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Video Editing/Production Tools for 7-12 graders

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Video Editing/Production Tools for 7-12 graders

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Animotica

This edits videos and makes movies and slide shows .
Used on Windows 10
Example:
In my 4th grade class make a video of a book project or presentation.

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Making flashy video slideshow presentations with Animoto is simple. First, select Create a Project, and the site walks you through each step. Choose a theme, and then upload short video clips and your own images or images from a Creative Commons site such as Flickr. Then, upload your own songs or songs from the site, and add text if you'd like. Like magic, the site creates a video and publishes it to your Animoto account. The finished product is a modern and engaging presentation that's appealing for kids and adults.

Once a video is published, users can share the link, grab an embed code, export it to other video sites including YouTube, or download a version to the desktop. New themes for projects and new music tracks, sorted by genre, are added regularly, so there's always something new.

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Animoto Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Making flashy video slideshow presentations with Animoto is simple. First, select Create a Project, and the site walks you through each step. Choose a theme, and then upload short video clips and your own images or images from a Creative Commons site such as Flickr.

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Communication (teacher to students, etc.)

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Communication (teacher to students, etc.)

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Remind
This app allows you to text parents and students.  This app is especially helpful because it doesn't require a computer. Most parents have a cell phone and you can contact them regarding school matters as well as send work etc.
Used on multiple platforms.
Example:
You could discuss any assignments via text with parents. They can question you directly.

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Use Remind to efficiently reinforce communication systems you already have in place. In addition to a class blog, learning management system, or student agendas, you can send or schedule a text message (including attachments) to remind students and families about important due dates, upcoming tests and quizzes, schedule changes, field trips, or other pertinent information. You can also use it to extend encouraging messages before or after exams or tests, or even before a day with a substitute teacher.

For extended vacations or year-round schools, stay connected here and there while kids are on break; suggest books to read, send out interesting facts, or ask kids to respond to optional polls to reinforce tidbits of learning while they're away. Forgot to mention something in class, need parent volunteers, or want to give kids a quick review before tomorrow's test? Remind integrates with applications such as Google Drive, Microsoft OneDrive, SignUpGenius, Quizlet, and many others, making it a one-stop school-to-home communication tool. For even more ideas, check out Remind's Twitter feed or the site's blog to get updates about new features and useful examples related to time management, communication, and positive messaging.
Editor's note: In the past, Common Sense Education has partnered with Remind. However, our reviews maintain editorial integrity and independence.
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Remind Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Use Remind to efficiently reinforce communication systems you already have in place. In addition to a class blog, learning management system, or student agendas, you can send or schedule a text message (including attachments) to remind students and families about important due dates, upcoming tests and quizzes, schedule changes, field trips, or other pertinent information.

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Khan Academy Kids
Specifically aimed at students Pre K. for basic learning and foundational skills.
Can be used at home or school.
Used on multiple platforms
Example:
Students could practice reading or work on identifying shapes.

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Khan Academy Kids goes beyond your typical, stale ABC 123 early learning app -- perhaps the single most populated genre in edtech. Among this crowded field, Khan Academy Kids is a refreshing collection of early learning videos, songs, and activities that cover a lot of ground without feeling cookie-cutter or stuck in the 1980s-'90s. This is thanks to the help of creative activities, nicely organized and paced learning, and tons of charm and style. The sweet, friendly animal guides and huge library of varied things to do make it easy for young kids to jump in and immerse themselves in learning. Books, videos, songs, and games are high quality, mixing core content like math with essential skills like executive function while putting touchscreens to good use. What's especially rare among competitors -- but is baked in to Khan Academy Kids -- is a balance between more restricted, multiple-choice activities that help aid recall and more engaging and skills-building activities where kids experiment, explore, and express themselves. For instance, a logic game asks kids to follow directions for putting hats on some animal friends, but between trials, kids are encouraged to play around by putting the hats on the animals in whatever way they like. Or, if kids get tired of responding to learning games, they can draw and then narrate a story as they move objects around the screen, read a book, or listen to a song. There's progress tracking, but it's limited. That could, however, be a plus for teachers who find overly complicated dashboards to be overwhelming.

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Khan Academy Kids Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Khan Academy Kids goes beyond your typical, stale ABC 123 early learning app -- perhaps the single most populated genre in edtech. Among this crowded field, Khan Academy Kids is a refreshing collection of early learning videos, songs, and activities that cover a lot of ground without feeling cookie-cutter or stuck in the 1980s-'90s.

