the free Google Drive and Google Apps for Work users.”

 “With Google Slides, students can create a simple ebook that includes text, photos, videos, and links,” says Diana Benner in this TCEA TechNotes blog entry. “They can even create or select themes, templates, and layouts for their book. Once created, the ebooks can be shared with other students, both locally and around the world, for feedback.” Find more ideas online at this blog entry to find out about more ideas.

Apple Announces ePub Export Function

“The update to Pages brings some of the features of Apple’s book creation app for the Mac ‘iBooks Author’ to the iPad for the first time,” states the Book Creator blog entry. Apple’s Spring 2018 Education event made this news public. “With Pages, you can export your documents in EPUB format so they can be read using iBooks on your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac, or with other third-party EPUB readers,” says the Apple website where you can read up on the process.

Make Computer Voice Narrated Audiobooks (Updated: 7/28/2019)

Wish you could turn student-created ePub files into narrated audiobooks? Or, make any ePub into an audiobook? You can on your Windows 10 computer. Take advantage of the Freda ebook reader’s built-in audio reader. First, save your Google Doc file as an ePub file on your computer. Then, open the file using Freda ebook reader. Once the file is open, have Freda read the file to you.

When you first ask Freda to read an ebook to you, you will see the following…you’ll want to choose READ ALOUD:

You can choose several voices (Microsoft David, Zira, or Mark) when having Freda read the ebook to you, as shown below:

Try out the different voices to see which you prefer.

The next question to consider is, How to record Freda reading the ebook to you? To accomplish that, you’ll need to get the free, open source audio editor, Audacity. Once you have it installed on your Windows 10 computer, you will need to adjust some of its settings. You’ll need to set the preferences as shown below:

Make sure to change the Recording settings to ENABLE “Sound Activated Recording.” That way, you can turn on Audacity, have it record once you turn on Freda to read aloud.

This will allow you to record audio from your Windows 10 computer as Freda ebook reader reads the book aloud to you. Here’s what that looks like:

Listen to Microsoft David read About Carroll.

Ready to Begin?

“Student-centered products enable learners to showcase their new knowledge and skills in relation to a particular topic in an infinite variety of ways,” write the authors of Digital Media in Today’s Classrooms. Charge your students with tasks that require creativity, analysis, and application. Get started now!

 

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English Language Arts Reading (ELAR)Google Tips and Tricks

Creating Dynamic Digital Poetry Books

by Diana Benner
written by Diana Benner

April is National Poetry Month and I can’t think of a better way to celebrate poetry than with student-created digital poetry books made with Google Slides. National Poetry Month was introduced in 1996 by the Academy of American Poets as a way to increase awareness and appreciation of poetry in the United States. Each year in April, tens of millions of students, teachers, and librarians rejoice in poetry’s important place in our lives.

Writing Poems with Google Slides

In the blog entry, Slide into the New Year with Student eBooks, I outlined four quick and easy steps on how to create an ebook in Google Slides. Your students will follow this same simple process for creating their digital book of poems.

The Poetry Marathon

In order for students to create a book a poems, they will obviously need to write more than one poem. Using a Poetry Marathon format to create a series of short poems around a common theme would work perfectly for this task. The goal of the marathon is to write one poem every hour, for twenty-four hours straight. The reward would be that you would have a collection of poems produced in one day. Of course, that might not realistically work in your classroom. Therefore, you would need to come up with your own rules for your marathon.

Types of Short Poems

Short poems are crucial for this kind of project as Google Slides will lend itself well to fewer words on a slide. This way, images can also be included to add visual representations of the poems.  A few short poems you can explore are cinquains, shape poems, nonsense verse, acrostics, couplets, and haikus. Take a look at these few that I included in my very own book, The One-of-a-Kind Daisy Mae.

Cinquain Poem

poetry

Click on image to open the digital book.

A cinquain poem is a verse of five lines that do not rhyme. The cinquain poem was created by Adelaide Crapsey.

Acrostic Poem

An acrostic poem is where the first, last, or other letters in a line spell out a particular word or phrase. The most common and simple form of an acrostic poem is where the first letters of each line spell out the word or phrase.

