10 Technology Lessons That Are Worth Making Time For

Technology is often referred to by teachers as either an after thought or "one more thing I don't have time for". A few weeks ago, I took part in a fantastic twitter chat on the Hour of Code. During the discussion, one thing that kept coming up was "How do you have time for coding with all of the other standards?" This is a question I get all of the time with technology in general. Over the past 10 years, I have had my students create blogs, videos, online storybooks, prezis, glogs, video games, and a variety of other technology based projects, while still teaching my math, literacy, science and social studies standards. What I have found is that teaching technology skills enhances my students' learning within the "regular curriculum" so much that whatever time I give to technology is time well spent.


Technology skills transfer and spiral. The skills you teach for one technology program can easily be used within another technology program. And within this new program you're going to learn how to do something else you didn't know how to do and that will continue the spiral. Here are some of the technology skills that I have found worth taking the time out of "regular curriculm" to teach:

1.) Logging in and logging out:
Especially with younger students, it is worth your time to spend time at the beginning of the year teaching students to how to log in and log out. Let's be honest some of our students will spend half or all of their computer time just trying to log in. Once kids can successfully log in, they can begin seeing technology as a tool to help them and not an obstacle to overcome. I am also sure to teach students about the importance of actually logging out so that another students doesn't inadvertantly begin working in your account. Like everything else, once students know how to log in and out of one account, they will quickly pick up on logging in and out of various programs and accounts.

2.) Reading the screen: 

My students giggle at me, but I regularly tell them "Those words on the screen aren't decorations!" Teaching students to read the screen seems simple, but it can be one of the biggest struggles, especially with low readers and those with little previous technology experience. This is especially true when an error message pops up and the kids don't even read it, they just come running and calling "Mrs. Raki, there's a problem!" 
So one of the first things I teach my students is to read the screen and think about what it's asking you. If it pops up asking if you want to save your work, you know the answer to that question. If you don't know where the button is for editing, start reading all of the drop down menus. Which do you think makes the most sense? (Hello real life reading skills!)

3.) Troubleshoot:

One of our first technology vocabulary words, that isn't a name of a piece of equipment, is troubleshoot. (For other technology words that are more specifically linked to pieces of equipment and technology techniques, download my Technology Vocabulary Word Wall Cards.) 
Once my students know what the word troubleshoot means, I regulary ask them "Can you troubleshoot that problem?" Can you figure out what is causing the problem or experiment a little to see how to fix the problem? I also teach students common problems and answers, starting with the simplest (Did you plug in the computer? Is your caps lock on?) and working to more complex problems and solutions (Click the refresh button if a website freezes. CTRL-ALT-DEL is a last case scenario that will get you out without hurting the computer too badly.) 
Once you start encouraging students to problem solve their way out of problems, you increase the chance that they'll fix the problem themselves (thereby decreasing the chance that they'll interupt you to fix it). This is also when you start seeing "peer tech support" where students help each other figure out the problem by sharing what has worked for them in the past. (Hello REAL collaboration!)

4.) Using a search engine:
When I spend time teaching students how to properly use Google and other search engines, they quickly become efficient searchers. Then, they can use this knowledge to search up answers in every subject. They can use this knowledge to find videos to help them when they get stuck in math. They can more efficiently find research for projects in science and social studies. They can decide which is a good source to use for their persuasive writing article.
One thing I do is make sure to start out by using my Internet Research Lesson with my students so that they understand what internet research is. Then, I make sure to share with my students the search engines that I want them to use. This old blog post - How to Make Internet Research Work for Students - gives you a few of my favorite. I am also sure to clarify for my students that websites like YouTube also use a similar search engine.

5.) Use basic functions (open, save, cut, copy, paste):
These functions can be used in pretty much EVERY program that students used, whether a stand alone program on a single computer like Microsoft Word or an internet based program like Weebly. Once students understand these basic functions, they can be transfered very easily to any new program I want to throw at them.  

6.) Manipulating images:
Like cutting and pasting, most programs allow you to manipulate an image in a similar way, by taking a corner, stretching it out or by sending it forward or backward in an effort to layer images, etc. etc. By teaching students how to manipulate the images, they are more likely to get in there and play around with images in a large variety of ways. These skills also begin to transfer as students realize that any non-text image (ie. shapes, lines, borders, etc.) often work in a similar fashion in most programs.

