It's February! This is a great time to ramp up our student engagement!
What are some innovative tools that can be used to engage students? Even if you think you have nothing new to add.... I bet you do! Even a new way to use an old tool.......
Educating Gen Zs is a whole new world.... but educators, we are up to the challenge!
Quizizz has so many options for how students can respond to prompts or answer questions. I love the match and categorize options, but I have started to use drag and drop too. Quizizz makes it so easy to get students to engage in a lesson and makes things more interactive for them, instead of just the usual multiple choice question they are used to. I also love using Kahoot and putting a picture or meme on a question and asking students what event or person it is describing, and even if it accurately describes a person, group or event.
ReplyDeleteQuizizz and Kahoot both have stepped up their student engagement game! I like offering different types of questions in Quizizz because it allows me to more fully assess (especially misconceptions using matching) and gives students something more rigorous than the traditional a-b-c-d choices.
DeleteOhhhh! I love the meme idea. I’ll have to think how to integrate it into math and/or science!
DeleteWe did a song writing lesson in December based on a session I had attended at GaETC. Students wrote lyrics in narrative fashion in a verse/chorus/verse/chorus song form, brainstormed ideas for a genre they would like their song to represent, and then I put them into SunoAI to allow them to experience their lyrics with melody, rhythm and AI voices. It was incredibly satisfying for many of them to "hear" their lyrics come to life. I am going to continue this type of musical learning experience this semester!
ReplyDeleteSo much fun! I think a student used this on her own to make a song for her tiktok video about her recent trip abroad!
DeleteThis actually makes the story come to life! Many times, our students write and select pictures to describe their writing, but this allows them to hear it first hand - First Hand Account!!
DeleteThat sounds amazing and so much fun! What a great way to allow the students to express themselves. I know as a student I would have been way too self conscious and shy to ever "perform" but by using AI voices in SunoAI it removes that stress for the students.
DeleteI also like that this lesson gives students a change to "use" AI technology in a guided way. Perhaps the more safe interactions with AI students have the more likely our district will be to allow use in the future.
DeleteYes, all above. Safe in my class is important to me, as is experiencing music and this does both with the added and relevant AI technology!
DeleteI follow Alice Keeler, Educational Technology Consultant | Google Developer Expert | Queen of Spreadsheets. She recently posted something that really caught my attention: "Humans are Better than Robots:
ReplyDelete-School is about humans. Education should be humanizing.
-The school is the heart of the community. They need to be hubs of humanity rather than a training center for tasks that compete with robots.
-How does today's lesson help students to feel connected to their community?
-How do our lessons help students with EMPATHY?! (Even in math class)
-Looking for "the capacity for empathy, creative expression, critical reflection, and the pursuit of meaning." Do our lessons center these ideas?
-Sadly, too many AI tools don't innovate what is possible. They are making faster worksheets... but how is it CONNECTING LEARNERS? Making Creators? Community builders? World Changers? Analyzers?"
In our virtual program, and especially now with asynchronous REACH and Advanced Content, I am missing out on "community" with my students. I have been trying to include collaborative assignments, but...Another recent post of Alice Keeler's (something I KNOW about, but kind of forgot about)..."BLOGGING", but more specifically "EduChat". In order to connect my learners, I am going to set up a student appropriate REA-CHat (or some semblance of a clever name). Students can then collaborate through brainstorming, problem-solving, etc.
HELP! Any ideas of page topics other than Technical Difficulties or Assignment Difficulties? :)
DeleteI agree with you community building is so important. We do some collaboration activities in class but many assignments in the younger grades do not lend themselves to it. So, I try to allow time before class and at the end of class for students to talk to each other, ask questions and to "share" something they want everyone to see. It is not something I explicitly tell them it just happens naturally. On Fridays, I also combine Kindergarten and First grade for our STEAM learning. This gives them time to build "relationships" with students in the other grade. One final community building activity we do is "lunch bunch" on Fridays. They are allowed to bring their siblings or other family members to eat with us. The students think it is so special and it gives us the opportunity to learn more about each other.
DeleteMonelle, You could add an advice page...Students could ask for advice with school related issues and they could offer each other advice. I am mostly thinking about SEL (i.e. stress, worry, social anxiety, etc)
DeleteThank you, Cori! I'll look into that! :)
DeleteI intentionally find times in my lessons every other week or so that I can allow them to just "chat" in the Google Meet chat box. Sometimes I guide them with a leading question or topic, other times, just let them chat. I find that many of them take advantage of this and often they discuss music or other related topics! I learn so much about them by "moderating" and I think it helps them feel community.
DeleteThis was me :) = I intentionally find times in my lessons every other week or so that I can allow them to just "chat" in the Google Meet chat box. Sometimes I guide them with a leading question or topic, other times, just let them chat. I find that many of them take advantage of this and often they discuss music or other related topics! I learn so much about them by "moderating" and I think it helps them feel community.
DeleteI like that! Thank you. :)
DeleteOne of the things I do in Kami that the students and I both like is adding stickers to the students' assignments. I typically use this for notes. I try to go in each day and add a sticker if they completed their daily notes. Not only does this help keep them accountable, it also helps me grade the notes at the end of the unit. I can quickly scroll through and check for the stickers.