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Khan Academy
Designed for to inspire  love and enjoyment of  learning. Covers a wide range of subjects, shows video explanations and practice for a wide range of subjects from math to science, reading, etc. Can also be self directed.
Used on multiple platforms.
Example:
After a math lesson, students can use Khan academy to do practice problems at home or in the classroom.

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For classroom teachers, Khan Academy is probably best used to introduce, practice, and review content. Though math is the most comprehensively covered subject, teachers focusing on science, history, or economics can teach or supplement full courses with Khan Academy. Math and reading content (in beta as of this review) is organized by course and grade level, so it's easy to target students' instruction for a particular level and skill. Plus, you can set a Course Mastery Goal, which will automatically give kids the practice to help them reach that objective. Use Math: Great Ready Courses to help get kids up to grade level. Class setup is super simple, and Khan Academy integrates with Google Classroom, too. To make the most of Khan Academy's features, explore the Khan for Educators course located in the teacher dashboard.

Using the site's powerful analytical and adaptive program, you can track students' progress and identify students who may be struggling in certain areas. If students are using Khan Academy during class, take advantage of the real-time reporting. You can stop the class to teach a skill they are all missing, or target the struggling students for some small-group instruction. And if you're working with little kids, you can use Khan Academy Kids to introduce foundational skills and SEL concepts.

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Khan Academy, a free website aimed at promoting self-paced instruction, houses thousands of academic videos that are baked into guided, adaptive instruction. With an initial focus on math, the site now offers courses on a variety of topics in science, economics, history, the arts, language arts, and computing, as well as prep for tests like the SAT and Praxis Core. Course offerings are continually updated and expanded. In response to the pandemic, Khan Academy has added a lot of support for distance learning and homeschool environments.

Students participate in courses, which are broken down into units and lessons. The course structure helps narrow focus on a particular skill or topic, but students are never restricted on the site; they can always access any content that interests them. Teachers can assign work lesson by lesson or set a Course Mastery Goal, in which the students work at their own pace to complete a course by a certain date. Students demonstrate mastery on short assessments throughout the course and by completing the course challenge test. Struggling students can work on prerequisites or use the Math: Get Ready Courses while also working to complete any other grade-level content.

Whether students are exploring on their own, using the site in class, or using it as a resource for homework and test prep, Khan Academy can be a very useful supplement to classroom instruction and discussion. If it's used as a primary source of instruction, note that the videos tend to be more procedural than conceptual. Nevertheless, the site's missions aim to promote more conceptual understanding, as they challenge kids to practice and master skills on their own, using hints and videos as support rather than as the main source of instruction. And nearly every Common Core math standard is addressed at each grade level, making the website a rich resource for standards coverage.

Some great features on the site: You can turn on subtitles within each video, and the full Khan Academy curriculum is available in at least 18 languages. It would be nice, though, if built-in text-to-speech was available for the text-only content. For students with visual impairments, there are a few accessibility options located in account settings. Students can also use the Khan Academy app, which provides access to all courses, plus allows downloads for offline learning. Because its organization and interface is fairly formal and its activities are straightforward, it's unlikely many students will open Khan Academy and be excited to dive in. However, it is truly one of the most comprehensive and targeted free resources available anywhere.

Learning Rating

Overall Rating

Self-paced lessons target real-world applications. Videos are simple, casual, and friendly; badges and points motivate without being too childlike. Interface is relatively formal and probably won't thrill kids.

Interactive exercises promote kids' conceptual knowledge more than videos alone, but not all courses are created equal. Progress tracking for students and teachers is superb.

Most lessons include customized step-by-step solutions and supporting videos. Teacher support resources are comprehensive.

Community Rating

Great tool for learning math and understanding concepts!

Khan academy is a profound resource for any student who is seeking help in subjects (not limited to) math, science, reading, and even life skills! Khan, the creator, has a very soothing voice that calmly explains concepts as he writes on a black screen, adhering to both auditory and visual learning styles. I only have experience with his math and science videos, both of which have clarified information better than any teacher ever has. Khan Academy also has a section for SAT/ACT prep, which is extremely useful, as it is an online option for students looking to practice without having to go to a class. For teachers, it allows for individual student progress reports that give access to how students are doing in particular topics or what they may be struggling in. This gives teachers the opportunity to create specific plans for each student. A downside of using this platform, is that each topic-teaching does not go past mild to moderate difficulty, so it can be hard for students to learn more complex problems if this site is their only source of teaching.

