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Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

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For those of you who haven't seen it yet, here is a collection of some good web tools to help you create digital quizzes. You can use them to design interactive quizzes, questionnaire, forms, polls and many more. The tools are easy and simple to use and no software installation is required. Check them out and share with us your feedback. Links of the tools are under the visual.

FlipQuiz is a web tool that allows teachers to easily create gameshow-style boards for test reviews in the classroom. All the boards you create can be saved for later use. You can also share your boards up on-screen and have students work on them collaboratively. Watch this demo to show you what a gameshow-style board looks like.

PurposeGames is a website for engaging learners through creating and playing games.As a teacher you can use PurposeGames to create a variety of game-based quizzes. Some of the options you have include:Image Quizzes; Multiple Choice Quiz; Image shape quiz.

Riddle is an excellent web tool for teachers. It allows them to create their own PlayBuzz and Buzzfeed-style quizzes, lists, polls, and more, often in under a minute. Riddle's goal is to provide best-in-class tools that making creating interactive content simple, so you can concentrate on the content instead of worrying about the tools.
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This is a cool web tool to use to create quizzes and assess your students. The basic free version alows you to create only 6 quizzes but you can go unlimited for $10 per month. Some of the features QuizBean offers to its users include:

Add 3 questions or 30. Make your quiz as short or as long as you want.

Add unlimited choices to your questions - that means multiple choice and true/false.drag 'n drop pictures for any question.

Reinforce what students should know by adding explanations to each question.

Allow students to see a report of the questions they got right and wrong.

Kahoot is a student response system that teachers can use to create and deliver quizzes and surveys to students. Kahoot provides a learning environment that is ideal for engaging students for it incorporates the precepts of both game-based learning and inquiry-based learning. Kahoot allows teachers to create quizzes and surreys that include a wide variety of multimedia elements such as videos, pictures and text. Each quiz you create can be accessed by students across different devices . Also teachers have the possibility to create time-controlled quizzes. You can set a specific period of time for the answer of each question. In this way students are rewarded not only for the correct answer but also for their timeliness.

Testmoz is an excellent web tool that allows you to create auto graded tests and quizzes. This application is designed by Matt Johnson, an undergraduate student at Washington State University, Vancouver.The strength of this application lies in its simplicity and user-friendliness. Testmoz supports 4 types of questions: True/false, multiple choice, multiple response, and fill in the blank. Each test you create has a unique URL which you can use to edit your test later on or to share with others.

JeopardyLabs is an excellent web tool that allows you to easily create jeopardy games without using PowerPoint templates. The process is very simple and does not require any fees, registration or software download. To create a Jeopardy template, click on " Start Building" button in the home page. Type in a password for your template so you will be able to edit it later on. Next, use the editor to customize your template the way you want. See the video below to learn more about how to build a jeopardy template from scratch. 8- ClassTools

ClassTools provides you with a variety of educational web tools to ' create free games, quizzes, activities and diagrams'. No sign-up is required and you can host your quizzes on your own blog or website.

Google Forms is also another excellent tool to use to create different types of quizzes, questionnaires and polls. Anything you create on Forms will be automatically saved to your Google Drive so you can access, view, and edit it anytime you want. Check out these tutorials to learn more about how to use Google Forms

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10 of The Best Tools for Creating Digital Quizzes

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For those of you who haven't seen it yet, here is a collection of some good web tools to help you create digital quizzes. You can use them to design interactive quizzes, questionnaire, forms, polls and many more. The tools are easy and simple to use and no software installation is required.

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TechChef » How do You Teach Presentation Skills?

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TechChef » How do You Teach Presentation Skills?

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As I mentioned in my previous post, one of my jobs as an Educational Technologist at a secondary 1:1 iPad campus is to provide professional development... to students. One of the most popular requests I get is for slide design and presentation skills. This tends to be also be the topic I have done the most research on AND delivered the most times. I have delivered variations of this presentation (see below) to Capstone, Mentorship, Comp Sci, Incubator, ELA, and SS classes alike.

The Secrets of Slide Design

The presentation I am referring to is linked here and embedded below:

Supporting the Secrets of Slide Design and Presentation Skills

I have also presented this topic at a variety of conferences to adult learners. What I have not done ( and realized this only recently) is drafted a proper blog post with all of these resources. Honestly, what happened was... I started penning my first book, "Cultivating Communication in the Classroom: Future-Ready Skills for Secondary Students" and had to take some time off from blogging. The entire 3rd chapter is basically a more elaborate and detailed version of this slide deck... citing additional examples, rationales, and suggestions for classroom integration. But... this blog post is not a sales pitch and if you know me at all... you know that I spend hours creating and curating content for teachers to be shared freely. So whether you invest in the book or not, I wanted to share with you some additional resources to support visual literacy and presentation skills. All of these resources (and more) are linked off the companion site for the book:

Secrets of Slide Design for Students and Beyond: This is a quick infographic that basically takes the slide deck above and summarizes major points.