Couplet

A couplet is a pair of successive lines of meter in a poem. A couplet usually consists of two successive lines that rhyme.

Dynamic Digital Poetry Books Are a Win-Win!

The end result of creating this kind of digital book is a win-win.  Not only are students engaged in writing poetry in various forms, but they are also using technology to publish a digital book of their original writing.  I hope this National Poetry Month activity will inspire you to keep celebrating poetry digitally all year long!

 

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curriculum
Content AreasLeadership

New OER ELA Curriculum

by Lori Gracey
written by Lori Gracey

With the budget crunch that most districts are feeling these days, it’s important to save money where possible and where it doesn’t negatively impact the education of students. One excellent way to do this is through the use of Open Educational Resources (OER). These are free resources that anyone may use and modify.

Free Curriculum

I wrote a while back about an outstanding and free math curriculum for grades 6-8. That same company, Open-Up Resources, is now providing a complete curriculum for ELA in grades K-5. The curriculum is based around texts that students love to read and includes the following:

  • Student Materials – digital and print options (perfect whether you are 1:1 or still paper-based)
  • Teacher Materials – digital and print options, including module and unit plans, lesson plans, assessments, and embedded professional learning
  • Book list of authentic texts
  • Curriculum map
  • Integrated, lesson-specific supports for ELLs
  • Lesson-level supports for students with special needs
  • Family resources

The offering also includes STEM and social studies topics. And it is aligned to both state and national standards.

Open-Up is a non-profit association that earns revenue to support these development endeavors by providing professional development on their offerings. But the resources are completely free and do not require that you purchase professional development from them.

Savings

With the savings from not having to purchase a curriculum program or to pay staff to write one, districts can spend more on professional learning for staff and on technology for students. This makes this offering from Open-Up a win/win for districts, staff, and students.

By the way, Open-Up is also developing free curricula for high school Algebra 1, Geometry, and Algebra 2 and for middle school language arts. All of these will be available for the 2018-2019 school year. You can request information on their website.

 

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Content Areas

Enhance Reading with Online News

by Diana Benner
written by Diana Benner

Looking for some quick tools to enhance reading in your classroom? Look no further than current event sources and online non-fiction. Before we review the list of online news sources, let’s remember why it’s important.

News in the Classroom

  • Students who use the newspaper in school read more sections of the newspaper and show significantly greater interest in local government, neighborhood events, current issues and foreign affairs.
  • In a three-year study of NIE in Volusia County, Florida, students in NIE groups showed significantly superior gains in spelling and vocabulary in their classes than did nonreaders.
  • Research by Dr. Dan Sullivan of the University of Minnesota examined programs in 22 cities across the country. The study compared test scores of students who had used the newspaper in class with those who had not. In all 22 cases, those student who used the newspaper scored better on standardized reading test than did those who did not. Minority students and those who were not native English speakers showed the greatest achievement. (2002, NAA Foundation.) (Source)

Non-fiction reading has gone online. Video and audio sources deepen engagement. Combine the news sources I’ve provided below with tools such as:

These tools help students better identify and process online information.You can use them with various online news sources.

Five Online News Sources

Let’s take a closer look at the news sources available to you and your students.

Dogo News – This site serves as a leading source of news and information and includes current events, news, and non-fictional content. You can find content relevant to Language Arts, Science, and Social Studies. You may also want to visit companion Dogo sites focusing on books and movies, as well as one for teachers.

Newsela – This site covers many subjects. Content appears at five different Lexile levels. This enables students to read the same material as their classmates at the appropriate level.

Newseum – The goal of this source is to promote, explain, and defend free expression.

Science News for Students – This site focuses on STEM-related research and events. They offer several types of articles, blog posts, and weekly features. Topics such as space, life and evolution, and math and technology prevail.

Tween Tribune – Get daily access to Associated Press news articles, many of which come with self-scoring quizzes. Lexile levels are K-12 appropriate. You can also find Spanish AP articles, lesson plans, and videos. “Monday Morning Ready” newsletter content appears as well.

Deepening Learning

Ready to deepen learning in your classroom? Take advantage of these tools and news sources to enhance your students’ reading.

