Apps Your Students Need To Be Familiar With

Teaching in the age of technology is a great thing.  The multitude of apps available to help you teach is too many to count.  But there are certain apps that your students should be familiar with.   Why?  Well, there will come a time when you don't have time.  What I mean is that you may need to come up with a quick lesson in a pinch.

Most of us have been there.  You decide at the last minute that you need to take a sick day.  There may be an occasion where something comes up, prompting you to have to leave school early.  The bottom line is, you have to come up with a lesson plan for your students, and quick.  That's where the power of apps comes in.  Some apps come with their own lesson store.  You can browse through the app's own store and find a lesson you deem appropriate for your students to do. 
Below are five apps that come with their own lesson store. 

Nearpod: Nearpod has a multitude of ready-made lessons that you can download and edit as needed.  Granted, some a cost a few bucks, but others are free.  But once you buy it--it's yours to use over and over!   Click "Explore," and you're presented with lessons based on categories like "subject" or "publisher".  You can preview the lesson before adding it to your library.

Formative: Formative also has a good selection of already made Formatives. Type in the subject and choose the Formative that works best for you. Download the lesson and edit it as you see fit.

Kahoot: Have your students learn new or review content!  Finding a Kahoot that's already made is one click away.  Click "Explore Games" and then choose the Kahoot that fits your class.

Flipgrid: Flipgrid has a variety of topics your students can address.  Journey back to the late 1970s and click on the "Disco Library" tab. Select your audience, topic subject, and goal.  If you find a Flipgrid you like, select your grid and add it.

Seesaw: If you're using Seesaw in your class, you must check out the Activity Library.  If for no other reason than to get ideas on how to use Seesaw in your class.  If you find an activity you like, click the "share" button and choose the appropriate class to assign the activity to. 

The Importance Of Immediate Feedback And Two Apps That Can Help

The other day I was observing a class.  The teacher did a formative assessment of that days learning by asking the kids to take out a piece of paper and answer the three questions she wrote on the board.  The students did so dutifully, pondering what they had learned that day. Some students wrote a few sentences for each questions while others wrote just a few words.  The students turned in their work in a tray at the front of the room and sat back down waiting for the dell to ring.
The bell rang and students exited the room, not knowing how they did on their end of the class assessment.  I asked the teacher when the students should expect to see the results of the assessment. She told me that she would get to it before the end of the week (it was Tuesday).

In an effective teaching practice, this should never happen, with or without technology.  I ask you, what’s the point of formative assessment if the students are not getting immediate feedback?  Isn’t the point of the assessment to find out where the students are in regard to their learning? What’s the point of getting feedback a few days later, after students have since moved on in their learning.  Because of that, the feedback won’t matter to them anymore. Most of the papers will end up in the trash after given back some days later.

This is where tech can help.  Feedback is important in the classroom for both teachers and students alike.  The students need to know where they stand in the learning process while the teacher should know how they’re doing in their teaching the material.  Are their methods effective in reaching their students?

There are a couple of apps that are not only great for giving feedback to students but they are great at giving immediate feedback.  ClassKick and Formative are two fantastic ways to see how students are progressing—in real time—and give the teacher the ability to give the student feedback on student work—as they’re doing it!

With student work being shown in real time on the teacher device, it ensures that each students work is being seen.  It replaces the old way of the teacher walking around and peeking over the students shoulder, hoping to get a good glimpse of student work.  Although it’s important for the teacher to continue to walk around, knowing that they’ll be able to view all student work in ensured.

The thing that makes both ClassKick and Formative unique is that they have the ability to show the teacher student work, as their working on it.  As the students is solving a math problem or writing a sentence, the teacher can see it all happen. Granted, with Google Docs, you can click into a students work and see how they’re progressing, but that takes an extra step.  And the way that ClassKick and Formative present students work, all on the teacher device in real time, makes it much easier for a teacher to monitor the students.

Again, immediate feedback is important in the classroom. Tech can help in the forms of Classkick and Formative.

The Digital Assessment Tool You Need To Try In Your Classroom

We all know that having a formative assessment as part of your class is an important part of teaching.  With that said, there are a plethora of formative assessment apps out there, many of them really good.  From Socrative to Kahoot, they can tell you what your class knows and doesn’t know.   One that I’ve been using lately is Formative.

Formative is like many other formative assessments out there.  As the teacher, you can create questions such as multiple choice, true/false, and short answer. 
I’ve found that there are a few things that set Formative apart from other assessment apps out there:
First, you can watch in real time on your computer dashboard as students answer questions.  You can also throw in your two cents as students work, leaving digital feedback on their work as they do an assignment. 

The second thing that separates Formative from an app like Socrative (don’t get me wrong, I love Socrative) is that Formative includes a library where you can search for pre-made Formatives.  Looking for something on Ancient Greece? Check out the Formative library, there may be one that pertains to the subject matter that you’re teaching.  If you find one that you like, you can add it to your account and edit it as you please.

Formative allows you to track your students progress. Click on the “Tracker” tab and you’re presented with a nice graphical representation of how your students are performing your tasks. 
If you’ve If you got an old worksheet laying around, or information text sheet, give it new life!  Formative will let you upload your document in your Formative.  After uploading, you can add questions and/or notes on top of the document.  Your students can then add answers or comments to your documents. 

And lastly, Formative works great with Google Classroom. If you use Google Classroom,  you’ll find that Formative fits in quite nicely in that it includes a link to share to Google Classroom.

If you haven’t check out Formative, I highly recommend giving it a try.