Slide Design Hacks for Secondary Students: This is an infographic that details some of the tools and sites I use to jazz up my slides.

Student Presentation Note-Taking Guide: I found when delivering this content to students, it appeared like it was the first time they had ever heard it. To scaffold the intake and processing of this info, I decided to create a Note-Taking Guide (pictured below and linked here).

Student Presentation Planning Guide: I also found it helpful to create a planning guide for students so they could refer back to sites and resources and quick tips (pictured below and linked here).

Student Presentation Planner (Communication Catcher): As a way to start conversations about designing and planning a presentation... I created a communication catcher. Think of these as instructional cootie catchers or fortune tellers (pictured below and linked here).

Feel free to download the PDF version of all of these and use them with you students and staff.

I thought... up until a few weeks ago, that this was a complete resource... but then I was sitting in a professional development that was designed to get collaborative (e.g. inclusion) and classroom teachers collaborating more effectively, and I had this idea. The presenters started talking about setting norms when these teachers work together and that got me to thinking about setting norms for when you have to craft and present a slide deck together... and thus... "Norms for Collaborating on Presentations" was born. Since I was in a professional development and because I have reverted to taking more of my notes in analog form, the info below is handwritten. It is more just some things to think about (for students and adults) when you present with another human being. The users of this info would answer the questions and then choose "need" or "don't need" for each statement.

Now I think you are pretty caught up on visual literacy and presentation skills... Please feel free to email me with questions about the resources. I also love getting emails or tweets @TechChef4u about how you are using them.

If you are delivering similar professional development to students or find there are specific needs students have, I would love to hear about them. Please share links in the comments!

As I stated in the Note-taking post earlier this week, I am pausing my #ScrapNotes series to share some initiatives I have been working on:

Stay tuned for more... !

WHERE WILL TECHCHEF BE NEXT?

If you are interested in booking Lisa Johnson and/or would like to know more about her speaking history or professional development portfolio... visit the TechChef4u speaking page for more info or email techchef4u@gmail.com.

And... Check out her latest creation... the book "Cultivating Communication in the Classroom: Future-Ready Skills for Secondary Students."

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As I mentioned in my previous post, one of my jobs as an Educational Technologist at a secondary 1:1 iPad campus is to provide professional development... to students. One of the most popular requests I get is for slide design and presentation skills.

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Organize your resources in an online digital binder - LiveBinders

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Organize your resources in an online digital binder - LiveBinders

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Organize and share education, small business and non-profit resources into virtual binders. Use LiveBinders for hassle-free access from anywhere.

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Free Online Collage Maker | Graphic Design | Photo Editor - FotoJet

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Free Online Collage Maker | Graphic Design | Photo Editor - FotoJet

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Why Choose FotoJet?

Rich Templates & Resources

Professional templates and function-focused resources make it simple to create collages, social media graphics, posters, cards, banners and much more.

Powerful Tools

Powerful design and editing tools enable you to achieve high-quality results quickly and without any hassles or headaches.

Easy to Use

With only a few clicks, anyone can create professional artworks, even without any experience.

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Try FotoJet for free! No download or registration required; effortless and time-saving!

Thanks to FotoJet, everyone can become a professional designer delivering impressive results with this powerful graphic design tool! Whenever you feel inspired, you can always create awesome designs with our extensive number of templates, crafting jaw dropping posters, flyers, cards, invitations, social media graphics, banners and much more.

A beautiful photo collage is a perfect, artistic way to share your photos. FotoJet's photo collage maker has 800+ stunning collage layouts and templates, including birthday collages, wedding collages, baby collages, family collages, love collages, to name just a few all designed to help you make your own collages online quickly and easily.

You will be amazed at how quickly you can edit your photos online with FotoJet! FotoJet's editor comes with powerful editing tools, such as crop, resize, and rotate, in order to enable you to enhance your photos in seconds. Also, you can touch up your photos with text, clip art images, photo effects, overlays, frames, and other effects that can help bring a photo to the next level.

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Free Online Graphic Designer | Collage Maker | Photo Editor - FotoJet

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FotoJet is a powerful online app for graphic design, photo collage, and photo editing. No download or registration required, try it for free now!

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The UCSB Library invites you to discover and listen to its online archive of cylinder recordings; donate to help the collection grow; and learn about how these sounds and songs create an audio history of American culture.

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Free music downloads and streaming. Discover and explore 600,000+ free songs from 40,000+ independent artists from all around the world.

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50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn

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50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn

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50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn
by TeachThought Staff

Modern learning is in a state of flux as it struggles to find out what it wants to become.

Schools continue to merely "add on" learning, while technology strongly suggests new possibilities for inside and beyond the classroom. From learning simulations and mobile learning, to adaptive apps, flipped classrooms, and self-directed learning through amazing digital channels, the possibilities for learning are almost overwhelming.

Below we've gathered a diverse list of learning apps across iOS and Android from giants like Google, Apple, Microsoft, as well as upstarts like Brainfeed, The Sandbox, and Knowji. None of the apps are perfect, but each app does something special, and in that talent represents what's possible as we careen towards 2020 and beyond.