7.) Copyright information:
Start out the year with copyright information. Talk about what constitutes plagerism. Talk about public domain images. Students who know better, do better and teaching students about these copyright issues will open their eyes to what can and can't be done with the information that is out there on the internet. This will reduce the amount of essays you recieve that are copied and pasted from the internet and increase the number of citations you recieve from older students.

8.) Internet Safety:
Don't share passwords. Don't give out any information except your first name. Don't participate in cyber bullying. Learning how to use the internet safely is an important skill for all students, even those who don't touch the internet for class, because we know they're using the internet at home. However, by opening our students up to new programs and ways to use the internet at school, they are even more likely to use this internet at home away from our watchful eyes. This makes it that much more important that students know how to use the internet safely. I start out the year with my Internet Safety Power Point and E-Quiz to make sure that this point is expressed clearly to my students from day one.

9.) Website URLs vs. Search Engine Topics:
My students regularly type website URLs into search engines without realizing that there is a distinct difference between the two. Then they don't understand why they have to do so many more clicks. So I always take time to teach students where the address bar is and how to use it. I post the URLs that we use most regularly on a bulletin board or on the white board so that students can get used to typing them in. I stress that URLs should never have capitals or spaces in them. With the way that most internet browsers are set up today, if students add in spaces, the browser will automatically assume that you are try to put your URL through a search engine.

10.) How to Use Your Most Commonly Used Programs: 
There will be certain programs or websites that you will use on a regular basis. Model your expectations on these programs by showing the entire class on a projector before they get onto the computers. For my class this year, I modeled how to use: IXL, Weebly, Storybird and Gaggle (our school's e-mail server). We have used other websites and programs, but these are the ones that are used most and so they are the ones that I deemed important enough to take time out of class to show the entire class how to use the programs. The other programs I use I only show to a few of my top technology students (and quickest finishers) and they in turn show the rest of the class one at a time as "tech support peer tutors". This old blog post - Technology Accounts to Create for Your Students at the Beginning of the Year - gives you some suggestions for websites you may want to introduce to your students whole group.

Teaching students some technology skills will not only help them to succeed in your class, but in their entire school (and real life) career. We must make time for this in our classrooms and realize that we are impacting learning even if these skills are not a part of our "regular curriculum".

10 Projects to Make with Power Point that Aren’t Presentations

Power is of the most common technologies used in today’s classrooms. Unfortunately too often the Power Point is a presentation created by a teacher and presented to students in a way that the students passively receive information instead of interacting with it. A better way to use this technology is to flip it around. Let students use the technology to interact with the information. Have students do research and use the research to make a presentation. Or even better, let students use Power Point (or Prezi or Google Slides) to make something more than a presentation. This post will give you ten ways that you can use Power Point to create more than a presentation. Use them as a teacher to create something more interactive for your students and it will be helpful to their understanding. Give these ideas to your students and let them create projects of their own and they will build a far deeper understanding than they ever could listening to a lecture.

Before we discuss the possible projects, let’s talk about the most useful, and most overlooked feature of Power Point. This is the ability to create hyperlinks. Within Power Point and Google Slides, you can create hyperlinks not only to outside websites, but also to slides within the presentation. These links can take students from slide one to slide ten and back, effectively building a website that is hosted only on your computer. Understanding this skill is a key point in making each of the following projects. 

10 Projects to Make with Power Point that Aren’t Presentations

1.) Create a game – With enough slides, you could technically create a full video game with Power Point. My students create vocabulary games with Power Point, but any type of game can be made. Students can include text, photographs, video, etc. They can hyperlink a path for their players that guides them through whatever topic they are exploring. The hyperlinks can go simply to a “Yes” or “No” answer slide or a “home” slide, or the links can guide students through a variety of levels. The games are limited truly only by a student’s imagination.  

2.) Create a video – Using transitions and animations within Power Point, students can create a very engaging presentation. Then, using screencast software, students can create a video of themselves talking people through the presentation, resulting in a .mp4 video file. Here is a video my son made using Power Point for his Country Study Project on China:

 

3.) Create an online poster – Online posters are images with links to additional information. I recently wrote an entire blog post on 4 Ways to Create Online Posters, and one of the easiest ways is through Power Point. Both Power Point and Google Slides allow you to save your completed project as a .pdf file. This means that you have a beautiful poster, which can include clip art, shapes, word art, and text that also has links to where people can find further information.

