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Create Your Own Comic Strips Online with MakeBeliefsComix

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We Offer Support and Resources.

From Richard Byrne, editor of Practical Ed Tech Tip of the Week -- ''Creating Comics for Comfort'' -- Living in Maine and father of two school-age children, Richard wrote the following item for teachers and students dealing with the terrible tragedy of the recent mass shootings in that state. He thought this an appropriate time to review and use Social and Emotional Learning resources, such as those offered by MakeBeliefsComix.com.

Make Beliefs Comix offers a library of fantastic, free ebooks for SEL. The library hosted by Make Beliefs Comix contains fillable PDFs that you can download for free. The latest addition to that library is 50+ Ways to Talk to Yourself and Find Healing. And for something a bit lighter, take a look at Pet Words: Conversations With Your Animal Friends.

"Here's a video overview of the Make Beliefs Comix ebooks and here's one about how to create comic strips on the Make Beliefs Comix website."

For many LGBTQ+ kids, especially when they're figuring things out, finding accepting spaces online can sometimes feel safer. Seek out creative opportunities and modes of self-expression, with this section in Make Beliefs Comix.

READ ABOUT US IN THE NEW YORK TIMES!

ARTICLE #1: (click on the link below)
MakeBeliefsComix encourages students to create their own visual pandemic diary.

ARTICLE #2: (click on the link below)
One easy way to start playing with ideas is through the free, online tool at MakeBeliefsComix.com.

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Create Comics Online, it's Fun & Free at MakeBeliefsComix!

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Create comics online at MakeBeliefsComix. A fun way educators & parents can empower students to express ideas and stories in comix!

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Join a game of kahoot here. Kahoot! is a free game-based learning platform that makes it fun to learn – any subject, in any language, on any device, for all ages!

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Photo by Victoria Boobyer provided courtesy of ELTPics
There are countless bright and shiny sites on the Web to choose from, and the "cool" factor of many can be very seductive to both teachers and students alike. How can we began to separate the wheat from the chaff among these sites or, as data-whiz Nate Silver has put it, identify the signal from the noise?

I first begin by asking myself a series of simple questions when I learn of a new web tool. If the answer is not "yes" to each of them, I generally put it out of mind (though I do keep a list of some of the best thet don't make the cut because sometimes they are helpful for just providing students a change-of-pace). The questions are:
1) Is it free?
Money is limited in most schools. I have yet to find a site that provided such exceptional resources that it was worth the (probably unsuccessful) effort to try to get my school to pay for it. And, truthfully, if my school gets any funds they can use for technology, I'd much rather have them use it towards new hardware and bandwidth to improve our antiquated equipment and connectivity system.
2) Can I figure out how to use it in less than one minute?
My time is limited, and I'm somewhat familiar with educational tech. If a site is too difficult for me to learn in a minute, then it's highly likely that it will take far longer for colleagues or my students to figure it out. There are far too many good tools out there to take much time to learn how just one works.
3) Can I teach my students how to use the site's basics in less than two minutes?
I'm teaching English, not computer science. My focus is helping students learn an insane language that requires all of their attention. In my situation, I have students who are entering a U.S. high school with few English skills and only a few years (at most) where they have to learn English and academic skills in Science, Math, and Social Studies. As far as they, and I, am concerned, technology needs to be a tool for making learning English easier and more effective, and not be another hurdle to overcome.
4) Can using it provide students an added learning benefit that can't be obtained by using "old-fashioned" tools like pen, paper, or whiteboard in the classroom?
Many Web tools are just fancier ways to do what good teachers have always done in the classroom. Others, however, can genuinely make English-language-learning more effective, easier, and/or more fun.

Sites like English Central provide immediate individual feedback on pronunciation, and opportunities for reading, listening and vocabulary development in an engaging environment. It's a less-intimidating place to make errors since the only "one" listening is the computer.

Resources like Starfall and KizClub promote the concept of students reading books of their choice by offering many options of "read aloud" stories providing audio and visual support to the text.

Web 2.0 tools like PixiClip and Fotobabble let students practice their speaking and reading ability verbally with an audio recording. Students can use it regularly, compare their previous work, and build their confidence by seeing and hearing for themselves how much they improve each week or month.

There are many more sites that fit my criteria for being an effective language-learning ed tech tool, and you can see the complete list here, along with many samples of student projects using them.
What sites do you use that meet those guidelines? Or, even better, what are the guidelines that you use?
Larry Ferlazzo teaches English and Social Studies at Luther Burbank High School in Sacramento, California.
He has written on education, writes a teacher advice blog for Education Week Teacher, and has his own popular resource-sharing blog.
He writes a monthly post for the New York Times on teaching English Language Learners.

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Larry Ferlazzo - Four questions to ask before using an Ed Tech tool

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Photo by Victoria Boobyer provided courtesy of ELTPics There are countless bright and shiny sites on the Web to choose from, and the "cool" factor of many can be very seductive to both teachers and students alike.

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The Difference Between Digital Skills and Digital Literacies

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The Difference Between Digital Skills and Digital Literacies

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We often hear people talk about the importance of digital knowledge for 21st-century learners. Unfortunately, many focus on skills rather than literacies. Digital skills focus on what and how. Digital literacy focuses on why, when, who, and for whom.

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In the context of teaching English, these are the main digital literacies:

Communication - in synchronous and asynchronous environments, for social and professional purposes.

Information - finding and selecting relevant information from a variety of online sources.

Production - work collaboratively online, mixing existing media into new forms; share views; create and distribute written, audio or video files.