Learning through play. Self-directed learning. Flipped learning. Mobile learning. Collaborative learning. Social learning. It's all here. Alone, none offer the turn-key approach to education that textbooks have traditionally turned to, but that's part of the strength. As education technology grows, we can adapt to new learning models that take advantage of the fragmented but enormous potential of self-directed, creative, collaborative, and almost entirely mobile learning.
50 Apps That Clarify 50 New Ways To Learn
50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn

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50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn

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50 Apps That Represent 50 New Ways To Learn by TeachThought Staff Modern learning is in a state of flux as it struggles to find out what it wants to become. Schools continue to merely "add on" learning, while technology strongly suggests new possibilities for inside and beyond the classroom.

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Free Technology for Teachers: Stop Motion Studio Offers a Great Way to Make Videos

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Free Technology for Teachers: Stop Motion Studio Offers a Great Way to Make Videos

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Stop Motion Studio is a great app for creating stop motion videos. The app is available for iOS, Android, Windows, and Mac operating systems. The basic (free) version of Stop Motion Studio lets you take as many pictures as you like and string them together in a sequence that plays back at a frame-per-second rate of your choosing. Each frame can be edited individually before you produce the final video. You can also add narration to your video in the basic version of the app. Completed projects can be saved to your device and from there you can share them on YouTube or on your favorite social network.

The Stop Motion Studio editor does offer upgrades that can be purchased in the app. Those upgrades include various background themes, templates, and audio track options.

Applications for Education
Creating stopmotion and timelapse videos can be a good way for students to tell a story that they have developed. Stopmtion and timelapse videos can also be helpful when teachers are trying to help students see how a lengthy process like osmosis works. While good stopmotion and timelapse videos can take a long time to create, tools like Stop Motion Studio make that process a bit easier.

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Stop Motion Studio Offers a Great Way to Make Videos

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Stop Motion Studio is a great app for creating stop motion videos. The app is available for iOS, Android, Windows, and Mac operating systems. The basic (free) version of Stop Motion Studio lets you take as many pictures as you like and string them together in a sequence that plays back at a frame-per-second rate of your choosing.

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Stop Motion Studio - Creativity at your fingertips.

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Stop Motion Studio - Creativity at your fingertips.

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15 Tech Tool Favorites From ISTE 2016 | MindShift | KQED News

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15 Tech Tool Favorites From ISTE 2016 | MindShift | KQED News

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"You can zoom in really close, the kind of close you can't get when you're at the museum," Martinez said. The app allows users to see brush strokes in detail, as well as some of the aspects of older art that aren't always visible to the naked eye, like elements that have been painted over.

If students click on the little yellow figure at the bottom (known as Pegman) they can dive into the 3D world of the museum space, affording them a view of other paintings on display in the same gallery. If a user is logged into a Google account, she can also create a gallery of art and even arrange works on a timeline.

World Wonders Project
This app is also part of Google Arts and Culture. Similar to Art Project, it lets students explore famous sites around the world like the Great Barrier Reef or Pompeii. Each site has videos, but also allows the user to dive into a 3D view when she clicks on Pegman. Students can zoom out to see a world map and pick locations all over the world.

YouTube
There are tons of powerful YouTube videos for learning available now, but it can be a giant task to search through everything to find the best clips. Martinez has started to compile a database of YouTube Channels by subject to help educators with discoverability (hint subjects are by tab along the bottom of the document).

If teachers have streaming problems in their schools, or filters that block YouTube, they can download the video from SafeShare.tv and upload to Google Drive.

YouTube Time Machine
This simple tool allows users to search and filter by time period. Unfortunately it depends on users who uploaded videos to accurately tag content. But it can be a useful tool for finding footage from historical moments relevant to class discussions and it's also possible to filter by subject.

Google CS First
Built on Scratch's programming language, this easy tool gives step-by-step instructions to get started and is great for the hesitant teacher who is just beginning to dip a toe into coding. Martinez estimates this works for grades 5th and up because the reading level of the instructions is more advanced.

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"You can zoom in really close, the kind of close you can't get when you're at the museum," Martinez said. The app allows users to see brush strokes in detail, as well as some of the aspects of older art that aren't always visible to the naked eye, like elements that have been painted over.

