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Google Tips and Tricks

Five Seesaw Holiday Activities Your Students Will Love

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Need some holiday activities for your students? Explore these Seesaw Activities that you can grab and assign over the holidays. Your students will love these. What’s more, you can customize this Google Slides infographic for your own use. Let’s see how in this blog entry.

View the Seesaw Activities

You can start exploring the Seesaw Activities right away. To interact with the digital Seesaw Christmas tree, click on the ornaments in the interactive version of the tree online.

Get the Infographic

This is a fun infographic that took about two hours to put together (Did I mention I flunked art in kindergarten?). You can get it and start using it freely. It’s modeled after VectorStock’s infographic, but I’ve made a few changes to the original design. Simply make a copy of the infographic using the steps provided below.

You may also find this tutorial on how to make copies of Google documents, including Slides and Docs, handy.

Note: Due to the volume of feedback, emails requesting edit rights to the original infographic will be deleted. Learn more about infographics and how to get them online.

More Winter Resources from TechNotes

This blog was updated on July 26, 2021.

 

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iPads
Special Needs

TCEA Responds: Remote Teaching for Speech Therapists

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Dear TCEA Responds:

Speech teachers are struggling to use remote learning to meet student needs. They have several priorities, including keeping their caseload confidential, as well as sending and receiving assignments. Each student requires individualized plans. Our district wants us using G Suite EDU tools, but Classroom isn’t working for us.

Is there any advice, app, or program that you can think of that would help with this situation? We have asked several districts, but everyone does their own thing. I would appreciate any direction you can provide.

Thanks, Teresa

Dear Teresa:

Thank you for sharing this question. While I’ll take a stab at responding, I hope TCEA Technotes blog readers will as well.

Clarifying the Challenges

In reading your email, I see you’re facing several challenges. Allow me to summarize them as I understand them:

Challenge #1: Confidentiality

You need remote teaching resources that protect confidentiality of student-teacher interactions. Solutions like Google Classroom fail the test. Speech therapists/teachers have needs for confidentiality that exceed Google Classroom. Is that right?

Wondering how to approach Special Education in remote learning and remote teaching ? Sign up for TCEA’s Special Needs Educator online course.

Challenge #2: Individual Interactions

You need to be able to manage a large number of students per speech therapist where every interaction is confidential. How do you put 80 students in one digital class without sacrificing confidentiality? Or communicate with each student in a separate virtual space?

Challenge #3: Participation

Participation is low when speech therapists rely on teachers’ websites. To me, it sounds like you want your own space. The only issue is, participation may or may not suffer.

Let’s take a look at two possible solutions.

Rounding Up a Few Solutions

Finding the right answer to a multi-headed problem can be tough. As you guessed, there is no one perfect solution that combines all those components. Here are two possible solutions you may want to consider.

Option #1: Seesaw for Schools

You could use a solution like Seesaw. Wait, I know what you’re thinking…”Seesaw? That’s for little kids, right?” Actually, it’s not only for young children; Seesaw works well with older students, too. Districts use it for professional development for adult learners. In fact, I use it with adults at many of my workshops without any problems.

Let’s review a few relevant points:

  • Seesaw offers excellent audio/video recording support across devices.
  • Seesaw keeps teacher-student interactions to one on one. Using it enables you to set up individualized groups so that each group could focus on specific students. What’s more, Seesaw makes interactions confidential by default.
  • Seesaw works on all sorts of devices. This includes iPads, iPhones, and Android phones and tablets. It also works with Amazon Fire, Chromebooks, and Windows/Mac computers.
  • Seesaw is free for educators. Many of the features you need exist in the free version (Seesaw Basic). If you wanted more, you could always get Seesaw for Schools. To assist you with the options, check the chart below.

tcea responds

Need to learn Seesaw? TCEA offers a $29 Seesaw Educator online, self-paced course. You get to learn from brilliant course developer Brittany Beaird. You also receive 12 hours of CPE credit, a digital badge, and a certificate. And, if you’re not already a TCEA member, you get a complimentary one year membership ($49 value). Learn more online at Seesaw Educator.

Seesaw is one of my favorite digital tools. It ranks up there as one of the best solutions to teaching and learning available.

Option #2: OneNote and Flipgrid

You mentioned you were using G Suite EDU. If you have access to Microsoft 365, that presents another option. You could set yourself and your speech teachers up to use OneNote and Flipgrid.

OneNote Class Notebooks can be password protected and assigned to individual students. You can embed Flipgrid Topics for each student, securing them with a password.

Those are two possible options. I didn’t mention G Suite EDU since it appears that solution is one you’ve considered already. I would go with Seesaw as the best option.

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Learning Management System (LMS)

Tracking Attendance for Virtual Learners

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

For decades, teachers took student attendance with visual checks and marks on paper. Then attendance tracking became an exercise in logging student absences and tardies in digital gradebooks. When teachers exchanged physical classrooms for virtual, however, it created a problem.

Few gave thought to how to track attendance. They scrambled to answer the question, “How can I track it in my learning management system?” In this blog entry, we’ll explore how some popular LMSs handle attendance tracking.

TCEA offers amazing learning management system (LMS) self-paced courses. These are designed to take the sting out of having to sit through hours of Zoom lessons only to realize that the presenters went too fast. Instead, take your time and learn what you need to be successful via TCEA’s courses. Learn more about why we did this on the Ed Tech Club podcast.

The Existential Question: Are They Here? Or There?

“Why can’t we call out their names and take attendance like we always have?” I overheard a teacher ask in a webinar. The question remains, How do you verify a student is sitting in your virtual classroom?  That’s an important question since school funding is tied to average daily attendance (ADA):

The average daily attendance (ADA) is the total days of student attendance divided by the number of instructional days for the specified time period. For example, a student attending every day would equal one ADA. ADA is not the same as enrollment, which is the number of students enrolled in a campus on a given day. (Source: Texas Education Agency)

Some LMSs have attendance tracking built-in. Some educators are relying on one-question non-graded assignments, visual check-in, or Flipgrid to keep track of who’s there. Which of these solutions will work best?

