EDUC581 Group 4 by https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3 en-us 2022-11-08 17:25:38 UTC 2022-11-18 13:53:44 UTC hello@padlet.com BrainPop jakeschechtman23 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375407815 BrainPOP is a K-12 video based educational software that has videos included with lessons and assessments!

BrainPOP includes mini lessons as well as different assessments students can take that go along with the videos they have. Teachers can assign these online or print the quizzes and allow students to take the quizzes on paper. 

BrainPOP has its own "ENL" version where there are ways to take the quizzes and watch the videos in different languages. But, on the actual BrainPOP website there is no way to translate which could be harder for a teacher to teach a culturally diverse class. 

This tool is harder to personalize due to the fact that the worksheets are based on a video. But, there are different games, matching, worksheets and quizzes teachers can allow students to complete. So, if a student prefers to demonstrate their knowledge in a different way they can. 

I believe the best part of BrainPOP is how many materials come with the video to assess students on their knowledge! This is a direct relation to standards and allows teachers to create very clear learning objectives. The worst part would probably be if BrainPOP does not make a video on your topic!

On a scale of 1-5 stars, I would give BrainPOP a 4/5 stars!]]> 2022-11-08 17:27:38 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375407815 Kahoot! jakeschechtman23 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375409894 Kahoot is a K-12 based software that is game oriented on quizzes!

Kahoot allows teachers to create interactive quizzes to review for tests, use as assessment and have students motivated to learn through competition and games with their classmates. 

Kahoot is a quiz based software but allows for many different features to get students engaged. Students can compete against each other on their own devices or take the quizzes on teams. Additionally, teachers may add pictures and audio to the questions. Kahoot also collects results, shows correct answers and has pause points where teachers are able to review questions. 

Kahoot is completely created by teachers which allows for complete cultural relevance in the classroom. Teachers can share their matters as well which allows for a lot of collaboration globally as well as just in a building or on a district level. This is a really neat way for Kahoot to stay relevant. 

Kahoot can be personalized to students needs based on the teacher's discretion. Knowing the students and what their needs may be is what allows the software to be as scaffolded a possible for students!

I would 100% recommend my district purchase this software and give it 5 out of 5 stars because of its ability to bring gamification into the classroom and allow students to be motivated about learning!]]> 2022-11-08 17:28:58 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375409894 Epic Books jakeschechtman23 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375410121 Epic Books is an online library that allows students and teachers to search from thousands of books in order to supplement lessons! The library ranges of books to all aged students and allows them to use these materials when needed. 

Epic allows teachers to create quizzes and assignments for students to complete in addition to the books that are accessible. As a first year elementary teacher coming from a middle school, the importance of a good read aloud can not be overlooked! Having good pictures and a good story is very important and Epic has so many choices in terms of books!

In terms of accessibility and cultural relevance, there are many books that can be translated, have an audio book read to students or measure exile levels and play videos. Epic has so many different supplemental materials to books that many can use to create a more culturally responsive lesson. 

Epic has exile level son the Home Screen and allows the instructor to assign and match reading levels which is really important in order to give a student the most age appropriate book. This allows for a much more personalized and deeper library than a real library ever could. 

My district has already purchased Epic and once I decided to use it for the first time I never looked back. It is an awesome way to get so much information across to students and supplement lessons with great books. Creating assessments and assignments to go along with them aswell really stays lesson targeted to what you are focused on with the students. 