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18 Great Google Apps for Education Posters to Use With Students ~ Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

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18 Great Google Apps for Education Posters to Use With Students ~ Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

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Educational Technology and Mobile Learning

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July 3, 2016
As we were browsing Mindshift's ' 15 Tech Tool Favorites from ISTE 2016' we came across this wonderful resource created and shared by Monica Martinez from EdTechTeam. This is basically a collection of interesting visuals and posters covering different GAFE related apps and tips including: Chrome tips, Google tools, Google Street view, Google Docs tips, iPad tips, top 10 Google Apps, GAFE efficient workflow and many more. These posters are available for free and some of them are also available in other languages like French and Spanish. These resources will definitely help you make the best of GAFE in your instruction and ultimately leverage the potential of technology in education. The posters are available in a Google Drive folder which you can add to your Drive account in which case you will receive automatic updates each time Monica adds a resource. Enjoy

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18 Great Google Apps for Education Posters to Use With Students

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July 3, 2016 As we were browsing Mindshift's ' 15 Tech Tool Favorites from ISTE 2016' we came across this wonderful resource created and shared by Monica Martinez from EdTechTeam. This is basically a collection of interesting visuals and posters covering different GAFE related apps and tips including: Chrome tips, Google tools, Google Street view, Google Docs tips, iPad tips, top 10 Google Apps, GAFE efficient workflow and many more.

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Best Websites for Teaching & Learning 2015 | American Association of School Librarians (AASL)

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Best Websites for Teaching & Learning 2015 | American Association of School Librarians (AASL)

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American Association of School Librarians (AASL)

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The 2015 Best Websites for Teaching & Learning foster the qualities of innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration. They are free, Web-based sites that are user friendly and encourage a community of learners to explore and discover.

Gone but Not Forgotten

The following sites have closed, reorganized, or become pay-based since being recognized as an AASL Best Website:

Answerables (Social Networking)

Tackk (Media Sharing)

BeenPod (Social Networking)

Knowmia (Curriculum Collaboration

2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009

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Best Websites for Teaching & Learning 2015

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The 2015 Best Websites for Teaching & Learning foster the qualities of innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration. They are free, Web-based sites that are user friendly and encourage a community of learners to explore and discover.

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Student Centered Classroom Apps From #ISTE2016 | A Listly List

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Student Centered Classroom Apps From #ISTE2016 | A Listly List

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Student Centered Classroom Apps From #ISTE2016

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Come learn how to make the most of your student centered classroom: from classroom redesign, student agency and personalized learning, gamification, rotation style centers for all age groups and blended learning, standards based lesson design, and student engagement. In the digital age we need to reboot our own pedagogy.

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Classcraft - Relationships are everything.

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A positive approach to behavior that inspires educators and motivates learners

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Connected Educators | Helping Educators Thrive in a Connected World

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Connected Educators | Helping Educators Thrive in a Connected World

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How Do We Know When Technology Helps—or Hurts—the Classroom? Educators at ISTE Weigh In | EdSurge News

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How Do We Know When Technology Helps—or Hurts—the Classroom? Educators at ISTE Weigh In | EdSurge News

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"We dropped over $10,000 last year on a math product, but I'm not sure if it's really helped our students learn."

Sound familiar?

Over the past few years, "efficacy" has entered the edtech lexicon as a word commonly used to reference whether or not edtech is driving student learning. But as educators and edtech companies look to track the most effective tools and practices, two big questions are at the fore: How do we measure technology's effectiveness? And if there's an answer to that question, then is the technology actually improving student learning-or has it been a waste of time and money?

With nearly 20,000 people in attendance at this week's ISTE conference, I chatted with a few teachers, administrators, and the president of ISTE during the conference to gauge their take on these questions.

How Should We Measure Technology's Effectiveness?

Educators frequently agree that it's challenging to draw a direct correlation between technology and student success. On the other hand, many feel that the most useful indications they have aren't data but instead their own observations about how students are reacting to the technology.

Shana White, for example, is a 15-year veteran P.E. teacher and tech coach from Georgia who "loves conducting classroom visits" to get a firsthand look at students on tech platforms. Similarly, over in Minnesota, a K-6 STEM teacher named Rachel Pierson relies on feedback from the students themselves. "If students are engaged, that's success. But if they're turned off, it's time to try another method," Pierson told me, while Shelly Stout, a Texas teacher, feverishly nodded in agreement. Stout adds that she's also used SurveyMonkey to gather students' point of view on which platforms they do and do not like.

Administrators were a bit more tempered in their responses, expressing hesitation about whether live observation is the be-all, end-all in assessing edtech impact. Blake Gould of DSST Public Schools in Denver, for example, says he pays attention to whether students are excited about learning--but that's not enough. His team at DSST looks at data like shortform student mastery checks and longform MAPP testing scores, feeding them through data analysis platform Ed-Fi.

Mike Dorsey, Director of Secondary Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment for the Houston Independent School District, felt the same. Even as his team has tried to integrate observations of "technology integration" into teacher evaluations, he says that it "seems awfully subjective from time to time."

How then, can schools integrate quantitative data into those classroom observations?

Multiple choice tests and high-stakes assessment had few fans at ISTE. Minnesota's Pierson conceded she understands the utility of standardized tests from a state perspective: "If you ask every student [the same] question, you can compare it across the state, which can be useful." Stout, on the other hand, doesn't like multiple-choice testing at all: "Standardized tests measure skills of a factory model."

However, adaptive technologies and tech-enhanced projects that allow teachers to find gaps in student learning received a thumbs-up from several of EdSurge's interviewees, with Pierson referencing one platform in particular as "the best way to get immediate feedback, both for myself and my students."