#1 – Schoology Attendance Tracking

Using Schoology? If you have access to Schoology Enterprise, you have several ways to track students in the course. These analytics include assignment, discussion, link clicking, and materials access. Armed with this information, you can see the impact of your assignments and work. But what about attendance tracking?

Did You Know?

TCEA offers a $29 Schoology Educator course you can take to get up to speed on Schoology Basic and Enterprise features. Bulk discounts are available, and you get a digital badge and certificate. You also earn 12 CPE credit hours. Learn more.

One easy way is to take attendance with the Attendance menu, available in Schoology Basic. You can see what that looks like below:

tracking attendance

Schoology Enterprise gives you even more information via their Analytics menu option. Their analystics system provides access to:

  • Consistent tracking of Schoology usage across web, iOS app, and Android app use
  • An insight dashboard. This dashboard provides insights into how students are accessing the classroom, including what materials students are viewing and the amount of time spent.tracking attendance

Source: View Image Source

Educators can export user analytic statistics as a comma-separated values (CSV) (a.k.a. comma-delimited) file. This makes importing the file to a spreadsheet program easy. Once in a spreadsheet (e.g. Excel, Google Sheets), you can generate graphs and more reports if needed. In summary, Schoology Basic gets you started with attendance tracking. Schoology Enterprise provides a wealth of information teachers can use.

#2 – Canvas

As you may know, Instructure’s Canvas is a popular choice for many school districts. But how do you track attendance in Canvas?

tracking attendance

Canvas, like Schoology, enjoys an analytics section. It also has a specific feature to track attendance. That feature is the Roll Call Attendance Tool. It masquerades as an assignment. Here’s how Canvas Basic Guide describes it:

The Attendance (Roll Call) tool is an external app (LTI). Use it to take attendance in Canvas courses.

Enabled at the account level, use the Roll Call Attendance tool in all courses in a Canvas account. Some districts are choosing to not use fancy, outside LTIs.

#3 – Seesaw

Why did your district pivot from a more age-appropriate LMS like Seesaw? If that’s a question you’ve been asking yourself, here’s why. Unlike Schoology and Canvas, tracking attendance isn’t obvious in Seesaw or Google Classroom. There aren’t any fancy analytics in these tools. That’s why some school districts dropped Google Classroom and Seesaw. Some districts, like San Antonio ISD, dropped Seesaw and pushed everyone to Canvas. The problem, however, is that Seesaw for Schools is easy to work with for younger students.

tracking attendance

While some districts compensated by tracking attendance in daily face-to-face, live (a.k.a. synchronous) meetings, others preferred daily assignments. The problem with that approach is that there is a time lag from when the student submits the assignments to when the teacher grades and puts it in the book. Putting the information into the attendance book is thus a manual process.

Were you aware that TCEA member Brittany Beaird created an amazing online course to assist you in learning Seesaw? Become an overnight pro with the highly-rated Seesaw Educator course. Or learn how to Bitmoji your virtual classroom with TCEA member Lisa Marie Bennett.

Even so, it is possible to track attendance in Seesaw without assignments. This approach relies on Seesaw’s Skills.

How do you track attendance with students in Seesaw? One approach that Lisa Monthie (Waco ISD) suggests is using Seesaw Skills. Kris Szajner describes this approach in the video below:

Source: Kris Szajner (@KSzajner)

“You can click on the skill and grade it by giving it stars. There’s a report that gives you the grades in a CSV file,” says Lisa Monthie (Waco ISD). This makes it easy to import into an external digital attendance tracking system. Chances are, your school won’t allow import into the gradebook system. That means most folks will be using the manual approach to transfer grades.

#4 – Google Classroom

Using Google Classroom as your LMS? One of the ways G Suite EDU educators are tracking attendance is to rely on a scheduled Google Meet.

Sign up now for Google Classroom, TCEA’s online, self-paced course.  Learn what others are saying about this and TCEA’s other online courses.

As mentioned in previous blog entries, you can use Google Chrome browser add-ons. In my blog entry, Google Meet Add-Ons and Updates, I share several tools you can use. Some of those Google Meet tools for tracking attendance include:

  • Meet Attendance – Collect attendance in a Google Sheet from a Google Meet
  • Google Meet Plus – An amazing tool that is a must-have for any teacher. You can drop links, famous quotes, or use a whiteboard that tracks who did what.

Need analytics to complement Google Classroom? Find a few solutions in Five Amazing Add-Ons for Google Classroom. One worth looking at is Classwork Zoom.

Have the freedom to try a different tracking approach? Give this last option a try.

#5 – Flipgrid for Student Attendance

“Worried about evidence of attendance for school funding? No problem, it took me about three minutes to schedule my weekly Flipgrid attendance,” says Dr. Randall Sampson (@RandallSampson). He goes on to say the following:

I can insert attendance in required SIS and have a back-up security blanket of evidence. Plus, all videos are time stamped! Today’s scheduled attendance is working. I also receive email confirmations every time a student checks in for attendance. What does a school get from a 15-second Flipgrid attendance video? Export your Flipgrid Attendance videos to a spreadsheet.

Wow, let’s unpack some of that. Dr. Sampson asserts that you can use Flipgrid to:

  • Collect time-stamped attendance
  • Receive email confirmations
  • Export attendance records to a spreadsheet

“I want to keep it super simple. I set it to 15 seconds. Student: State your ‘first and last name’ and say ‘here,'” Dr. Sampson says. Isn’t that amazing? Thanks to Microsoft, Flipgrid.com is available at no cost to educators around the world. Get your free education account now.