 

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Story Speaker
ChromebooksContent AreasGoogle Tips and Tricks

Create Interactive Stories with Story Speaker

by Lori Gracey
written by Lori Gracey

Coding is an incredibly important skill in today’s world and all students should have some practice with it. But sometimes, you want to create something amazing without having to spend time on writing code. A new Google Docs add-on can help with that. Story Speaker allows students to easily create interactive “choose your own adventure”-type stories that are then read by any Google Home device.

The Process

Story SpeakerThe teacher or Google administrator gives the students access to the Story Speaker add-on. Students go into Google Docs and select the Add-ons menu and choose Story Speaker — Open Story Speaker. They then write a story in Google Docs either on their own or using one of the two provided templates: Basic or Advanced (more about the templates below). The final step is to click Play Your Story and the story will be read by the Google Home. You can even export the story and save it to a class website or email to parents to listen to on their own Google Home or on Google Assistant on a smartphone. You can watch a short two-minute video to get the idea here.

The Story Speaker Templates

While you don’t have to use them, having the templates is a nice resource, especially for older students who are focusing on writing longer stories or when younger students are working together to craft a story. They provide a framework for their ideas. The Basic template comes complete so that all the students have to do is change what is provided to what they want to say. The Advanced template provides all of the features as the Basic one, but also adds the ability to:

  • Allow the story to skip to different parts by using the GOTO command.
  • Add Randoms to make the story different each time it is read. The student defines the potential random words (like dog, zebra, octopus, black widow spider) and Google Home selects a new one.
  • Add Saves so that information from the listener, such as his/her name or favorite color, can be integrated into the story.

The Built-in Coding

Throughout the story, there will be forks where the listener must make a choice. Fork options are written in bold, which shows what the Story Speakerlistener must say in order for the story to move forward. Students can begin to learn about basic if/then statements in code and how to predict outcomes. They must think like the listener as they predict what words he/she might say in response to the story. And they must follow logical, branching concepts, all without realizing that they are doing it. In addition, students can put notes to themselves in bold in the writing, much like programmers do, as bold text is not read out loud.

From a Teacher’s Perspective

Most kids don’t like to write. Staring at a blank page can be very frustrating for them. With Story Speaker, there is no blank page, which makes it less intimidating. And the fact that their story will be read aloud by a cool tech device makes it more fun. However, to ensure the learning is real, I would make sure to do the following:

  • Define the purpose of the writing. What do you as the teacher want to emphasize? Is it action verbs, having a strong beginning and ending, building tension to the climax, or creating great dialogue? Make sure the students know what their stories must contain to meet the content standards.
  • As a class, look over the content found in the template and discuss what they see. Then have the students develop a list of components that they will need to include in their own stories to make the template work well.
  • Strongly encourage peer editing. There is tremendous power in having students help each other become better writers.
  • Allow time to hear all of the stories. This might be done during the last five minutes of class, every Friday, or whenever you have a spare moment. But it’s important that all of the students get to shine.

By the way, if you just want to have Google Home read out any text, such as the Declaration of Independence or a poem your class is studying, simply copy and paste it into a blank Google Doc and then have Story Speaker read it aloud without using the templates.

Over time, your students can develop a class library of stories to share with their peers and next year’s students. This is authentic writing for sure!

 

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Alexa skills
Content AreasEducational Trends

Fine-tuning Your Virtual Assistant: Alexa Skills for All Content Areas

by Dr. Bruce Ellis
written by Dr. Bruce Ellis

Amazon’s Alexa can be a big help in a lot of contexts. But have you embraced the use of Alexa in the classroom yet? If you’re new to the idea of virtual teaching assistants, hop on over to this post to get some background on how Alexa can be a valuable addition to your lesson plans. If you’re already on board with Alexa, you’re in the right place to discover all the skills that will allow Alexa to be more helpful and relevant in your classroom, no matter what you teach.

Adding Skills

Begin by locating the Skills section in the free Alexa app that is associated with your Echo, Dot, or Tap.

While you can use the search feature, I have found it to be quicker to just browse the Education and Reference category. By default, your search results are listed by relevance, but you may want to change that to sort by average customer rating. Below are some skills that you might want to enable and how they can be used in the classroom. Search for the bolded skill name.