For instance, last school year, Shana White's P.E. students took to the Internet to do research on a nutrition unit. Students posed as dieticians, received fictitious descriptions of patients with dietary restrictions, and researched restaurants to answer questions such as: "Would someone who's gluten-intolerant be able to dine here?" Her data points included student work and formative assessment-and after the project, two of her most overweight students ended up losing 30 pounds.

Balancing quantitative and qualitative data, say the educators, can create a holistic view of edtech's impact-and can be practical, given how quickly edtech products change. Instructional Technology Specialist Wanda Terral (of Lakeland School System in Tennessee) warns that relying on numerical data alone can be misleading, especially if a school decides to switch its focus to, say, student portfolios during the following year.

"It's important to find a sort of assessment that's generic enough to be flexible," Terral says. "Trends change. Products come and go."

So... Is All This Tech Implementation Work Going Somewhere?

Talk to former K-12 edtech director and education thought leader Alan November, and you'll find that he's not too pleased with how technology has impacted classroom learning.

"Regardless of the test, the impact of tech has been negative. Google is distracting, ethics are a mess, and the industry has to come to grips with the fact that this is all a mess," November says. He adds: "Students don't know how to approach messy questions! There's no inquiry!"

There's data to back his concerns. A 2015 OECD report assessing the impact of tech across 30+ countries reported that those countries investing the most money in school technology have declined the most in student performance. "I'm quoting Stanford's Larry Cuban when I say that technology is way oversold, and it has under-delivered," November says.

Mike Dorsey, Director of Secondary Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment for the Houston Independent School District

Part of the problem, observes ISTE President Brian Lewis, is that too much emphasis has been placed on the products themselves rather than on schools designing effective rollouts or implementation strategies. "We've all seen that distributing hardware becomes the impetus [for all of this change]," Lewis observes, "but that's not effective." Instead, he recommends that schools take three steps--and do that in the following order:

1. Create a plan to tie technology to curricular objectives;

2. Organize professional development to get teachers prepared, and then

3. Choose the best technology for the job.

Many of the educators I encountered at ISTE echoed the sentiment that the technology itself isn't as important as how one chooses to use it or the training that educators receive. And no one made the point more strongly than Houston ISD administrator Mike Dorsey. "Unfortunately, the measures of success that public schools look at are too narrow. It's time that we look at the whole package, evaluating teachers based on their use of the tools and resources."

Dorsey also had a message for all of his fellow administrators out there, one that he takes to heart.

"You have to remind yourself that it's not about the new toys. It's about teaching kids to think."

Mary Jo Madda (@MJMadda) is Senior Editor at EdSurge, as well as a former STEM teacher and administrator. In 2016, Mary Jo was named to the Forbes "30 Under 30" list in education.

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How Do We Know When Technology Helps-or Hurts-the Classroom? Educators at ISTE Weigh In - EdSurge News

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"We dropped over $10,000 last year on a math product, but I'm not sure if it's really helped our students learn." Sound familiar? Over the past few years, "efficacy" has entered the edtech lexicon as a word commonly used to reference whether or not edtech is driving student learning.

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21 Top Presentation Tools for Teachers - More Than A Tech

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21 Top Presentation Tools for Teachers - More Than A Tech

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For years, PowerPoint reigned supreme as presentation software of choice for just about everyone, including teachers and students. In recent years though, upstarts like Prezi showed us that there was more than one way to move through traditional slides. We complied a list of 21 of the best presentation apps for educators. Sure, you'll see some old favorites, but we're sure there are at least a few on this list you've never heard of. Everyone is looking for different features and options when creating a presentation. For that reason, we chose not to give these tools a "rank". Instead, the list is sorted alphabetically. Check out these 21 top presentation tools for teachers!

1. Animoto

Animoto is geared toward making videos as opposed to traditional slide decks. With that being said, its a great way to combine video and photos into a unique, professional looking presentation. You simply select a style, add your media and text, then produce and share.
Cost: Free - $7.99+ / Month
Link: www.animoto.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/Nm5O72YpVxk
Platform: See Chart

2. ClearSlide

A more secure way to conduct your presentations! You can present anywhere there is internet access and you share the access code. You can pitch, sell, and close your deals with ClearSlide and you will rely less on technology and more on the end game. You can answer questions on the fly and ensure security for your clients. Designed more for business customers, but there are some creative education uses.
Cost: Typically $69 / Month
Link: www.clearslide.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/G7nrWhH97UU
Platform: See Chart

3. Emaze

The next generation of online presentation software! Choose a free template and create an amazing visual experience. Emaze features a proprietary state of art HTML5 presentation designer. You can even create your presentation in 3D! The application has a similar style to Prezi when it comes to transitions, but Emaze takes it to the next level.
Cost: $10.00 - $100.00 / Month
Link: www.emaze.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/VL7peSju6bc
Platform: See Chart