4.) Create an E-Quiz – Jeopardy games have been around for awhile and there are a wide range of easy to use, free to download templates to create these e-quiz games. Students can also easily create their own multiple choice questions and hyperlink each option to a correct or incorrect slide. An example of this is my Long Division Jeopardy Game.

5.) Create interactive equations – When we begin talking about variables with students, we use symbols such as stars and hearts to stand for the missing numbers. In Power Point, you can layer a shape or a clip art image on top of a textbox. Then, you add an animation to the shape or image so that when activated, the shape or image will disappear. This way the person “playing” with the interactive equations can attempt the equation on their own and then check their work by activating the slide. Here is an example of a compiled Power Point that my students made when I was teaching in a technology lab. This is one of the projects from my Math Technology Integration Matrix.

  

6.) Create a virtual field trip – Pictures, videos, maps, hyperlinks and text can be put together to build a “field trip” to any dplace on earth or in history. These virtual field trips can be recorded as a video or they can be more of an interactive web where the person “visiting” the field trip can choose to click on different elements and explore their own interests. My History Time Machines are a small example of virtual field trips. I also had my students create virtual field trips for during our Deserts of the World Unit. 

7.) Create interactive flash cards – By using a large rectangular shape, students can cover half of their slide and create a set of “flash cards” where each slide is a separate flash card. These could be vocabulary flash cards, math flash cards, flash cards about important historical events or really anything students would make regular flash cards for. When activated, students can “turn over” their flash card by having the rectangle disappear. Here is an example of using Power Point to practice multiplication facts:

 

8.) Create interactive diagrams – Diagrams and pictures are a bit easier to make in Power Point because images and shapes can be so easily manipulated. But even more than that, students can link each image or shape to outside websites or other slides with additional information. For example, my son created this food web about the plants and animals in Germany for his Country Study Project. When you click on any of the items on the food web, it takes you to a slide with lots of information about that plant or animal.

 

 9.) Create step by step directions – Using photographs, shapes and arrows, students could create a step by step tutorial to how to do just about anything. In fact, using screenshots (press print screen to copy, use CTRL+V to paste), students could create a “how to” for other students on how to create something in Power Point. These how to or step by steps could then be saved as a .pdf or even as a set of images. Print them out and you have your computer center directions ready too!

10.) Create a digital storybook – Digital storytelling is a great motivation for creative writing. With Power Point, even non readers could create a digital story, by putting together photographs, shapes, or images. They could even draw pictures in Paint or KidPix and insert the pictures into Power Point. Once the story is complete, the students can dictate the words while recording a video or add in typed up words and save as a .pdf.

 

Power Point is a great tool. Google Slides does most of the same if you don’t have Power Point on your computers. But the key to all of these projects is to let the students build interactive projects with knowledge they have learned in class or through individual research.

 

Create Global Learners by Connecting with Classes Around the World

For a period of time while I was in teaching in Morocco, I managed a blog called Global Teacher Connect. On this blog, we had monthly collaborative projects where classrooms from around the world could get together to work on projects or connect students in different ways. Unfortunately, life got away from me and  I forgot to pay for the domain name and it was swooped up from under my feet and so the blog is now back to it’s old domain name: http://globalteacherconnect.blogspot.com/. In the meantime, I have also kept a Global Teacher Connect Facebook Page, which has been pretty unactive. I’d like to change that and so I’d like to change that by opening up the page as a place where teachers can connect with other teachers for collaborative projects.

Collaborative projects are a way of connecting students with other student around the world. These projects help give students a chance to connect with and understand students from different cultures and ways of life. By doing this, we open our students up to the possibility that there are other people in the world who do things differently than they do. We open them up to the perspective that other people around the world are more similar to them than different. We open them up to see the world from a different point of view. These connections open up conversations between students of different classes, different races, different cultures and different religions. Knowing people from other cultures makes people less likely to believe stereotypes and hateful messages about people who are different than themselves and more likely to try and see the world through the eyes of others. For a long time, teachers have been using pen pals as a way to connect students to other students around the world. Penpals are a great first step, but with today’s technology there are so many other ways to connect students to other students around the world. Here are a few ways you might consider using to connect your students with other students around the world:

1.) Skype Chats – When I first moved to Morocco a teacher from Canada contacted me because they were studying Morocco and wanted to talk to a class of kids from Morocco. We sent e-mails back and forth two or three times and then we arranged a chat where our kids “met” face to face via computer screen. Her kids taught us a song and my kids taught them a song. Although the arrangement was to teach her kids about Morocco, my kids learned about Canada at the same time. They were amazed to see pictures with piles of snow and loved their virtual tour of the Canadian classroom.
How else could we apply this?
What about talking to students who live on a Native American reservation during our Native American unit? Wouldn’t that be a great way to show students that Native Americans today live just like we do, even though they had different houses long ago?
What about talking to students who live in the Democratic Republic of Congo during a study of the rainforest? Wouldn’t that be a great way to help them understand that people as well as animals live in these areas?
What about a series of chats with classes from different continents during a geography study? Could your class create a map of where each class was located?
For more ideas on how to use Skype in the classroom, check out my blog post – Bringing Experts into Your Classroom with Skype.

2.) Google Doc Collaborative Writing – My oldest son is currently writing a a story with his best friend. We are in South Dakota. She is in North Carolina. Sometimes they set a time and work together. Sometimes they each work when they have time. Either way they are building a chapter book together without actually being together.
How else could we apply this?
How about letting students do research together. They could add to a list of research questions. Then they could answer the questions as they find them and combine the efforts of different students in different places with different sets of resources.
What about a book review document where students from different classes can add reviews of books they have read?
For more ideas on how to use Google Docs, check out my blog post – Using Google Docs to Aid in Collaboration.

3.) Edmodo Book Groups – Within Edmodo you can create groups of students. These groups of students can work together on various projects. Students can be added to groups from any class. This would be the perfect place to host a student book group. Students can read the book in assigned sections and come to the group to answer questions or chat about the book.
How else could we apply this?
What about an author study group? Students could have a group devoted to a particular author. They could come back and work with the same students on different books throughout the course of a school year – or longer!
What about a non-fiction group based on a topic? Say you have kids that are very interested in the Middle Ages, or dinosaurs, or India. Put together a group, with members from at least 2 classes, where students read a bunch of books on that topic and discuss what they learned.
For more ideas on how to use Edmodo in your classroom – check out my blog post: Edmodo Makes my Flipped Classroom Easier.

 4.) Virtual Problem Solving Challenge – A great way for kids to practice math skills is to come up with their own word problems. Students could then share these problems with students from a different class, somewhere else in the world, by posting them on a blog, sending them by e-mail or even putting them into a Google Doc. Kids build critical thinking skills and global thinking all at once.
How else could we apply this?
Allow students to “critique” as well as answer problems created by their friends. This will be a great time to talk about vocabulary that is specific to a region or dialect. It is also a good time to talk about what makes a good world problem.

5.) Collaborative Google Map of a Monuments and National Parks Near Each Class’ Home – Create a Google Map of monuments and national parks near your classroom and then ask other classes to add their own set of monuments and national parks to the map. Monuments and national parks are great ways of knowing what type of things are deemed important to a culture. For example, in Morocco many monuments have religious importance and you will find important mosques and religious schools preserved as “monuments”. In the US religious monuments are rare, but we have a lot of our natural resources set to the side as special and worthy of preserving. There could be some great discussions from maps like these, and by having people of an area designate their monuments, you are getting a picture with less bias than some other resources we could use for similar discussions. Students will study Geography and culture while learning about people from around the world.
How else could we apply this?
What about creating a map of the places you go to buy things? The types of stores and markets in an area will tell you a lot about the economy of an area and could be a great contribution to a study of economics.
What about creating a map of where the food of an area comes from? Students could mark their school and any farms or ranches that are located nearby. This could be a great way to talk about urban/suburban/rural situations as well as how far your food source is in different countries. It’s also a great time to talk about – do we buy from these local farms or do we buy from supermarkets who buy their food from farther away to save costs?