ReplyDeleteTo add a sticker, go to add media> stickers> select the one you would like and add it to the page!
Great idea! I kind of do the same thing in Slides with my Bitmoji as the sticker... so I know what pages they have completed correctly. :)
DeleteI like that idea, especially for middle school! We don't do as much note-taking in 4th, but I could use stickers for positive incentives when they good a passing grade on an assignment!
DeleteEveryone Loves a good sticker! I really like the way it eases grading as well with a visual check instead of having to re-read each page.
DeleteI use stickers in Book Creator, I did not know that you could do the same in Kami. In Book Creator, I like being able to choose stickers that match their interests or likes because it is a way to say "I know you".
DeleteI just used stickers last week when students asked me to check over an assignment before they turned it in. It was super easy and a quick way to give students feedback. I'll definitely use this again in the future!
DeleteMy students completed a writing activity in Writable related to our current topic in SS: The Westward Expansion. I went into Writable, selected Create, and Book Journey. I found a book in Myon that I was reading about the topic, and this tool allow you to enter the title of the book and AI will generate a series of High 5 quick writes for you. These will be placed in a Journey and you can assign them as bell ringers at the start of class.
ReplyDeleteI really like all the tools in Writable. I think the students are getting a deeper dive in writing process by using this program!
DeleteI discovered a new resource on Book Creator. Under the Teacher Dashboard under Resources they have a February Activity Book. It is filled with different activities. Some pages are activities like "design a cover" for the book, others have informational videos or books read aloud online followed by activity sheets to complete about what they have learned. This month includes weather, Valentine's day, Presidents Day, Groundhog Day, exercise and so much more. It is easy to choose which pages you want to include and delete those you do not. I plan on showing the students the book and explain the pages. Then I will allow them to do it as a choice for asynchronous work which will be especially helpful to those students that complete everything and need additional enrichment. I hope they create them for each month!
ReplyDeleteI might try that with my ESOL students, too! Thank you! :)
DeleteWow! I did not know about this. I am going to look into it as an option for my students in skills! I love that it reads the pages to them!
DeleteThis is a wonderful idea! I don’t use Book Creator as much as other apps but it’s a great plus when there are templates.
DeleteI love Book Creator-but I am going to steal using it as a choice for asynchronous or free choice work! Thank you!
DeleteI attended the GA Science Teacher Association Conference on 1/31/2025. I was able to present "Enhancing PBL with Project Zero Thinking Routines" I focused on starting with a phenomena driven approach (hooking kids with an image/video/hands on experiment) then guiding students through a thinking routine. Project zero was created by Harvard and all of the information can be found: https://pz.harvard.edu/thinking-routines. If you are interested- look through their resources and pick one to start working with your students on. I started with see think wonder. When beginning- I have to guide a lot and semi point out what I need them to see. As they learn the thinking routine they become more independent and gain critical thinking skills that can translate across curricula. If you want to see more of my resources and the slides I presented, feel free to visit: https://sites.google.com/cowetaschools.net/pbl-pz/home
ReplyDeleteI love this! I've done some perusing and will add this to my EduChat room! I love a way to add that critical thinking element to the collaborative/social element. Thank you for sharing, I've already bookmarked it!
DeleteI've been using the "See, Think, Wonder" as well! Like you, I've had to prompt them to notice the important things, especially when showing them a political cartoon. I can already see that they are noticing more and making more connections as we do this more often and as I provide specific questions if needed.
DeleteSharing something recently learned that has been a game changer when using google forms for short answer responses. Once you have written your question and toggled the required button on, you can then click the the three dots to the right and choose "Response validation". You will then click length, followed by minimum character count (Or maximum if someone overwrites) and the specify the number. This completely eliminates responses like "idk" -" I don't know"- "Not sure" and any other response that would be only one for two words in length. Upon submission students will be given a message reminding them the message must be at least "x" amount of characters.
ReplyDeleteWhat a good work around for those idks! At least if they want to say they don't know the answer, they have to write that as a complete thought! Maybe even with some evidence or reasoning to back it up! ;)
DeleteYes! I forgot about those validations...I've really only used them for Escape Rooms. LoL Thank you for sharing!
DeleteI have not used that validation toggle button yet, so thank you for pointing it out! Will definitely be helpful!
DeleteHeather south
ReplyDeleteOne of the tools in Kami that has been really beneficial is the screen sharing option. It is under the comments tab. You can record yourself on any screen modeling a strategy or skill. Then it can be posted on the classroom document or assignment. This is great because students can go back to review the modeled strategy.
Read aloud. I have added a read aloud to my soccer unit this year. The story I selected teaches some sportsmanship lessons that would otherwise be hard for me to teach in a virtual environment. It is prompting class discussion that helps students relate the lesson to real world scenarios.
ReplyDeleteRead aloud...just seeing those words makes me happy. Read alouds create a sense of community and shared experiences that are so meaningful, especially as your students will have you as a teacher for more than one work!
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