4. Google Slides

A permanent fixture in many classrooms now, Google Slides is a free presentation software that can be accessed from any device with an Internet connection. You can create, view, present, collaborate, and edit anywhere at anytime with anyone. Google's auto save feature ensures your work is never lost. Versatility, ease of use, tutorials, and Google Apps integration make Google Slides incredible!
Cost: Free for education
Link: www.google.com/slides/about/
Preview Video: NA
Platform: See Chart

5. Haiku Deck

Tell your story with Haiku Deck! Choose a backdrop for your story or ideas to share with the world! With the power to make stunning graphs and charts at your fingertips, you can maximize your time and efforts to create
beautiful presentations with incredible fonts, and layouts! Post them on the web and control them with your phone! Limitless possibilities.
Cost: Free-$5.00 / Month
Link: www.haikudeck.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/US4QbyBR0Cg
Platform: See Chart

6. Impress

Part of the Open Office Suite, Impress is a free alternative to Microsoft PowerPoint. Its has a similar look and feel, but with a much lower pricetag. You can even take existing PowerPoint files and edit them via Impress. Not bad for a free program!
Cost: Free
Link: www.openoffice.org
Preview Video: NA
Platform: See Chart

7. Keynote

The flagship presentation software for Mac that was introduced in 2003. Keynote makes it simple to create and deliver beautiful presentations to your class, grade level or school. Powerful tools and dazzling effects with user friendly visuals are what makes this program one of the industry leaders. Keynote also include great photo and video integration through other Mac programs and features some compatibility with Office products!
Cost: $19.99+
Link: https://www.apple.com/mac/keynote/
Preview Video: NA
Platform: See Chart

8. Pear Deck

Pear Deck takes an engaging approach to presentation. When a teacher starts presenting, students join the presentation via a unique code on their own device. Teachers control the slides and students follow along. Pear Deck also allows teachers to embed actionable content into their presentation. Draggable icons, real time drawings and more. Student can then interact with the slides from their own device and teachers receive the data on how they interacted. You really have to see this one!
Cost: Free - $11.99 / Month
Link: www.peardeck.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/evoJy4WcReM
Platform: See Chart

9. Microsoft PowerPoint

The industry standard that has been used since 1987. Powerpoint is a highly powerful presentation software tool for business, education, and personal use created by Microsoft. It allows nearly limitless multimedia enrichment and effects that are designed to captivate and educate all audiences. Approximately 30 million presentations using Powerpoint are given daily across the world!
Cost: $69.99 and up
Link: products.office.com/en-us/powerpoint Preview Video: NA
Platform: See Chart

10. Microsoft PowerPoint Online (Office 365)

Same as above only through your web browser. The online version lacks some of the premium features of the traditional package, but its still a viable option for creating professional presentations.
Cost: $5.00 - $12.50 / Month
Link: products.office.com/en-us/mobile/office Preview Video: NA
Platform: See Chart

11. PowToon

Online presentation software that uses animation to capture your audience's attention. You will undoubtedly increase engagement of your colleagues, parents, or students! Excitement and motivation are sure to follow. You can even export directly to YouTube so the whole world can see what you have created.
Cost: Free - $10.00 / Month
Link: www.powtoon.com Preview Video: https://youtu.be/ldY3USp8I8g
Platform: See Chart

12. Prezi

Bold, reinvention of presentation software for the classroom and the boardroom using photos, videos, and dynamic text!! Specializing in captivating motion through the presentation will grab your audience's' attention and take them on a ride! Prezi puts a new twist on the traditional slide deck.
Cost: Free - $13.25 / Month
Link: www.prezi.com
Preview Video: https://youtu.be/WsyinM0K650
Platform: See Chart

13. BONUS: Animaker

Reimagine the way you create classroom presentations and boardroom presentations from the comfort of your browser with Animaker. Create your own video presentation from scratch or choose from the wide variety of prebuilt templates. With a few drags and drops your video presentation will be ready within minutes.
Cost: Free - $39.00 / Month
Link: www.animaker.com/video-presentation-maker Preview Video: https://fast.wistia.net/embed/iframe/77nwz1oji9?popover=true
Platform: See Chart

What Works on What Device

Did we miss your favorite tool? Let us know in the comments below. We are always looking to add to our list of the best presentation tools for teachers!

Post by Chris Lenhart & Mike Daugherty

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21 Top Presentation Tools for Teachers - More Than A Tech

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For years, PowerPoint reigned supreme as presentation software of choice for just about everyone, including teachers and students. In recent years though, upstarts like Prezi showed us that there was more than one way to move through traditional slides. We complied a list of 21 of the best presentation apps for educators.

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How to Motivate More (And Better!) Writing With Blended Learning

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How to Motivate More (And Better!) Writing With Blended Learning

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By Jessica Sanders

Blended learning is the perfect solution for every teacher, whether your school can't afford enough technology to go completely digital or you simply believe that technology is an important part of the modern classroom.

While blended learning can improve any lesson or unit, it's especially beneficial with writing. Writing is challenging for many students, and blended learning makes it more attractive and less daunting. Using tools that engage students and gamify the learning experience to motivate them to do it more often, becoming better writers in the process.