6.) Collaborative Video Creation Projects – There are so many ways to create videos using technology today. For a few ideas of how to make videos with your students – try my Video Creation Websites blog post or my Video Creation iPad Apps blog post. How about having a collaborative YouTube channel with other teachers. Students can create videos. You post them to the YouTube page. Then friends from other classes can go and watch their videos. The friends will learn from the videos and can even leave comments on the video. 
How else could we apply this?
What about having a specific theme to the videos? One of the Global Teachers Connect projects was to create an Earth Day video. In fact, you can still download the project outline for free at my Teachers Pay Teachers store.
How about specifically doing math videos, similar to those at Khan Academy? My kids use this Student Created Video Tutorial Sheet to create math videos to teach each other. Think of how much more we could do with those if we pooled them together!

7.) Create a Padlet to Ask People Questions – Padlet is a website that lets people add their own pictures and notes to your “wall”. Ask a question on it and anyone can answer. Send the question to a “friend” and they can pass it on from there. This could be a great way to gather information for graphs or simply to do a type of “research”, similar to when we put a question out on Facebook to our friends.
How else could we apply this?
How about working on the same project as other classes and asking them to share pictures of their completed projects on your padlet?
Why not ask each class to upload a small video of their classroom and see what classrooms look like around the world?
What about using it as another place to do a book chat? Post questions about a book and ask everyone to go in and add their thoughts.

8.) Create a Collaborative Prezi Presentation – A few years ago I had my students jigsaw information about Ancient Rome. Each group took a different section, home life, government, economics, etc. You can find all of the specifics in this old blog post. Once they had done their research, we put it together into a collaborative prezi presentation. Like Google Docs, you can work in the presentation at the same time, or at different times, but in the end you have one big presentation that everyone has contributed to.
How else could we apply this?
How about creating a research project and grouping students between 2 or more classes based on student interests? Let students break the topic into sections down using e-mail or Google chats. Then each student does some research and adds to a collaborative Prezi.
What about creating the Prezi and ask different classes to post pictures of their classroom or their school into a designated section of the presentation?

9.) Collaborative Research with LiveBinder – LiveBinders are a great way to collect resources together. You can include pictures, videos, links to web pages and words you have typed. There are plenty of LiveBinders out there created by teachers to organize resources for other teachers. Why couldn’t students do the same? Two classes or two groups could work together to research any topic you cover in Science or Social Studies and share the information in a collaborative LiveBinder.
How else could we apply this?
Why not let students create a collection of their favorite educational websites? Sometimes students are better at finding those resources than we are, let them collaborate with others and they’ll double their manpower.
How about creating a series of LiveBinders for different books? Each LiveBinder can include resources used for the books, student reviews or reflections and discussion questions created by the students.

10.) Make Graphs with Collaborative Spreadsheets – On many of the homeschool groups that I am a part of people are asking for data collection questions to help students gain access to “data”. We can do the same thing with collaborative spreadsheets – part of Google Docs. Students can ask the question and send it to a few classes who can record their data. Students can then use that data to create graphs for class. The graphs can also be created in the spreadsheet program and shared with those who supplied data.
How else could we apply this?
Why not use this in coordination with other collaborative apps? Students can vote through these spreadsheets on which novel they want to study, which project they want to use or which type of collaborative project they want to participate in.


On the Global Teacher Connect Facebook page, feel free to stop and put a shout out to teachers (or other parents if you are a homeschool teacher) to see who would want to connect for a project like these. You may also post a link to a google doc or a blog post (no paid products please!) about your collaborative project. Let’s work together to build global learners and greater understanding by all.

Novel Study Made Easier on the Kindle

My oldest son is doing a novel study of The Hunger Games for his reading curriculum this trimester.  He is using my Student Selected Novel Study Packet, which works with pretty much any novel out there, which is perfect for homeschooling although I actually designed it to make differentiation easier when I was teaching in a classroom with many levels.  My son is reading the book 2 chapters at a time. After each set of two chapters, he has 4 pages of work to do.

 

On the vocabulary page, he finds 5 words, uses context clues to guess the meanings and then looks up the definition in the dictionary.  Since he is reading on the novel on his Kindle Fire, he has developed a system of highlighting the words and the context clues in two different colors while he is reading.  This enables him to find the words easily when it comes time to do his vocabulary page.  Since his Kindle Fire also has a built in dictionary, that step is much faster too!

 

Next, he does a summary of what happened in these two chapters by completing a story map.  While he is reading, in yet another color, he highlights key events that he wants to remember for his story map.  He can even type in his own notes to go with highlighting.  No more lost post-it notes, but lots of good thinking while reading going on!