Primary Learners

  • Speak Listen Learn – Speak Listen Learn is being launched with the ability to sing the alphabet, teach letters/pronunciation, words, play sound effects, animal noises, tell jokes and more.
  • Animal Workout – Animal Workout allows kids to become different animals while getting exercise. Alexa will offer up encouraging words as they go along to also boost motivation and confidence.
  • Music Bop – This Alexa Kids Skill consists of fun, interactive adventures that get the kids moving around whilst also incorporating educational themes.

ELA

  • Earplay – Students will enjoy these choose-your-own-adventure stories featuring sound effects. You will need to sign up for a free Earplay account for Alexa to access.
  • Spelling Bee – The spelling bee is designed for students (grades 4 and 5) to help them practice their words. You can also use Spelling Champion, which will let you enter your own words to practice.
  • Amazing Word Master Game – Match your word skills against Alexa as you take turns saying a word that begins with the last letter of the previous word said. Earn more points for longer words. Consider having elementary students work in groups and take turns saying their word after Alexa to see how many points the class can get and if they can beat Alexa. Be sure to enunciate clearly; otherwise she might mistakenly think you said a shorter word!
  • Word Chain – Similar to the Amazing Word Master Game above, this skill limits the game to two categories: names of countries or names of countries, states, and capitals. Social studies students will find this fun and challenging…especially since you cannot repeat a place previously said.
  • Difficult Word Quiz – This skill reminds me of the word quiz section of Reader’s Digest. You’ll find it very appropriate for middle and high school students to expand their vocabulary for the SAT and ACT. Each quiz has ten words, and you must choose the correct definition of each.
  • The Magic Door – This is a choose-your-own-adventure skill that lets you explore the sea, hills, or dark forests. There are sleeping dragons, temples, the faint sound of music, and other mysterious sights and sounds to lure your students in. They probably won’t be able to finish the adventure during the class period. So then you can have them write their own endings to the story.
  • Short Bedtime Story – Each of these stories is 30 seconds to one minute long and can be personalized to one student’s name. These might work well as writing prompts. The Amazon Storytime skill has professionally narrated stories for children ages 5 to 12.
  • Magoosh Vocabulary Builder – Alexa will ask questions about five different vocabulary words to help you increase your vocabulary.
  • Highlights Magazine – Bring the family together to try some terrifically toothsome tongue-twisters, laugh at family-friendly jokes, and reconnect with Goofus and Gallant™. If you’re up for a challenge, push your imagination to the limits with brainteasers, or host a poetry slam in your living room. You can also listen to stories about animals, friendship, sports, and more.
  • Listening Comprehension Practice – This is an interactive story game suitable for all ages. Hear fun, quick stories and answer questions at the end to sharpen your listening comprehension. Each story is about Hutch, a boy in the 5th grade with a big brother and little sister. Listen to Hutch’s adventures and hear him make up his own entertaining tall tales. New content is added weekly, so check back often.

Math

  • Math Mania – Solve these addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division problems.
  • The Queen’s Mathematician – Mischievous elves have kidnapped the Tree Queen, and she can only be rescued if you, her best mathematician, unlock the charms that are keeping her hidden. Kids 6-8 use early elementary math facts, solve word problems, and stretch their imaginations and vocabularies in a quirky tree house castle full of surprises and kid-friendly humor.
  • My Math – This is a powerful skill that can do lots of different things to help students master math facts.
  • 1-2-3 Math – A math challenge which tests your elementary computing skills, including addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, comparison, etc., in three modes.
  • Lemonade Stand – This game skill simulates owning a lemonade stand. Alexa states the weather forecast for the (simulated) day and then the player buys cups of lemonade to sell, buys signs for advertising, and sets a price for a cup of lemonade. The game focuses on the following player skills: careful listening, math, money, business, understanding odds and chance statements, and managing expectations.
  • Railroad Math – Railroad Math is a math challenge which tests your elementary math skills, including addition, subtraction and multiplication.