Digital citizenship - being aware of and managing your digital footprint.

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Wifi is not always available
Students are familiar with the online tools and do not follow instructions
Students get easily distracted and it is difficult to keep them focused on the task
Not all students have smartphones and tablets
Some parents and even teachers are reluctant to allow learners to use technology in the classroom

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Your favourite activities seem to be:
One Note
Inforgraphics
Scrible
Video dictionaries
Video diaries

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Tried and tested by teachers - add your own

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Tried and tested by teachers - add your own

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www.tricider.com
Quik app
http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/
https://nearpod.com/
https://audioboom.com/
https://create.kahoot.it/

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It may do at first (as it often does when we teach in any new way) If that's the case, perhaps you need to think again.  This post by Larry Ferlazzo provides some good questions that may prevent you from wasting too much time selecting inappropriate tools:

http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/blogs/larry-ferlazzo/larry-ferlazzo-four-questions-ask-using-ed-tech-tool

Another possibility is to have sharing sessions with other teachers - sharing effective teaching ideas and learning from each others' successes and mistakes is much more efficient than us each learning these lessons through trial and error on our own.

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Problem: Classroom management: tech is seen as fun, not serious so how do I keep learners on-task?

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Problem: Classroom management: tech is seen as fun, not serious so how do I keep learners on-task?

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I suppose the first thing we can do to prevent our learners becoming distracted while using technology is to set very clear rules about the process. It would be even better if we ask students to come up with the rules themselves, make it a project work and then we can put the results in form of posters on the walls of a classroom. As soon as someone violates the rules, we can remind them that they themselves helped to create those rules. Another thing is to constantly monitor what students are doing. I liked the idea in the practical examples in one of the units of this course where the teacher came up with a rule that if students get distracted and use the Internet for entertainment purposes and get caught, their computers are turned off and they have to perform the same actions on paper, using a textbook. This would definitely help, I am sure. (Elena Bočkāne-Lendzova)

Clear rules are essential to maintain working atmosphere in the classroom. To my mind a little bit of competitiveness would help too as then students might be more focused on the outcome of the assignment and think less about distractions. (Ieva Poriete)

Here's some good further reading:
http://www.teachmag.com/archives/3510
https://www.edutopia.org/discussion/classroom-management-tips-technology-rich-classroom
https://www.gradelink.com/blog/6-top-tips-for-managing-technology-in-the-classroom

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Problem: But I'm not very confident myself!

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Problem: But I'm not very confident myself!

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Have clear aims for your lesson - and if using technology can help your achieve them in some way, consider using it.  Focus on what the learners wil need to do within a specific task (this will often be quite limited, depending upon the task).  Just learn that (you don't need to know everything - and hardly anyone does).  Most apps and programs are made to be easy to use - and there are usually at least a few teachers in each school who are more confident.  If you keep doing that, you'll build up your knowledge and confidence in no time.

If you want to develop particular areas of your understanding then there are lots of resources on http://www.teachingenglish.org.uk.  There are also loads of free courses from top universites around the world on coursera.org and www.futurelearn.com.

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Problem: This could take a lot of class time!

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Problem: This could take a lot of class time!

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That's possible - but it's your choice as a teacher how much class time should incorporate technology and digital literacy.  Some areas of digital literacy (information literacy for example) can be developed without using any technology - and then transferred to an online context.

Keep in mind that digital literacy can be developed at the same time as other knowledge and skills (not instead of).  If we can use it to engage learners in projects that they may otherwise less interested in, then the time spent could be more impactful.

If you find yourself using technology for the sake of it, without a specific purpose in mind, then it is less likely to be useful.  As with any other area of ou teaching, there should be clear reasons for using technology.  If you can't see the purpose behind it, your learners will probably pick up on that too.

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https://educationblog.microsoft.com/2017/03/10-best-uses-for-onenote-in-your-teaching-and-learning/

https://piktochart.com/blog/using-infographics-classroom/

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Problem: But  my students think they already know everything!

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Problem: But  my students think they already know everything!

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Have clear learning objectives for your lesson.  Share them with learners and get them to evaluate what they can do better as a result of your lesson - If it is a useful lesson they'll then see that.  If they genuinely haven't learned anything new, then they have good reason to be sceptical (as with any class, right?).  Just because a lesson develops digital literacies and includes technology, it doesn't mean that we shouldn't consider our learners' needs and ensure lessons are interesting while providing an adequate level of challenge.

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Using digital literacy to develop critical thinking

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Using digital literacy to develop critical thinking

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Creating critical thinkers through media literacy: Andrea Quijada at TEDxABQED

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Problem: I can't download new software onto school computers!!

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Problem: I can't download new software onto school computers!!

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Err, this is becoming less of a challenge as many Edutech tools (like this Padlet for example) do not need to be downloaded, are free and can be accessed from a variety of devices.  Check out the list in the top right corner of this page.

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Problem: Our school doesn't have enough equipment :(

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Problem: Our school doesn't have enough equipment :(

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This is a huge challenge for many of us, but not an insurmountable one.  Find out what devices your learners have access to, which they would be able to bring to class (or potentially use outside of class).  There are many reasons why collaboration on projects and tasks is beneficial for learners, so very often it's not necessary for every child to have a device.

As with any creative project it's helpful for children to have time to develop their ideas before rushing in to make something.  A lesson that develops digital literacies doesn't necessarily need to involve technology at every point - for example, lots of offline storyboarding can be helpful before children produce a cartoon or comic.  Consider the materials at your disposal when planning lessons and speak to other teachers.