 

 

The third page he works on is creating three quiz questions based on the chapters he has read.  He sometimes uses highlighting for this as well, since he likes to pick out minute details for his quiz questions.  We are working on including at least one big idea or inferencing question, forcing him to think further outside the box.

 

Finally, he completes a reading response page where he writes about the chapters while responding to a prompt.  This has been a great way to see what he has taken from the chapters.  He likes that there is a rubric on the bottom of the page so he knows exactly what he needs to include in his writing.  In fact, he told me he wishes every page he ever did has a rubric so that he isn’t left wondering if what he’s doing is going to be what we’re looking for.

 

If you’re interested in having your students work on a Self-Selected Novel Study, you can find the entire packet including the pages shown for up to 30 chapters and pages for before and after reading the novel.  A Kindle Fire is NOT needed to complete the packet, but it definitely makes the note taking processes easier!!

Publishing Student Work on the Internet

 

Everyone – adult and child alike – creates better work and is more dedicated to their work when they are presenting to a real audience.  Teachers have known this for a long time.  This is the reason we have students write for class newsletters, present at parents nights, perform plays and have poetry readings.  As teachers we are always trying to give our students a ‘real audience’. 

With our new technologies, we now have the opportunity to give our students a real audience - without the air quotes.  Technology allows us to have students write and create for an audience of the world.  By publishing work on the internet, students are able to share their work and receive feedback from real people all around the world.  They will receive real, unbiased feedback and learn how to react appropriately to that feedback.  All of these are life skills that are becoming more and more important in our 21st century world. 

  Parents and teachers are often wary of sharing student projects on the internet for security and safety reasons.  I share the wariness of sharing too much information on the internet, but I also see kids who already share tons and tons of information and would highly benefit from learning how to share information responsibly.  We need to start by teaching students how to be safe on the internet.  I use this Internet Safety Power Point to introduce these concepts to my students.

Next, I introduce my students to creating content.  They build project presentations, tutorial videos and online book reports.  We share this content in safe settings like Edmodo and allow classmates to comment on the work.  Once students have experience with giving and receiving feedback, we then share the work to a more general public, posting work on a YouTube page, a blog or by asking another class to take a look at it.  Students are also encouraged to share their work with their parents and to ask their parents to share their work using social media sites.  We ask parents to leave feedback, not only on the work of their own children but also on the work of other classmates.

By building this community of sharing, students learn:

1.) to understand that everything on the internet was created by a human who is not necessarily an expert.  This allows them to begin thinking critically about the information that they find on the internet.

2.) how to share information responsibly.  Unless we teach students this skill, they will always share too much information and in this day and age it may come back to bite them.

3.)  how to give and receive feedback appropriately.  The internet gives use the idea of anonymity and makes people say things that they wouldn’t say in person.  We need to start training students young to give appropriate feedback and how to respond to feedback, both positive and negative.   

4.)  the importance of putting your best work out there.  Students want others to look on their work with approval.  Knowing that others are actually looking at their work will encourage students to push themselves.

5.)  technology skills that will help them succeed in the real world.  Creating tri-fold boards and hand drawn posters are not skills needed by people presenting information today.  However, creating videos, podcasts, and presentations are definitely skills that can be used in pretty much any field students go into in the future.

 

Using DuoLingo in the Classroom

There are so many benefits to teaching our students a second language.  As they learn a second language, not only are they stimulating new parts of their brain, but they are also building new background knowledge and making connections to vocabulary they already know.  For example, while learning the word for ice in French (glacier), students should make the connection to the English word glacier.  This connection helps them to remember the word longer and be able to retrieve the word quicker – in both languages.

While we as teachers often understand the growth our students can make by learning a second language, we don’t generally have any control over their access to said language classes.  However, there is a way to use technology to give this possibility to our students.  It’s called DuoLingo and it’s the perfect place to start learning another language.  The program has an app (both for iPad and Android) and a website that provides amazing help with learning a language.  Because DuoLingo can be used on computer, iPad or Android tablet, it is a perfect app for any classroom because it allows us to do more with the technology we have, rather than requiring the purchase of new technology, which is a personal pet peeve of mine – see my post on why we don’t always need to buy new technology for the classroom.