Now that you’ve seen some different approaches to attendance tracking, share what you are doing. Have no doubt, attendance tracking is about bringing money into the school district. This makes doing it right and in a consistent manner important to your admins. Finally, don’t forget to explore TCEA’s free Remote Learning resources and blog entries.

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Online Courses
Professional Learning

New TCEA Online Courses to Keep You Learning

by Lori Gracey
written by Lori Gracey

Whether you will be back in a physical school classroom or will be teaching online in the fall, I think we can all agree that we need to upgrade our daily practice with a variety of teaching resources. And there is no better way to do that than to take advantage of one, two, or many of the online, self-paced courses that TCEA offers.

These “do in your own time at your own speed” courses are focused on real-world application of technologies and their best uses into the classroom. They include the latest research on good teaching strategies and brain learning. With a mix of short video segments and text, the courses also include DIY learning labs to ensure that you have the chance to practice your new skills. They are completed in Canvas and, upon completion, provide 12 hours of CPE credit, a digital badge, and a digital certificate.

About the Courses

Individual courses start at just $29 each and include a complimentary year of TCEA membership (normally $49 by itself). Discounts are also available if a campus or district registers 10 or more people for the same course.

Individual Online Courses

Here are the current offerings to increase your skills.

Bundled Courses

Courses that make sense to take in sequence have been bundled for additional cost savings to educators and school districts. The following bundles are available:

  • Become a Google Teacher – Includes Google Educator Level 1, Google Educator Level 2, and Google Classroom. The bundled price for all three courses is $75 ($65/person for groups of 10 or more from the same campus or district).
  • Become a Google Trainer – Includes Google Educator Level 1, Google Educator Level 2, and Google Certified Trainer. The bundled price for all three courses is $75 ($65/person for groups of 10 or more from the same campus or district).
  • Certified Google Educator Level 1 and Level 2 – Includes Google Educator Level 1 and Google Educator Level 2. The bundled price for both courses is $54 ($44/person for groups of 10 or more from the same campus or district).
  • All Google Courses – Includes Google Educator Level 1, Google Educator Level 2, Google Classroom, and Google Certified Trainer. The bundled price for all four courses is $99 ($88/person for groups of 10 or more from the same campus or district).

Upcoming Online Courses

TCEA is working on a number of additional online learning experiences for you. These include the following with their projected release dates. (Please keep in mind that the release dates are our “best guesses” as to when each course will be ready for participants.)

  • Canvas Educator – July 13-17, 2020
  • Bitmoji Classroom – July 15, 2020
  • Strategies That Work, Part 1: Core Components – July 15, 2020

Other courses, such as Brain-Based Learning Strategies, Social/Emotional Learning, Robotics Certification (EV3), and G Suite EDU 101 are also in development. You can look for all new courses to be posted to this website as they become available. If you have questions about any of the course content, please contact either Miguel Guhlin (mguhlin@tcea.org) or Peggy Reimers (preimers@tcea.org).

What Others Think about the Online Courses

Here are just a few of the many positive comments made about the online courses and how they are helping educators be better teachers and leaders:

“Just wanted to let you know that I logged in…and saw PASS. Thank you so much for the prep! I feel more confident now as I move onto Google Level 2! I appreciate all the work you did, all the videos, and the added websites. All of them truly helped in my passing!”

“I have never used Google Classroom before. This course is very detailed and step by step! It’s wonderful! After this course, I feel like I have the skills to set up my classes and utilize Google Classroom to facilitate learning with quicker response times on grading. Thank you!”

“I found the course to be easily accessible and provided resources as well as scenarios that will help me prepare to obtain Google Certified Trainer status.”

“The TCEA Level 2 Google Educator certification was terrific! The facilitator not only knows the ins and outs of Google’s plethora of products, but he is also engaging and interesting to listen to during the instructional videos.”

Be fully prepared for innovative teaching this fall by enhancing your learning and your instructional strategy tool bag with these courses designed specifically for dedicated educators. We’ll see you online!

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Special Needs

Remote Learning for Special Education Teachers

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Concerned about doing a great job via remote learning for special education students? You’re not alone. “Don’t worry about special education students,” one principal said to her teachers. “We have a district team working to pick up the slack.” Providing remote learning opportunities for mainstream students is tough enough, and few accommodations for special needs students are available for remote learning. In this blog entry, we’ll explore three common challenges and offer some suggestions.

Challenge #1: Reinforcing Academic Vocabulary

“How do I reinforce academic vocabulary in the home environment?” asked one educator. Keeping up with new vocabulary in non-fiction and fiction content presents fresh obstacles and students may find themselves overwhelmed with text-centric content. How do they navigate it?

Vocabulary development requires evidence-based, designed instruction. To be effective, deliver instruction with fidelity, intensity, and duration (source). Several possible solutions can improve the situation:

  • Increasing interactivity with digital documents
  • Relying on browser-based tools like Microsoft’s Immersive Reader’s picture dictionary

Let’s take a quick look at each with an ed tech perspective.

Increasing Interactivity with Digital Documents

When annotating content for vocabulary learning, students may do the following:

  • Circle the prefix
  • Circle the suffix
  • Underline vowel sounds
  • Say parts of the word (or divide the word into syllables)
  • Find the root meaning of the word

To get a sense of how these work together, watch this video on Word Learning Strategies. Some excellent annotation tools for older students include Kami and Xodo. If you are working with younger students, Seesaw has built-in tools you can use as part of its Activities.

Dividing Word into Syllables and Picture Dictionary

As you may know, Microsoft’s Immersive Reader makes it easy to divide word(s) into syllables.

special education

As you can below, Microsoft’s Immersive Reader can display a word to define a word. This can be helpful to students.

special education

Learn more about Microsoft Immersive Reader.