Gamify Writing

Blend it: Use gamified tools to reward students for their writing.

Gamification has been used in the classroom for decades, and with technology, it's even easier (and more fun!) to use. With gamification tools, students are rewarded for completing certain tasks, can level up within the program, earn badges and compete with classmates. All of these features motivate students to work harder, and in this case, write more.

While this website was not designed for students, it's a great way to get them writing every single day. The idea is simple: students write 750 every day, in their own private "notebook," helping them to develop, not only a habit of writing, but their own style and voice.

If students write anything at all, they receive 1 point. If they write the daily allotment, 750 words (or more), they get 2 points. If they get on a writing streak, putting "words to paper" for more than two days, they get even more points.

They're also able to access a variety of data sets that tell them all about their writing, from words per minute to time spent typing and number of words written that day. All of these gamified features will encourage friendly competition and motivate students to write as much as possible.

Data

Blend it: Use data to personalize lessons and recommendations.

Big data, personalized learning... these phrases may sound daunting, but in the world of blended learning, they're your best friends. When students use technology to write, you're able to gather information that allows you to cater lessons and assignments to what they need specifically.

This helps to make them more confident learners and better writers. When students feel confident in the work they do, they're intrinsically motivated to do it more often.

This K-8 tool allows students to log their reading and answer standards-aligned questions about what they just read; each question is tied to a specific writing anchor. The questions are open-ended to promote critical thinking, and students can choose from one of three question categories: book review, blog post or comprehension question.

All responses go to you, where you're able to give them a score and provide private, immediate feedback. While this will allow you to collect some unstructured data on how each student is writing, the Data Dashboard is where you'll get the most valuable information.

Within the data dashboard, simple graphs show you who is excelling or falling behind within each writing anchor. You can also see a class-wide and individual data on average response scores, number of responses written and more. With this information you can provide students with the materials they need to improve within certain standards or help them find more challenging reading material so they can excel.

Provide Students With an Authentic Audience

Blend it: Use an authentic audience to inspire students and motivate them to write for a greater purpose.

When students write a traditional book report, it's seen only by you, and perhaps by a tutor or parent who helped them write it. When they know their friends, family and perhaps even people they don't know can see their writing, there are more inclined to do a better job.

Using an online platform also allows students to write more often because it's easy for them to access. You could assign a bi-weekly blog post-requiring even just a paragraph or two-on a subject students learned about in class or a current event.
Try It: Edublogs
Blogging is one of the easiest ways to get students writing for an authentic audience, while learning a variety of other skills such as how to choose online media, how to work within WordPress, and how to reference sources in a blog format. Edublogs was designed for use in a school setting and is therefore safer, with a number of admin features that allow you to ensure students are using the tool appropriately.

Pair blogging with an app like Writing Prompts, which provides students with 600 creative writing prompts, in the form of text, images, colors, genres and more.

For a truly authentic audience, have your students write on Figment, an online community of teens who write and critique each other's work.

Engagement

Blend it: Use engaging apps and tech tools to keep students excited about writing.

Engagement is the name of the game at a time where students are more distracted than ever before-cue video games, social media and YouTube. However, you can use this to your advantage by bringing engagement-based learning tools into your classroom. While many tools aim to engage students, not all are effective, so finding the right one to truly motivate your students is the challenge.

If you've ever seen word magnets on a refrigerator, then this will be familiar to you, and likely your students. Students start with a little more than 20 word magnets that they have to drag and drop to create a poem. They can request more words if they're stuck, or start over if they don't like the finished product.

Once done with their poem, students can use a tool like Prezi, created for making presentations, for them to bring these words to life. With Prezi they can add animations, imbed videos, upload images and more.

Blended learning can transform your classroom into an exciting learning environment, motivating students to write more (and better!) than they ever have before. Consider how you can bring these tools into your lessons tomorrow!

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How to Motivate More (And Better!) Writing With Blended Learning

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By Jessica Sanders Blended learning is the perfect solution for every teacher, whether your school can't afford enough technology to go completely digital or you simply believe that technology is an important part of the modern classroom. While blended learning can improve any lesson or unit, it's especially beneficial with writing.

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10 Teacher Tools to "Techify" Your Classroom

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10 Teacher Tools to "Techify" Your Classroom

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By Bethany Petty

The classrooms of today have the potential to look vastly different than those of the past. Many teachers have access to a vast array of technology tools that can be used in the classroom to increase student engagement.

Sometimes, however, the world of educational technology can seem daunting and extremely overwhelming-especially for newcomers. Use this list of teacher tools to "techify" your lessons one step at a time. Each one has the potential to enhance your classroom biome and get students excited about your content.

$45/year after 30-day free trial

This is a collaborative tool that can be used in virtually any classroom. Teachers create a free "wall" where students can talk with one another. Teachers can customize a variety of features such as the wall background, image, title and URL, as well as moderate posts from their students. In this case, the teacher must accept each post before it's visible to the entire class.