The DuoLingo program includes all of the elements of learning a language – reading, writing, listening and speaking.  (Unless you are working on a Kindle with no microphone where the speaking part is automatically turned off.)  Unlike other language programs, if you have previous experience with this language, you can take a screening test and move quickly through the more basic levels, which means you start exactly where you’re supposed to. 

The courses are broken into small sections, each of which includes you listening to, reading, writing and speaking your target language.  Once you have reached mastery of a specific set of skills, you are automatically moved on to the next.  In addition to the activities, within each small section you will find a written “lecture” that explains the topic to you in English, with written examples.  Each “lesson” within DuoLingo takes about 20 minutes, and does not necessarily have to be done every day (although no less than twice a week would be suggested, so students don’t forget what they have learned).  This could easily be fit into your literacy centers, be morning work or become a part of any checklist.  (See my post on using checklists instead of centers.)

You can choose to have all of your students learn the same language, or let each student choose a language based on their background and interest.  With 18 different languages including Spanish, French, Russian, Italian and Vietnamese, there really is something for everyone on this site.  In addition, this program would be great for English Language Learners.  Instead of learning another language, students can log-in in their home language and practice their English vocabulary and grammar.

 My sons in grades 2 and 5 use this program to enhance their French vocabulary and grammar and love the interactive pieces that allow them to “power up” as they get correct answers.  I personally use it to review the grammar rules I have forgotten from in class lessons and I find it much easier than many other programs I have used.  Oh, and the best part – this is a FREE program and they even recently added a place where you can sign up as a teacher and monitor the progress of your students!  No money needed to try this out in your classroom and start helping students make connections in new parts of their brain!

 

Top 10 Social Studies Websites for Elementary Students

For two years, I was the Technology Specialist at a school in Georgia. During that time, I amassed a large collection of websites that I use with my students. You can download my E-Book of Websites for the Elementary Classroom for free from Teachers Pay Teachers or Smashwords, or, you can check back here each week for the website suggestion.

This week we are looking at Social Studies websites.  Here is a list of my favorite 10 websites to use in elementary classrooms when we are studying History, Government, and Geography.

 

 

1.) Social Studies for Kids – This website includes a collection of articles on current events, historical events and other great Social Studies topics.

 

2.) Ducksters – History & Geography – Ducksters is a great website for Science and Social Studies, but the Social Studies part is particularly fabulous.  Each category has tons of links to additional information and subcategories.  This is a great place to start students out when working on a research project.

 

 

3.) BBC History for Kids – BBC has amazing educational resources for all subjects, but their history section is particularly fabulous.  This site has games that help students explore ancient history, British history, world wars, and historical figures from tons of different time periods.

 

4.) Timeline Maker – Generate a timeline with up to twelve events by simply inserting dates and descriptions in chronological order.  This timeline can then be printed and used in class.

 

5.) Google Earth – How helpful is an online interactive globe where you can zoom into mountains, valleys and oceans?  So many ways this can be helpful with geography, topography and helping students build a strong base in understanding where history happened and why.  A perfect website to include in a unit on Maps & Globes

 

6.) Time for Kids – An online newspaper for kids with current event articles, videos, photos, etc. is a great source for Social Studies class.  In fact, I wrote an entirely separate blog post about Time for Kids awhile back, but it is a worthy addition to this list as well.

 

7.) World Atlas – This website provides an amazing interactive atlas.  Students begin at a world map.  If they click on a continent, they will be taken to a continent specific map as well as information about that specific continent.  Then, within the continent map, they can click on each country name and be taken to a country specific map with information about that specific country.  Talk about a great starting place for a Country Study Project, huh?

 

8.) Garden of Praise – Biographies for Kids – This website includes biographies of tons of important individuals from history written specifically for kids.  Many of the biographies include links to additional reference material on the person, definitions of key vocabulary from the biography and video clips about the person in the biography.

 

9.)  Congress for Kids – This amazing site has great information and diagrams to describe the creation of the United States government and the process of how each branch works.

 

10.) Ben’s Guide – This is a US government based site with lots of information about the services provided by the government, processes used to create laws and elect representatives.  The site is conveniently broken down by grade levels to make differentiation easier.  

 

For more resources to integrate technology into your classroom, check out my Technology Integration Kit.  You can also check out these blog posts:

Top 10 Science Websites
Top 10 Reading Websites
Top 10 Writing Websites
Top 10 Math Websites
Websites to Teach Typing Skills
Websites to Create Videos