Challenge #2: Providing Accommodations on Digital Platforms

“How do I provide accommodations in Seesaw? I am not the teacher of record and cannot see what the regular ed teacher is doing.” Are you in this situation? Remember that the classroom teacher has a few options. Emily (Seesaw Support) offers these tips:

special education

Emily suggests that options differ according to the age level of students. For older students, she recommends separate classes be set up. That way, the general education teacher has her own class and the special education teacher has her own class. This means that students have to switch between the two and would then log in using their “Home Learning Code” or email. This can be confusing for younger learners. (Want to learn more about Home Learning Codes? Explore this short, TCEA Remote Learning video and associated resources.)

Younger students may be unable to keep track of the “Home Learning Code” for several classes they are part of. Emily recommends that the teacher invite specialists as co-teacher(s). Then, use folders to keep specialist work organized. Explore other options in this blog entry.

Challenge #3: Steep Learning Curve

“I’m struggling with a learning curve with technology. It is all new to me. I don’t want to use Zoom due to potential issues that I don’t know how to fix. And I’m worried that children lack accessibility.” Are you an educator who has previously relied on  face-to-face interactions alone? Transitioning to online can be tough. A few questions to ask yourself:

  • What is the least amount of technology that you need to learn to be effective?
  • Which of those technologies are district-approved?
  • What rulings has your district made about special education accommodations?

Many districts have already decided what technology tools you will use. In some districts, for example, you may be using the following:

  • Phone – Keep in contact with parents and colleagues using your home phone. (You may want to read this blog entry on how to protect your privacy with a personal Google Voice account.)
  • Video/Web Conferencing – While Zoom has risen to the top as easy to use, districts are using other tools as well. Those tools include Google Meet and Microsoft Teams.
  • Learning Management System (LMS) – Some districts may have standardized on one of these. Use the one that is age-appropriate and district-approved. Ask for professional learning opportunities. Often, what you end up using depends on the general education teacher. Piggyback on their efforts.
    • Canvas
    • Google Classroom
    • Microsoft Teams
    • Schoology
    • Seesaw

For example, Martina is a special education teacher who is collaborating with Charles, a general education teacher. Martina uses Google Voice for voice contacts with parents and students.  When participating in grade level meetings, she uses Zoom because Zoom is what the district decided on. Since Charles is using Seesaw for his younger grade students, she is now a co-teacher in his Seesaw class.

Learning Has No Limits

As you make the effort to coordinate your support work for students, remember to take time. Take time to learn, manage, and renew yourself at the start of each day. Learn how to do something old in a new way, manage your interactions with students and staff. And find a way to renew your energy with exercise or meditation.

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Good TeachingGoogle Tips and Tricks

Video Sharing in Google Classroom and Seesaw

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Need to share videos into Google Classroom or Seesaw? You’re not the only teacher who needs to put a quick tutorial video together for students. Here are some strategies that other educators recommend around the topics of video storage, sharing and creation tools and tips, as well as how to share videos in Seesaw and Google Classroom.

Storing Videos in the Cloud

With both Google Classroom and Seesaw, you can share links to existing videos. This means that you can make a video using any tool you want and then post it anywhere. That anywhere can be YouTube, Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, or wherever. One thing you need to be careful with is ensuring that the video is viewable by anyone with a link. This is an option when you put the video in a cloud storage space.

Did you know you might have almost unlimited storage in the cloud? Both G Suite EDU and Microsoft OneDrive offer unlimited (or almost) storage.

share video

A New Player? Loom Pro for Free

“Looms is my choice as a best option,” says TCEA board member, John Bimmerle. He goes on to point out that it is “super quick.” Loom Pro, which has gone free for teachers, is also open to students at K-16 education institutions. Loom Pro comes with a desktop version and Chrome extension.  Learn more about their COVID-19 Loom Pro free offer via their announcement. My experience? It lagged a bit in rendering the video on their website. After 10 minutes, I uninstalled Loom and opted for another tool. Let’s hope they improve and/or demand eases up.

Wait, Wait, There’s ONE MORE Newcomer!

Flipgrid announced on April 1, 2020 that they are adding screen recording to their amazing product. It’s a free, no-cost offering. Watch their announcement video via this Tweet (or see the unauthorized MP4 video I made of it):

The possibilities with Flipgrid screenrecording option are endless. You can now organize your screencasts, such as of your desktop and apps, into grids and allow others to contribute. What’s more, you can export those screencasts as MP4 video files to place on YouTube. What’s amazing is how easy it is to screen recording using Flipgrid. And, all of this is FREE and available at no cost to educators. It also allows you to start and stop video recording, which is an amazing feature.

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.

Video Creation Tools

If you’re still looking for a good tool for video sharing, here’s a quick run down of other digital tools you can use to creating teaching videos.

  1. Screencast-o-Matic. Screencast-O-Matic is a fantastic tool that will let you record from their site. You can record up to 15 minutes, and it allows for webcam picture recording. Save your videos in .mp4, .flv, or .avi video format or you can upload them straight to YouTube.
  2. Screencastify. Screencastify is a Chrome extension that allows you to record, edit, annotate, store, and share video screen captures. Record a specific tab, or your whole desktop, at the click of a button. The free Lite version normally limits recording time to five minutes per video and has a watermark. Due to COVID-19, as of this writing, you can get premium version for free for 60 days. You may also want to look at some of their free e-learning resources. They are also announcing a new feature for students to use Screencastify. Find out more at Screencastify Submit. Watch a video intro.
  3. Nimbus Screencapture/Screen recording. Nimbus is a Chrome extension for capturing web pages, either part of one or the whole browser window. You can also edit your screenshots and screen record your desktop or a particular tab.
  4. Zoom. Available at no charge and in wide usage as a result of COVID-19, many people don’t know they can use it to record and share their screens. Using Zoom Basic, you can record webinars that feature picture in picture, play music as you share your screen, and save a video recording to your computer. Many videos you will create will be no more than five to 30 minutes, which fall into the free version of Zoom time limits. Of course, those time limits have been waived for educators during COVID-19.