I love to use Padlet to encourage the backchannel while my students view content-related films. This activity encourages them to remain engaged in the movie and has allowed me to transition away from the typical "viewing guide."

Toss out your PowerPoint Jeopardy template and try Kahoot instead. This is probably the most popular and requested tool in my classroom-my students love to review content with this tool, which is a gamified student response system that appeals to all students.

The competition between students can be tense at times, but students are reviewing content and staying engaged, which is amazing to see as a teacher.

Create a free account at getkahoot.com and begin making your games. Teachers can choose to create a variety of activities through the platform, the most popular in my class being the quiz option. After entering a question, response choices and the correct answer, your Kahoot is ready to be played.

Teachers can share the link to their game, which will allow their students to review material on their own.

This is fun review activity for students that increases their engagement in your content. Many individuals are familiar with this game from the popular talk show show, Ellen.

Heads Up works on Android and iOS devices, and requires participants to describe a word, which is displayed on the device, to their partner.

How can this be beneficial in the classroom? The Heads Up app offers "in-app" purchases, one of which is the "Build Your Own Deck" option, also $.99. Select this option and add the relevant terms to your deck.

This simple app was a huge hit in my classroom when we played with a deck I created to review for a course quarter final.

Free; Screencastify Lite

This is a tool that allows teachers to create screencasted videos for their students right from their Google Chrome browser. Currently, Screencastify offers multiple account options, including a "lite" version which limits users to creating videos of no more than 10 minutes in length.

If you've "flipped" your classroom, most of the instructional videos you create for your students will be less than 10 minutes long, so this tool will be perfect for you.

This tool is easy to set up and would be a simple way for your students to create their own videos. In my classroom, students use this tool to "techify" their traditional presentations.

Instead of creating a PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation-projecting it on the whiteboard and reading words directly from the presentation-students create a screencasted video to prove they understand a concept. It's also an opportunity to create engaging instructional content for their fellow classmates.

In my flipped classroom, EDpuzzle is an absolute necessity. EDpuzzle is free tool that allows teachers to embed questions and comments into videos, sourced from YouTube, Crash Course, Teacher Tube and more. The best part is that this tool not only requires students to interact with video content, but also provides teachers with feedback about about their students understanding of it.

Simply create an account with EDpuzzle, which you and your students can make using your GAFE account, and you're ready to create.

Getting feedback from students is vital in any classroom. Teachers need to understand what concepts our students understand and what topics are still unclear.

Geddit is a well-rounded student response tool that can be used in classrooms with any electronic device, including Chromebooks, laptops, tablets or smartphones.

First create your free account (signing in with your GAFE account is an option), then add classes, and share unique course codes with your students. You can then create lessons and include multiple choice, short answer, or true/false question (Geddit also has mathematic characters) to assess comprehension.

When students access Geddit, they are first asked to rate their understanding of the concept being discussed and are then required to respond to questions written by their teacher. Teachers can easily download results of this activity providing invaluable data.

Free

If you are a 1:1 classroom, or are moving in that direction, you should consider using a Learning Management System, like Schoology. Not only does Schoology allow teachers to create and assign tests and quizzes, it provides the option of a "discussion board," an important feature for many online or blended classes in the higher education realm.

The discussion board is my favorite tool to use because it's through these course discussion boards that I'm able to encourage students to interact with course material and discuss their ideas and opinions about that material with each other.

This not only encourages collaboration , but also motivates shy students, who don't typically participate in traditional discussions, to voice their opinions as well.

Blendspace is a tool that allows teachers to curate and share resources with their students. After creating a free account, teachers can begin to compile resources on "boards" and share them with their students via email, URL or QR Code.

Blendspace is a worthwhile tool to for any teacher to have, and it's especially helpful in my flipped classroom. At the end of every unit, I create a Blendspace board to share with my students that includes links to all of the instructional videos for the unit, as well as links to graphics I believe are helpful, and of course, the Kahoot unit review game!

Students can use Flippity to review course content with electronic flash cards. Students make their own flashcards by creating a copy of a Google Sheets template found on Flippity's website. They rename the copied file, enter required terms and definitions, publish their link, and paste it in the designated cell.

Students are then provided with a link to their Flippity flash cards, and the Google Sheet which contains their original terms and definitions is saved in their Google Drive.

Flippity has recently added a quiz show template through which students can create their own Jeopardy-style review game, also done with a Google Sheets template.

Do you have an iPhone, iPad or android device? If so, Explain Everything is an inexpensive app you definitely need. Explain Everything allows anyone to upload, annotate and narrate virtually any file, including a PowerPoint or Google Slides presentation. Once edited, you can export the file and share it with your students through a variety of outlets, including Google Drive, Dropbox and as a link through email.

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10 Teacher Tools to "Techify" Your Classroom

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By Bethany Petty The classrooms of today have the potential to look vastly different than those of the past. Many teachers have access to a vast array of technology tools that can be used in the classroom to increase student engagement.