Formative/EduWin for Kristy Chia

As teachers, we all know how important formative assessment is. Intervening at just the right time can make a difference between a student continuing to make the same mistake or forming a misconception, thus needing remedial help, and a quick redirection that sets the student off on the next step to deeper understanding.

Formative is a real-time tool that gives you the ability to assess your students' understanding, and give them immediate feedback.

Because Formative works with any device, it is a great tool to use with student Chromebooks or tablets.  You can create a free account using your @unionsd.org GAFE username and password. Once you have an account, you can create an assignment and send it out to students using a "Quick Code." It is easy for students to access Formative from the USD Symbaloo Landing Page. They enter the assignment code and can "Continue without logging in" to participate in your assignment. However, you might like to keep track of student work and progress. To do that, you'll first need to create a class.

After students access Formative through the Symbaloo page, have them click Signup, click on sign up as a student, and press the red bar "Sign in with g+." On the next screen, have students enter the Class Code (not case sensitive), and then press "Let's Do This" to join your class. 

You can upload a PDF or Word document and have students answer questions on top of the canvas. You can create a new document using multiple choice, true/false, typed response, or show your work/drawing responses. You can even embed a YouTube video. 

When students join the assessment, you'll be able to see their answers in real-time, and send them feedback.

Formative has a GoFormative Guide and Walkthrough Google Doc that you can find here. Since they are a new company, having launched in January, they are constantly adding new features and updating the document. You might like to bookmark it rather than make a copy.

Megan Mullaly, a teacher at Dartmouth, has been using Formative. She offered this, "I've used Formative before starting a unit to pre-assess, during a lesson to check for understanding, and the end of a unit as a summative assessment. I like it best for the checking for understanding (my questions were too long/involved with the summative). One of my struggles as a middle school language arts teacher is to provide quick feedback; Formative gives immediate feedback--a game changer. When I use Formative during a lesson, I am way more in tune with what worked and what I need to go back and re-teach in a timely manner (not after I've avoided a stack of exit passes for a day or two!). And of course the kids are more aware of their learning and understanding with the immediate feedback. It did take me a little bit to get used to the format/display. To start, keep it simple--only ask a few questions and use multiple choice and true/false style until you are more comfortable with the format. Also, I would suggest checking out the videos on their Youtube channel: formative youtube ."

Formative is a fledgling company and is interested in getting constructive feedback from users. Please let me know if you're interested in helping out their developers.

EduWin for Kristy Chia and her Third Grade Class

Kristy Chia's students are using Chromebooks to take pictures of their Third Grade Memories. Using the Camera app, students can add filters to the photo before they take it, a bit like in PhotoBooth on Macs.

Once the picture is taken, the students save their photo in Google Drive. Using the photos, they are creating Google Slide presentations. With the photos in Slides, they have learned to crop and use the photo editing tools. 

After their presentations are finished, they plan to narrate their Slide presentations with Movenote. These Third Graders are putting so many new skills to work in this project. Congratulations!

If you or one of your colleagues are doing something in your class that uses edtech tools, please let me know. I'd love to share it with other teachers.

Voice Recording/Movenote/EduWin for Athenour TK Teachers

As elementary teachers are getting ready for Open House, many have asked about using an app that generate a QR code to record students talking about a project. They want to attach the QR code to the student work so parents and visitors can hear student voices. A QR code is kinda like a bar code. Using a QR code reader, a free app available for smartphones, the user scans the QR code and is taken to the URL where they can access the webpage where the information is stored. 

Here is an example of one I found on the back of a Heinz ketchup bottle. Download a QR code reader app from either the iTune or Google Play Store and try it out.

At the beginning of the year, I was a big fan of AudioBoom, and even wrote a blog post on it. But since then, they have changed their model and listeners are now required to sign in with an account. This works fine if you have a tablet or two that are signed into an account and available for your listeners to use during an event, or if your parents are happy to sign up for an account. However, there are a few other web apps, Chirbit and Vocaroo,  available that you might like to try out. Each have their pros and cons. Here is a table with some of the features you might like to consider before jumping into one of the apps:

Want to get started but need a little help? Send me an e-mail.

Movenote

Movenote is a Chrome Web App, available in the web store, or by adding from "More - + Connect more apps" under New in Google Drive. The app makes it easy to record audio and video will narrating a Google Drive Doc, Presentation, Sheet, or Drawing. Imagine being able to add that personal dimension to your student work, while covering those listening/speaking CCSS standards!

Here's how to get started.

EduWin for Athenour TK Teachers, Mary Katayama and Rachel Schaffer

TK students' learning is being enhanced by Bee-Bots. Bee-Bots are tiny programmable robots that can be used to teach vocabulary, math, sequencing, collaboration, creativity, and so much more!

Athenour's TK teachers have embraced using Bee-Bots. Armed with a binder full of curricular ideas and their own imagination and willingness to jump in, the teachers are integrating the students' newest friends into lessons.

Students are using them to learn about Community. You can see the community they have built, complete with a Starbuck's. The community is built on a grid, with streets wide enough for the Bee-Bot to navigate. But first, the students need to learn how to program the Bee-Bot.

Working in collaborative groups, students were assigned a task, Maze Designer; Program Planner, this student is responsible for using measuring sticks to find out how many times a Bee-Bots needs to follow a command; Recorder, this is the student responsible for writing the program; and the Bee-Bot Programmer, the student who follows the Recorder's directions and enters the commands into the Bee-Bot by pressing the buttons.

In this activity students learned vocabulary (words like memory, maze, rotate, and command), the concept of right and left (remember how hard that is to get correct?), measuring and math, and a myriad of social skills. Following the activity, the students write about their experience, using some of their sight words, eg go and end.

Congratulations and thank you for making such a rich lesson so much fun for your students!