Popular Screencasting Tools

Those are some of my favorite browser-based screen recording tools. There are also free screen recording tools that you can install on Windows. Of course, Mac users can rely on QuickTime, which offers free recordings. If you need to edit videos, Shotcut is a great editor for Windows, Mac, and GNU/Linux computers.

A Personal Recommendation

People often ask, “What do you use?” Until lately, I have relied on Screencastify. With its $29 price tag  for one year, it’s worth the investment. While I still use Screencastify when on a Chromebook, on Windows 10 and Mac I recommend another tool, Open Broadcaster Software (OBS). I can’t tell you how amazed I was at the flexibility, versatility, and speed of this free (and no-cost), open source tool. Gamers (e.g. esports) use OBS to stream their game-play to various streaming services (e.g. Facebook LIVE, Twitch, Periscope). You can use it to record your content, too.

Look hard? It’s not as bad as you think. Here’s what OBS looks like when I’m using it to record videos for TCEA Remote Learning.

Highlight Tool: Open Broadcaster Software (OBS)

Instead of recording your desktop, OBS allows you to record anything your computer does (see sidebar image for a list). While not for the faint of heart, OBS continues to get easier to use every day. If you have to record video, it makes switching between different scenes and input sources (e.g. audio, video, webcam, browsers, and apps) easy.

Intended as a streaming solution, you can use it to record and save video to MKV or MP4 format. I am truly astonished how fast it is once set up. However, the setup can be confusing, and so I encourage you to read my upcoming guide on recording videos with OBS. In the meantime, be sure to read the the OBS Studio Quickstart guide.

Even More Video Sharing Tools

Looking for other powerful tools to use? Here are a few.

  1. Flipgrid.com – Flipgrid is a free, fun, and easy way to have a video chat. It is a great tool to get student feedback while incorporating student voice. There is an iOS and Android app.
  2. VideoNot.es. Have students use this Google Drive app with their Google account. That will allow them to take notes while they watch a video that you assign. Notes work as video markers. Click the notes, and you leapfrog to the matching spot in the video.
  3. Vialogues. Vialogues allows you to create conversations that revolve around a video.
  4. EdPuzzle. This is the premier tool for adding content to an existing video. It makes it easy to use what you need from any video. You can insert audio notes or record over a video with your voice. You can even add questions at any point in the video and track your students’ understanding.
  5. Educannon (Playposit). This is a great way to annotate existing YouTube videos for students to watch at home.

share video

Some Quick Tips for Video Recordings

Here are some quick tips for video recording you may want to keep in mind:

1) Storyboard your content first, then create a video about your lesson. All the tools are free to get started.

2) Keep videos short, two to three minutes or five to 10 minutes max (shorter is better). You can always create more videos. Think “bite-sized chunks” that students can nibble on their way to/from school, sitting somewhere waiting for an adult to do something, or during the gap in a basketball game on television or in person.

3) Plan for reflective, online classroom activities. Use tools like Quizziz, Kahoot, and GetKnowt to create some online assessments.

Recording Video on the Go

Need tools for recording videos on the go? You can use your smartphone and an app to get the job done. Need some solutions for Android? How about iOS?

Sharing Videos in Seesaw

Sharing content in Seesaw has never been easier. The steps involve creating an announcement and adding an attachment. Then you select the type of attachment you want (a link). Afterwards, paste the link to your “shared with anyone” video resource. For a visual overview, check out this animated GIF that walks you through the process. Remember, you can have a copy of that video saved anywhere so long as it is “shared with anyone link.”

If you want to share a message straight to the camera, you can record video directly into Seesaw using your device’s camera. Instead of choosing LINK in the Add Attachment window, choose VIDEO, as shown in the picture below:

share video

Sharing Videos: Google Classroom

Google Classroom makes it easy to share content by posting it into its stream or to YouTube. If it’s an instructional video, you can then add questions with EdPuzzle. Dropping your videos into Google Drive, then sharing a public link is easy. Drop the link to the video in the Google Classroom stream. You may like Eric Curts’ video series on Google Classroom.

Final Thoughts

Still not sure what’s the best tool for the job? Let’s review the options below:

  • Flipgrid user? Need an easy to use tool, then Flipgrid screen recording is so easy. You can save your screencasts as MP4 videos on your computer. Flipgrid works via your browser, making it the perfect tool on mobile devices. This is also an amazing feature for students to use.
  • Screencastify? If you are a Chromebook users, or want to use a simple, powerful tool, then Screencastify will make the job easier. As a veteran Screencastify user, it’s one of my favorite tools. They are also announcing a new feature for students to use Screencastify. Find out more at Screencastify Submit.
  • OBS Project? Not afraid of a little complexity? OBS offers a free, no-cost screen recording tool that works on your Windows or Mac computer. It’s super-fast since it’s running on your computer.
  • Mobile user? Try XRecorder to screencast your Android screen, YouCut – Video Editor & Video Maker, No Watermark to blend pictures and video with light editing. On iOS?

Need a video editor? Use the free, open source Shotcut for Windows, Mac, and GNU/Linux. Or if you need a browser-based web editor, WeVideo may be your only option (check here for more info).

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How to Increase Reading Fluency with Repeated Reading Strategies

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

How do you increase a child’s reading fluency? It’s a question that seems to have an easy answer. One common response is that you give them more opportunities to listen to others as they read. You also make it important for them to read aloud and then provide them feedback on their reading. In this blog entry, we’ll explore a high-effect size instructional strategy that can increase reading fluency and explore some ways technology can make implementing this strategy easier.

A Quick Review

If you’ve been following the TCEA TechNotes blog, you’ve sensed our new focus on the work of John Hattie. Hattie conducted meta-analyses of research on instructional strategies. Some strategies fall above what he characterized as the “hinge point,” or an effect size of .40. Strategies that speed up student growth in one year fall above the hinge point. For example, the jigsaw approach (1.20) yields three years of growth in one year when used in a consistent way. Reciprocal teaching (.74) yields almost two year’s growth in one year.

