Experiment with Something New

This is a guest post from Nancy Wadin, Teacher Librarian at Sunny Hill Elementary School.

To be effective, technology needs to be implemented in a thoughtful, student-centered way. Teachers are inspired to allow students more freedom to explore technologies and create something unexpected. Students need to be empowered to take responsibility for their learning and encouraged to stretch themselves to learn from other students’ work. In addition, students must be allowed an alternate time frame upon which to demonstrate their learning, as one of the benefits of technology use is to allow students to learn at their own pace and on their own schedules.

Three easy-to-use tools to explore are listed below. These are the tools that make sense in the classroom setting and also provide possibilities for a Blended Learning model, the use of which Barrington 220 is currently implementing.

Nearpod is a technology tool that allows teachers to create presentations, embed activities to assess understanding within those presentations, and then share the presentations for students to do on their own or with their class. This tool could be used within a Blended Learning model, in which students could watch and respond in the Nearpod on their own schedule, with the feedback being reported to the teacher through the Reports feature. Or, it could be used in a classroom, with the responses of the students being seen immediately by the instructor and displayed for the other students. This would encourage engagement and increase the desire to respond appropriately.

Screencasts are a great way to capture student thinking and encourage speaking fluency. Teachers can instruct using Flipgrid to prompt students to show video/photos of the work they have done and describe their learning. It allows students to make a recording which incorporates their photo(s), explains their thinking process, and uses tools to enhance their verbal description. Once it is posted, the teacher and other students can watch and make constructive suggestions. This app allows for feedback to the student while simultaneously gathering immediate assessment information for the teacher.

Google Forms can be used to create quizzes or exit tickets. Use these forms to assess learning through the use of simple quizzes which could be altered based on accommodations for certain students. Use a QR code to share with students. Create exit tickets within Forms and quickly ascertain who has reached your learning objectives. At the same time, have students self-assess and be more reflective by asking them what they could do to improve—with the hope that they would accept greater responsibility for their learning.

These tools are just a small sample of the possibilities. If you haven’t already used one of these, try it this week. There are many more tools that are worth the investment of your time to find new ways to use technology with your students. Ask your Library/Technology Assistant (LTA), your Teacher Librarian, or your Instructional Digital Age Learning Coach (iDAL) coach if you are hoping to experiment with something new.