Short Description: economics-games.com allows students to run simulations and make decisions as a market participant. A student may elect to play a solo game or a multi-player game, selecting from a variety of economic topics such as fixed costs, monopoly, competition, and prisoner's dilemma (to name only a few). Depending on the game, students are initially presented with certain data/information and must submit decisions based on what is provided. Once the student (or each player) makes a decision, the student is directed to a results page which can then be discussed with the teacher and/or as a class.
Example of Uses: As an aspiring high school Social Studies teacher with a background in Economics, this seems like a great tool to use to supplement the introduction of economic/business terms and concepts. In the classroom, students can learn definitions and principles (i.e., the "Who", "What", "Where", "When"); in the simulations/games, students experience and demonstrate the practical application of such terms to understand the "How" and "Why". In this context, critical thinking skills are used to assess the information provided and arrive at a well-reasoned decision. Such skills are further developed as the students and teacher engage in a discussion about the rationale and impact of the choices of the student(s), without, of course, the pressure of real world economic consequences. With an often dry topic as Economics, this tech tool also seems like an effective way to keep a class interested and engaged with material. Perhaps bonus points could be offered to students who yield good results in their simulation and can support their decision-making with strong arguments.
The obvious limitation is that this particular tech tool is designed for one subject. However, similar simulations and educational role-playing games exist for other content areas. In any case, the simulation or game should present information to the s
Lauren MacDonald
Tool Name: TodaysMeet https://todaysmeet.com
Short Description: TodaysMeet is a backchannel virtual classroom tool used for communication and collaboration between students that occurs during a lesson, when students are at home, or even with students from other schools. TodaysMeet allows for the elimination of off topic comments and helps keep the classroom as a whole focused. Also, this tool allows for all students' voices to be heard and opens the conversation up for everyone to effectively collaborate. What is extremely helpful for students is that they can print out the conversations on TodaysMeet or re-enter the classroom while at home to refer to notes, instructions, or help on homework.
Examples of Uses: Students can access the virtual classroom on TodaysMeet anywhere and continue the conversation with classmates and teachers even after the lesson has ended. This is extremely helpful for teachers when they come across more challenging concepts or units in the curriculum because students can use each other to bounce ideas and questions off of rather than the teacher taking a whole class period to answer multiple questions from confused students.
As mobile learning becomes more and more prevalent, we must find effective ways to leverage mobile tools in the classroom. As always, the tool must fit the need. Mobile learning can create both the tool and the need. With safe and specific structures, mobile learning tools can harness the excitement of technology with the purpose of effective instruction.
Short Description: Symbaloo is a social bookmarking tool through which teachers can share their favorite web resources. In addition to organizing homework, lesson plans, and administrative paperwork all in one place (among other features), Symbaloo allows teachers to create "webmixes" consisting of links and sources for particular subjects and/or topics. For students, it's a useful tool for gathering content for research and maintaining that content in one common area, rather than searching all over the Web.
Examples of Uses: Teachers can use Symbaloo to organize websites and databases which are reliable and trustworthy for their students. Teachers can post links to sources of information which they deem credible and useful, thus saving time and energy for their students. Teachers can also review the websites that their students find and share to their own personalized learning spaces.
Visme is similar to Canva in the sense that it is more than just a tool for creating presentations. You can create charts, reports, infographics, and much more. The site offers a wide array of templates, all which are fully customizable to meet your needs. The software ties into other sites such as Flikr to offer millions of images, vector graphics, and icons to make your presentation stand out. Visme lives up to its "multi tool" label with its rich feature set and visually appealing design.
Discover an endless library of free books, picture books, & poetry or use simple tools to create books in minutes. Storybird is a creative community where readers & writers celebrate storytelling.
The Comic Creator invites students to compose their own comic strips for a variety of contexts (prewriting, pre- and postreading activities, response to literature, and so on). The organizers focus on the key elements of comic strips by allowing students to choose backgrounds, characters, and props, as well as to compose related dialogue (shown at left). This versatile tool can be used by students from kindergarten through high school, for purposes ranging from learning to write dialogue to an in-depth study of a formerly neglected genre. The tool is easy to use, made even easier with the Comic Strip Planning Sheet, a printable PDF that comic creators can use to draft and revise their work before creating and printing their final comics. After completing their comic, students have the ability to print out and illustrate their final versions for feedback and assessment.
Think of past analog tools built in a digital way. One example might be a Venn Diagram ready for digital creation and output. What might have George Washington's Twitter or Facebook account looked like… imagine the followers! Perhaps you just want students to create a museum display. Let your students get formative with these amazing tools.
Make any video your lesson. Edit a video by cropping it, adding your voice or embedding questions. Then, track your students with powerful hassle-free analytics.
EDpuzzle is a great tool for creating interactive video lessons for the classroom. Teachers can use video content already published online, or upload their own content. This is a great tool for use in a flipped classroom.
Edpuzzle is an easy and effective way that not only integrates interactive learning through powerpoints, but can deliver videos in the classroom in a fresh manner. Video is no longer a passive experience, because with either the Edpuzzle website or app, videos come to life with audio-notes and questions: directed at the class!
Short Description: Seesaw is an educational tool that allows teachers to maintain a digital portfolio of student work, as well as deliver differentiated assignments to specific students. Additionally, the teachers can provide feedback on submitted work and students can submit their work/assignments with text or video comments (typically reflections). The tool also comes with the feature of enabling the sharing of these portfolios with parents of the students. With teacher monitoring and approval, parents can gain access to their child's work to track academic progress, view the teacher's feedback, and contribute commentary of their own to the submissions.
Examples of Uses: Teachers can use Seesaw to collect digital files throughout the school year as opposed to a pile of papers. In this sense, Seesaw is effective for both organization and communication. By sharing a student's digital portfolio with the parents, this serves as an effective way to preemptively prevent the need for parent-teacher conferences. Through Seesaw, parents are able to monitor what has been submitted and can also view what the teacher has evaluated or commented upon. In doing so, they can easily determine where their child needs improvement or support. This knowledge and method of communication can lend itself to early solutions before a deficient or underachieving academic situation develops.
OneNote Class Notebook is a great tool to promote student collaboration with the "Collaboration Space." Teachers can share notebooks and collaborate too!
Engage your students in online literacy learning with these interactive tools that help them accomplish a variety of goals-from organizing their thoughts to learning about language-all while having fun.
SlideDog is a powerful presentation tool that seamlessly switches between multimedia presentation files and makes it easy to present like a professional.
Turnitin is revolutionizing the experience of writing to learn. Turnitin's formative feedback and originality checking services promote critical thinking, ensure academic integrity and help students improve their writing. Turnitin provides instructors with the tools to engage students in the writing process, provide personalized feedback, and assess student progress over time.
Plickers is a tool that teachers can use to assess their students quickly and in real-time without the need for students to have a device. As long as teachers have a device with the Plickers app downloaded, they can scan their students Plickers card to collect data in a matter of seconds!