Picking a high-effect size strategy is not enough. These strategies also fall into general categories. They include “surface,” “deep,” or “transfer” learning. That’s because Hattie defines learning in this way:

…the process of developing sufficient surface knowledge to then move to deeper understanding such that one can appropriately transfer this learning to new tasks and situations. (Source: Visible Learning for Literacy)

Jigsaw is a surface learning approach that assists students in two ways. Fisher, Frey, and Hattie says that surface learning consists of two sub-phases. The first to help students acquire, summarize, and outline a topic. The second is to practice testing and receiving feedback. As you might imagine, the jigsaw approach works great for this.

Reciprocal teaching focuses on comprehension. As such, the goal is to assist students to transition. That transition is from surface knowledge to a deeper, conceptual understanding. Knowing when and why you will use a strategy remains important. Neither strategy (e.g. jigsaw, reciprocal teaching) would be appropriate for developing decoding as a part of reading fluency, which is our primary concern in this blog entry.

Definition: Decoding: Decoding is the ability to apply your knowledge of letter-sound relationships, including knowledge of letter patterns, to correctly pronounce written words. Understanding these relationships gives children the ability to recognize familiar words quickly and to figure out words they haven’t seen before. (Source: Reading Rockets)
Definition: Fluency is defined as the ability to read with speed, accuracy, and proper expression. In order to understand what they read, children must be able to read fluently whether they are reading aloud or silently. When reading aloud, fluent readers read in phrases and add intonation appropriately. (Source: Reading Rockets)

Developing Decoding Skills

Listening to teachers at a professional development event, one teacher pointed something out. She made a connection to the type of problem reciprocal teaching solves. “Students first need to move beyond the mechanics of reading. They need to become fluent readers first.” Reciprocal teaching addresses a different problem. That problem is, “What if students are fluent readers, but cannot comprehend what they read?” But what about those students who haven’t overcome the mechanics of decoding?

Why Decoding and Fluency Are Important

Students, from grades one through middle school, may encounter decoding challenges. This might also be true for older students learning a second language. Timothy Shanahan  offers the need to:

  • Get students to read the author’s words in an accurate manner.
  • Read texts at about the speed of oral language.
  • Make reading sound like language. This involves pausing in the right places so that text makes sense.

While there are several approaches for addressing decoding, repeated reading offers one approach. It works for young readers as well as middle school students. Repeated reading (effect size of .75) enables students to move from decoding to meaning:

Repeated reading involves students reading the same passage (=>3x) to teachers. When the student miscues, the teacher can read the correct word aloud. Then, the student rereads the passage until reaching a satisfactory reading level.

Repeated Reading Approach

There are several other approaches to achieve repeated reading effectively. One way is to have a student listen to a passage read aloud by the teacher. Then the student reads it to himself several times. Then, the student reads it aloud. The teacher calculates the rate, accuracy, intonation, pacing, and expressiveness and reports this to the student along with elapsed time. The student re-reads the passage again with this information in mind. The student has the goal of improving these elements.

How could classroom technologies facilitate repeated reading as a strategy? Let’s consider one of the challenges teachers and students face.

Opportunity for Repetition with Repeated Reading

One of the challenges teachers and students may encounter with repeated reading is the opportunity for repetition. A teacher with a large class may be unable to read for each child. Carol Chomsky suggested another approach that involves teachers recording a selection to audiotape. Students are then invited to record themselves as well.

With modern technologies, teachers have several options:

  • Option #1: Use Flipgrid. The teacher can read the text, modeling facial expressions and word formation for students. This is great for dramatic readings since students can see it. In return, students can record themselves reading their text. They can submit as many repeated responses as they like. What’s more, Flipgrid includes Microsoft’s Immersive Reader. This makes it a fantastic addition given Immersive Reader’s features.
  • Option #2: Seesaw. Teachers can share an audio/video recording of a reading, then invite students to leave a video/audio recording of their repeated reading. This is great because it makes archiving and tracking student growth easy for sharing via Seesaw.
  • Option #3: Google Slides or PowerPoint Online. The teacher can display text to be read on screen via a slide and then insert an audio recording. Students can then record their own versions for a particular number of times (three to five times) before turning it in to their teacher.
  • Option #4: Use web-based audio recorder. Using a web-based audio recorder, the teacher or student can record audio. Copies of recorded items can be saved to Google Drive, OneDrive, or submitted as part of Microsoft/Google Forms.

These are great options to use because they result in a record of reading, and it can be dramatic to see growth over time. What’s more, they make it easier for the teacher to provide corrective feedback. Corrective feedback has a significant impact on fluency and comprehension.

“Repeated readings has been the most researched and successful approach to improving reading fluency,” says Lauren Nienhuis. These technology tools mentioned can assist you in maximizing your impact on student readers. Give them a try for repeated reading.

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Learning to Juggle with Seesaw

by Guest Blogger
written by Guest Blogger

Are you a juggler when it comes to education?

Have you ever wanted one spot to keep track of everything as a teacher? Sometimes, we educators feel learning something new is “just one more thing to add to our plate.” But being a digital leader means sharing and collaborating effective, efficient ideas and tools. Seesaw Learning Journal is such a tool. It even can help educators communicate effectively and efficiently with both students and parents.

Seesaw is a platform to encourage student engagement online, where they can showcase their voice and ownership in their work. It is a student-driven online journal that can be used in many ways and is available through the web, iOS, and Android.