Science

  • NASA Mars – If your students are studying Mars, you might find this skill very resourceful. You can ask Alexa questions about the red planet or the rover Curiosity. Other similar skills to check out include Planets Trivia or Star Facts or Earth, Moon and Sun Facts.
  • Science Buddy – Science Buddy is a fun and interactive way for kids to learn about science. It quizzes topics including earth science, biology, physics, and energy. It is based on the National Science Bowl but with simpler questions; Science Buddy will ask you ten multiple-choice questions with three choices each.
  • Outer Space Alice – With Outer Space Alice, kids learn about the International Space Station, geography, languages and other fun facts about the world.

Social Studies

  • This Day in History – Check in with Alexa to find out what events happened on this day.
  • Black History Facts – Live stars share important facts about African American history.
  • Kids Court – No more “she pushed me/he started it.” Send them to Kids Court and let Judge Lexy decide.
    While you rest, they will learn some basic facts about the U. S. judicial system. They will learn to present their cases coherently and speak up for themselves.
  • Texas Fun Facts – Help students learn more about their home state.
  • Kids News – Kids News provides fun entertaining daily current events, science and other types of news.
  • Colonial History – Looking to learn more about our Founding Fathers and the era that they lived in? This skill shares interesting historical information about the era of American colonial history.
  • Time Machine – Listen to the top headlines of the same day in a randomly chosen year from 1851 on.
  • Kid Power – Want to get active and save lives? UNICEF Kid Power is a way to play games and transform your activity into food packets that UNICEF delivers to malnourished kids around the world.

Other Subject Areas

  • Jeopardy – Each weekday, Alexa receives six questions by the show’s official writers. How many can you get correct? This may be a great challenge for gifted and talented students. There’s also a Teen Jeopardy available.
  • Twenty Questions – Young students will enjoy thinking of an animal, vegetable, or mineral and seeing if Alexa can deduce it by asking yes-or-no questions.
  • Ditty – Ask Alexa to make a fast song with Ditty, which turns any message you give it into a song. This is a great way for students to quickly create a song about a particular topic.
  • Learn Spanish – Learn the most commonly used phrases in Spanish.
  • Take part in the breakout explosion and have your students Escape the Room. There are currently four different rooms to try and escape from. This activity is great for logical thinking and problem solving, as well as small group teamwork.

More Skills Coming

New skills are added every week. And as more folks rate the skills, you’ll find that it’s easier to find the best content. Regardless of the user rating, though, be sure to enable the skill and test it out yourself before you introduce it to the classroom. And if you have an idea for a skill that should be added and are interested in creating it for Alexa, jump over to Getting Started with the Alexa Skills Kit or the set of YouTube videos on Developing Alexa Skills.

If you find a skill that is great in the classroom or just plain fun, leave me a comment and we can enjoy it together!

 

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WriQ
Content AreasGoogle Tips and TricksWriting

Improve Students’ Writing with WriQ

by Lori Gracey
written by Lori Gracey

Helping students improve their writing can be an extremely difficult and complex task. There are so many variables present in a piece of good writing that must all work together. Grammar, spelling, word choice, plot, sentence construction, voice — how can a teacher help students improve all of these and still have a life of her own that isn’t consumed by grading? Enter WriQ, an add-on for Google Docs.

Designed for the teacher and not the student, WriQ is a tremendous tool. The system scores and keeps track of students’ spelling, punctuation, and grammar errors so the teacher can focus on the things that computers can’t score as well. This will save the teacher time and frustration in marking those common errors. You can view a good introductory video on the power of WriQ here. The system auto-scores students’ docs and tracks the following measures over time:

  • Correct word sequences score
  • Grammar error rate
  • Percentage error free
  • Punctuation error rate
  • Spelling error rate
  • Text maturity
  • Time spent writing

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The teacher dashboard provides a clear, graphical view of students’ writing activity, and lets you track their progress over time. That is HUGE! The teacher can also submit individual feedback and comments.

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There is a good FAQ page available here that will answer most, if not all, of the questions you have. WriQ is completely free for now, but over time, additional “premium” features will be added. For a limited time, as a thank you to everyone who scores 100 student writing passages to help them out, they’ll give you free access…for life! So get it added to your Google Docs today and start submitting your students’ writing. This is definitely a tool that you will want to continue using!

Interested in other add-ons for Google tools? Check out these blogs here and here.

 

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