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Privacy Rating

Data Safety How safe is this product?

Users can interact with trusted users.

Users can interact with untrusted users, including strangers and/or adults.

Profile information must be shared for social interactions.

Data Rights What rights do I have to the data?

Users can create or upload content.

Users retain ownership of their data.

Processes to access or review user data are available.

Ads & Tracking Are there advertisements or tracking?

Personal information is shared for third-party marketing.

Traditional or contextual advertisements are not displayed.

Personalised advertising is not displayed.

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Khan Academy Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Khan Academy, a free website aimed at promoting self-paced instruction, houses academic videos that are often baked into guided, adaptive instruction. With a focus on math, the site also offers video tutorials on a variety of topics in science, economics, the arts, and computing, as well as prep for tests like the SAT.

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Subject Specific Tools -Reading Elementary/Pre K

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Subject Specific Tools -Reading Elementary/Pre K

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Epic Books and Videos
Digital library of book sand videos that can be used for K-5. This tool can be used for silent reading or used to supplement learning on a informational topic or provide background knowledge .
Used on multiple platforms
Example:
I would have my students read the books from this library during DARE time. I might also assign a book before we covered a science topic in class.

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Epic! - Kids’ Books and Videos Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Is Epic! - Kids’ Books and Videos good for learning? Use Common Sense Education’s reviews and learning ratings to find the best media and edtech resources for your classroom.

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Subject Specific Tools - Secondary/Middle School

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Subject Specific Tools - Secondary/Middle School

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Pizzara
Teachers can upload lectures, assignments, homework and respond to students' questions.
Used on multiple platforms.
Example:
The teacher gives a science lecture and the student is confused or has questions, they can be directed to the teacher or another student for help with any confusion or questions.

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Teachers of advanced high school kids with virtual classrooms -- or blended classrooms with big online components -- may match well with Piazza. Use the tool just as it's intended: a place for kids to ask questions and get answers. Students' responsibility to understand content increases as they're required to explain to -- or edit an explanation for -- their peers. Teacher repetition decreases because you weigh in once with an instructor's checkmark of approval, or write one response to provide clarification and modeling. Further, the site has built-in organizational features that help deter redundancy in posts.

In general, Piazza works best when the questions require clear, concise responses: Kids reviewing chemistry or, say, struggling together through Chapter 7's practice test. That said, for history or literature units the one-answer design could be cumbersome, since it would force all possible quality responses to be combined into a long, final answer. Nevertheless, there might also be some creative use cases for the tool in dealing with questions that elicit more abstract or interpretive responses.

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Piazza Review for Teachers | Common Sense Education

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Teachers of advanced high school kids with virtual classrooms -- or blended classrooms with big online components -- may match well with Piazza. Use the tool just as it's intended: a place for kids to ask questions and get answers.

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Schoology
Teachers can create tasks/assignments, assessments, and discussions for students (or even other teachers). Individual teachers can opt for the free version loaded with features related to time management.
Used on multiple platforms.
Example:
In my fourth grade class we assigned morning work. I could put the assignments on Schoology for the week and then review to see if it was completed.

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Schoology is a web-based learning management system (LMS). Teachers can create tasks/assignments, assessments, and discussions for students (or even other teachers). Individual teachers can opt for the free version loaded with features related to time management, organization, and feedback, or schools/districts can pay for the enterprise version that includes additional audio, student progress, and support features as well as all the administrative features necessary to manage hundreds of users and many different classes. Schoology is also an online gradebook with the ability to create assessments and rubrics and keep track of student performance.

There is also a native essay grader that is easy to use and workspaces for group collaboration. One of the best things about Schoology, though, is that it takes the classroom to the smartphone. Schoology allows both teachers and students alike to access their classroom, allowing them to learn, teach, grade, and communicate in a modern way.

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Schoology Review | Educational App Store

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Schoology is a web-based learning management system (LMS). Teachers can create tasks/assignments, assessments, and discussions for students (or even other teachers). Individual teachers can opt for the free version loaded with features related to time management, organization, and feedback, or schools/districts can pay for the enterprise version that includes additional audio, student progress, and support features as well as all the administrative features necessary to manage hundreds of users and many different classes.

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Illuminate
Formative  assessment for  learning . Can be used  in lower and upper grades.
Used on multiple platforms.
Example:
In my 4th grade class we did a science unit on  geology and we  made up questions related to the  topics we covered in geology.  We used this test to gauge their learnings.