Ups and Downs of Seesaw

seesawThere are several benefits to using Seesaw. Students are able to showcase their best work for parents, peers, and teachers. Students are able to explain their masterpieces, and take pride in ownership through their use of camera, video, drawings, and notes, especially when they know it is being published. This helps shy students who want to speak but are not very vocal. Teachers benefit from Seesaw by being able to use the student journal as a paperless storage for work samples, to show and discuss at parent conferences, and even use as an assessment tool. Additionally, teachers can make private notes and give feedback.

Seesaw is also user-friendly for families. Parents can see and comment on all their child’s masterpieces, and they can communicate one-to-one with the teacher. Best of all, multiple parents or any family member can join and comment. I have one student right now that has her grandma, aunt, and mom connected, and they all comment on her work!

The core Seesaw service is free for teachers, families, and students. It is a key part of their mission to impact as many students as possible. They also offer Seesaw Plus and Seesaw for Schools, which are optional paid upgrades for teachers and schools who want to do even more with Seesaw. You can view a comparison of Seesaw, Seesaw Plus, and Seesaw for Schools features here.

As for the disadvantages of Seesaw, if students are signing in through a class QR code, they are not able to edit previous work. This requires the teacher to navigate this extra step. The appearance of the dashboard needs to be updated to be more appealing to the student. The disadvantage for the teacher is printing out invitations to the parents. You must download the entire class PDF file, not just one student’s, in order to send the QR code home. The con for the parents is the lack of push notifications on iOS and Android. On tablets, students are not able to draw on a still picture while recording their voice. For example, when my kindergarteners are reading a list of sight words, I like them to check them off as they read. They can on Chromebooks, and it may come Android soon.

Using Seesaw Learning Journals

Teaching students to use Seesaw Learning Journal is an easy task, even for kindergarteners. First, students can sign in either by email (recommended for grades 3-12) or by QR codes (recommended for grades PreK-2 ). I teach kindergarten, and in my classroom of 19, the students log in and add their “Wow Work” (best work) themselves on Chromebooks and tablets by signing in with a class QR code.

Next, students can add content by camera, video, notes, Google links, drawings, or even by uploading a PDF. My students this past week chose their “Leaf Projects” to showcase. They appsmashed with Chatterpix and uploaded it to Seesaw. Some then chose to type a sentence about their projects; others choose to type describing words. It was their choice, their voice, and they have ownership in their work.

Third, students have a choice when it comes to assignments within the “Activities Tab.” The assignment can be specifically for a certain student or be the same for the whole class. Finally, the student logs in and clicks his name, then his activity tab. After they complete their assignment, they save it to their Seesaw account.

Grown-Up Growth

Teaching the adults to use Seesaw is my favorite. After using Seesaw for six years now, my interest sparks each year as Seesaw is updated.

As a teacher, the class is set up by entering your students’ names and their email addresses, if you chose for them to sign in with emails. The teacher is then able to let students upload their work and can give feedback and comments about their work. Teachers also have the option of giving the students more power by letting them comment on their peer’s work. This is recommended as long as a digital citizenship lesson has been provided.

Next, teachers get to differentiate student work in the activities tab by only assigning certain work to certain students or the whole class. The activities tab provides teachers with a single place to see who has completed and turned in their assignments and who is still working on them. Teachers can also tag certain TEKS/objectives to certain activities. This makes it easy to pull up reports on a certain TEK and see if you need to reteach that concept, or if your students are grasping the lessons.

Seesaw has a plethora of activities already made for you. They are sorted per subject, per grade level, and are available to add to your students’ accounts. No reason to reinvent the wheel! The teacher can simply copy and adjust it to the student’s needs. The Skills tab on Seesaw is a great way to assess a child on a four-star scale.

Staying Connected

Another great part for teachers is the parent communication. For years, I used Seesaw, Class Dojo, and Remind for parent communication. I was all over the place, with some parents connected to this one but not that one. The last two years, I have only used Seesaw, and all my parents are connected in one place.

This makes it easy to send out announcements for the class, to send flyers home, or even a quick message. You can communicate to the parents/families, or just to the students, or just to one parent. It is a great way to send weekly personalized messages out on how their child is learning and participating in class. I also send out a weekly announcement on what their child is learning in my class for that week. I was able to embed my link to my Google document to sign up for parent/teacher conferences and was able to get real-time feedback.

As you can see, there are many pros and just a few cons to using Seesaw Learning Journal. Overall, Seesaw is user-friendly for the students, parents, and teachers. Give it try!

Laressia Martin is an educational technology leadership expert and elementary educator. You can learn more about her on her website or on Twitter.

“Vitz-9572”by Jon.Proehl is licensed under CC BY 2.0

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Collecting, Curating, and Sharing with Seesaw

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Looking for an easy to use tool that makes collecting, curating and sharing student work from tablets simple? Then Seesaw is a solution worth exploring.

At the Tots and Technology Conference held in Galveston, Texas in June, TCEA member Brittany Adcock shared her experience using Seesaw, which bills itself as a student-driven digital portfolio solution. Seesaw works on Android and iOS devices (e.g. iPads), making it an incredible tool to simplify and streamline content sharing by students. In the past, students and teachers encountered limits to their sharing. The app works quite easily (check tutorials online) in this way:

  1. The teacher creates an account on the Seesaw website, setting up a class.
  2. The teacher prints out a flyer emailed to her by Seesaw containing a QR code, then hangs that flyer on the wall where students will be working.
  3. Students who are ready to submit their work open the app on their device, select the “I’m a student” button, and then scan the QR code on the flyer. They will then be given a choice to add a variety of content, including video, audio, text, web links, or images/video from the device’s Camera Roll (iOS).
  4. Once students have submitted their work, the teacher can decide to approve it for inclusion in the Class Learning Journal, which is viewable by all students in the class today.

Teachers can also create a Seesaw-based blog, and adding content to the website is as easy as clicking a globe beneath a student’s creation.

In her presentation, Brittany (listen to this interview with Brittany as she shares her insights at TCEA Tots) describes Seesaw in the following way:

A digital portfolio that collects students’ digital and physical work in one place. Everything is organized, making grading and conferences easier! A space that each student can “own”  with built-in tools that make it easy for them to capture learning, reflect, and learn new skills. A parent communication tool that seamlessly shares what’s going on in your classroom and builds a strong school-home community.

seesawblog

We Are StoryMakers Seesaw based blog. Are you sharing your students’ work with a global audience?

After exploring Seesaw in the context of professional development sessions for adult learners, here are three ways that my session participants took advantage of the app:

  1. After creating paper slide videos, learners saved those video creations to their Camera Roll. These were shared via the Seesaw blog (view blog created with products from a Lubbock workshop on Tablets in the ELL Classroom, as well as the Becoming a Storymaker pre-conference session).
  2. Since learners were working in Star Trek-themed teams, they submitted their work to “Away Team: Janeway” (a reference to Captain Kathryn Janeway from Star Trek Voyager television series; other captains included Captains Archer, Kirk, Hernandez and Uhura). This organized student work by their group, rather than just an individual submission.
  3. Students created content with PicCollage, web links, and Notes and then submitted it.

A versatile solution for collecting work on tablets, TCEA member Karen Balbier (El Paso ISD) shared that she uses the app to collect work from participants in her professional learning sessions, and in turn, asks them to share their K-12 students’ best work for inclusion. An innovative use of a technology intended for students, adapted for adult learners, Seesaw is a sensational tool for facilitating collecting, curating, and sharing work created on tablets.

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#TCEATots Voxercasts: Learning for Elementary Educators

by Miguel Guhlin
written by Miguel Guhlin

Earlier this week, I had the opportunity to travel to the TCEA Tots and Technology Conference taking place in Galveston, Texas for elementary educators. When I attend conferences like this one, it can be overwhelming to process all the information that’s being shared. That’s why I took a few moments to start up the Voxer app and interview folks on the way to TCEA Tots.

Below, you’ll find short “voxercasts.” The Voxer app makes it easy to record content and then quickly share it. I bookmarked the tweets where I shared the Voxercasts and you can subscribe to the #TCEATots Voxercasts RSS feed via the Diigo social bookmarking tool.

These TCEA Tots voxercasts really help capture the flavor of this fantastic conference geared to teachers of young children. Note that links below will open to a Voxer page.

Seven Tots and Technology Voxercasts:

  1. Green Screen Tips from Dr. Bruce Ellis – This conversation really blew my mind, so to speak, and sharing the tips Dr. Ellis included in his overview of green screes caught the attention of pre-conference attendees in my Become a Storymaker session.
  2. GeoGuesser with Dr. Bruce Ellis – This conversation expands on social studies/geography connections possible with GeoGuesser, a Google feature I had never heard of. In fact, when I spoke with Lampasas ISD teachers who were presenting on virtual field trips and geo-related activities, they did not know about it either.
  3. iPad Sharing Made Easy (Part 1) with Miguel Guhlin – This conversation has me sharing about iPads and getting information out there. I highlight several apps, including Readdle Documents and Seesaw. This is a two-part series since we were having too much fun, and Part 2 also mentioned Android.
  4. iPad and Android Sharing Made Easy (Part 2) with Miguel Guhlin and Dr. Bruce Ellis – You may have noticed that the previous voxercast was cut short. This is the second half.
  5. Notecard Confessions with Pedro Delgado (El Paso ISD) – What a joy to chat with Pedro Delgado (Twitter @neuropete01), TCEA Teacher of the Year Award finalist. He describes how he and his fourth and fifth grade students adapted the Paper Slide Videos, which I shared in my pre-conference session at TCEA Tots and Technology, to create Notecard Confessions. Check out Pedro’s phenomenal web site here.
  6. sherrieshelleyVirtual FieldTrips and More with Sherrie Berry and Shelley Kozma (Lampasas ISD) (shown right) – We discussed Seesaw, as well as other awesome ideas and tips in the iPad classroom. This really addresses collecting student work from iPads. Also discussed Microsoft in Education, as well as Skype in the Classroom. And Google Lit Trips were also referenced. Catch them on Twitter @shelleykozma and @sherrie_berrys.
  7. Digital Storytelling with Dr. Martha Green (Texas A&M) and Cecelia “Cece” Porra – In this wonderfully rich conversation, Martha, Cece, and I discuss digital storytelling and its application for instructional purposes. Martha provides some insights into using digital storytelling for mathematics, as well as shares other ideas.
  8. codinginlangartsCoding in the Language Arts Classroom with Kelly Hong – Listen to Kelly share what she knows about coding in the language arts classroom. Who would have thought you could “write” or “code” fantasy stories and tales with MIT’s Scratch program?
  9. Seesaw with Brittany Adcock (@adcockb10) – Listen to Brittany share about Seesaw, a phenomenal digital portfolio tool.
  10. digitallearningctrsDigital Learning Centers with Crystal Flores and Jeanine Freeman (@techtimewithj9) – This is a fascinating presentation by Crystal and Jeanine about how Crystal created audio versions of her classroom books. Also listen to Dr. Roland Rios share his reflections, too.
  11. TCEA Tots participants were asked to share their insights: What is one take-away from TCEA Tots? Other participants Image 276(TonyaHinkebein; MalvernMRS shown below with service dog, Nelson) also offered their thoughts on Promoting Technology Use in their classroom.
  12. Collaborative Grant Writing (Part 1 and Part 2)– This was an enlightening session regarding crowdfunding (e.g. DonorsChoose) with Brandi (@aesfinearts) and Mandy Bryan (@mandyrbryan) and collaborative grant writing tools. It resulted in two parts.

Be sure to check back for even more interviews from TCEA Tots and Technology 2016 in Galveston, Texas. And if you want more learning for elementary educators, consider joining us for the Tots Frisco conference July 24-26.

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