Epic has a 5/5 stars from me because books are just so important and Epic has built sun a great foundation of books readily available in the classroom!]]> 2022-11-08 17:29:05 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375410121 iReady dancingkarley77 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375722894 i-Ready Learning is a very high-quality instructional resource that is for students in kindergarten through eighth grade. i-Ready is an online platform that has a wide variety of resources for teachers to easily differentiate instruction based on the needs of students. This program uses a problem-solving based approach that builds conceptual understanding through research, and practice. This tool has a various amount of activities and assessments. i-Ready provides instructional tools such as assessments, instructional games, lessons, and more. i-Ready Diagnostic provides normative-and criterion-referenced data. Students’ needs will be assessed through i-Ready Diagnostics.  i-Ready is an online program for reading and/or mathematics that will help your student's teacher(s) determine your student's needs, personalize their learning, and monitor progress throughout the school year. I like that it does personalize individual needs and the students take personalized assessments to fit their needs. I also like that it engages and motivates students to want to improve and grow. I do not like how they sit on the screen the whole time which might cause the students to get burnt out. I also do not like how the students can continuously click on any answers throughout their lessons whether or not they understand it. This will show up in their diagnostic results and it's hard to determine whether or not they grasped the concept(s) or not. All and all, I would recommend this program to my school because iReady provides scaffolded support that meets each student's needs. I would give this tool a 4/5 stars!]]> 2022-11-08 21:23:12 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375722894 Quizziz dancingkarley77 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375836737 Quizizz is a learning platform that offers multiple tools to make a classroom fun, interactive and engaging. As a teacher, you can create lessons, conduct formative assessments, assign homework, and have other interactions with your students (for all grades) in a captivating way. Quizizz is a digital app that allows you to pick or create your own quiz. Quizizz can definitely be used for assessment, and an instructional game.  As a teacher, you can conduct live competitive games as well as assign independent quiz games for maybe a homework assignment. Quizizz is available in 18 languages. Quizizz can be personalized for specific students needs and levels if the teacher makes 20 something individual quizzes or maybe make different groups and assign each group a specific Quizizz that fits their needs. I like this tool because Quizizz has a "friends" feature that allows students to host and play quizzes with their classmates. For each quiz, teachers are able to add images, video, and audio to allow for differentiation. You are able to use other quizzes already published, or, you may create your own quiz. I don't like this tool because it limits the number of questions you can put in your quiz/presentation as well as you are not able to make a copy of a previous quiz/presentation unless you have the premium for both. I would recommend this to my school because I feel as though it takes less of the pressure off the students when they see it's a game. I would rate this tool a 4/5 stars.]]> 2022-11-08 23:48:43 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2375836737 EdPuzzle dancingkarley77 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2377583933 EdPuzzle can be used for all grade levels. It is used for elementary to high school levels. Edpuzzle is a great way for educators to share videos with their students, as well as test their knowledge along the way. Edpuzzle is an easy-to-use platform allowing teachers to engage every student by videos. Edpuzzle can be used as an assessment tool. You can quiz your students on the videos during and after the video. Edpuzzle has multiple languages such as English, Spanish, and Brazilian Portuguese. In EdPuzzle, you can personalize specific students needs and levels by reflecting on students' responses to their specific questions. I like that videos can be taken from YouTube or directly uploaded, as well as teachers can add open ended questions or notes at any point during the video. I do not like that you must have wifi to use this tool. That could be tough. I would recommend this tool to schools because these videos could reinforce what is being taught in class as well as this is a great opportunity for teachers to assess their students. This is a good way for teachers to get an understanding of who is grasping the concept(s) being taught in class. Teachers can check if students are watching your videos, how many times they're watching each section, and if they're comprehending the areas of subject. I would rate this tool 4/5 stars. ]]> 2022-11-09 22:11:56 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2377583933 Newsela dspadoni1 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381236084 Newsela is a tool for grades 2-12. 
This is a website that allows English, social studies, and science teachers to completely transform reading inside their classrooms. This site provides educators with engaging articles that align to various standards, with over 20 genres of texts to choose from. Teachers can then go in and change the Lexile of these texts on a student-to-student basis. They also provide quizzes and writing prompts (as well as answer keys to these) with each article to test student comprehension. 
This site can be used as an assessment tool with its drill and practice quizzes. However, it also is a wonderful lesson delivery and research tool, as it has such a wide array of texts and topics to choose from with customizable Lexile scores. This can be used for teachers to assign specific readings, or for students to use these texts in their own search of knowledge without having to worry about bias or misinformation. 
This site is incredibly culturally relevant. They have an entire section dedicated to ELL’s. The ELL section provides teachers with texts that have read aloud mode to help fluency. They also have texts in both English and Spanish, so that students who do not speak English can read the same text as the rest of the class. Beyond this ELL section, the text library has a wide array of diverse topics, authors, and backgrounds for students to read from/about, making this site remarkably diverse! 
This site is wonderful for student specific needs. Being able to change Lexile's on any article is wonderful. If you need to teach Shakespeare, you can change the Lexile on his article to as low as second grade for struggling students, and up to twelfth grade for more advanced. I find this to be incredible. There have been many times where I have tried to find articles with similar content but at different reading levels and they never line up exactly. Having this site change the reading levels for you while keeping the articles content makes reading much more accessible for students! 
My favorite part of this site is the ease of access and content. You get a lot of material, and the site is quite easy to navigate and search on! Customizable articles with a quiz and a writing prompt can be an entire lesson if time allows! It also makes for an easy homework assignment! My least favorite part of this site is that there are only twenty genres to choose from. As an English teacher, the limited number of articles may make some lessons hard to connect with an article from this site. 
My school district just subscribed to this site, which is why I wanted to explore it! I am very excited to use it in my own classroom, as I love how easy it can make my lessons- giving me the article, potentially different reading levels if needed, a quiz, and a writing prompt. This makes my planning much easier and can really help my students' comprehension! 
I would rate this tool 4/5 stars! 
]]> 2022-11-12 22:13:49 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381236084 Khan Academy kevinvibbardjr https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381602085 Khan Academy is a learning platform that could be used K-12 and across many different content areas including Math, English, Science, History, Economics, and much more. Students are able to work at their own pace and make there way through various lessons on different topics. This is useful for differentiating learning.  Within the lesson their are videos for students to learn and understand the topic. After you have watched the videos they provide you with practice problems on the lesson. After completing a couple of lessons they give you a quiz on the topics. Depending how well you do on the practice and quizzes you get more ”mastery points” this could be a fun way to have students compete against one another in the classroom. The language can be changed and their are various lessons from various countries all over the world. Often it provides different names and characters from different backgrounds. The tool can’t really change the lessons and quizzes as they are already created. However, you could differentiate learning by having different students have to complete different lessons or have a different mastery points goal. I like that Khan Academy allows students to work at their own pace and also it is interactive where they are engaged and completing questions on their own throughout the lessons. The one thing I dislike about Khan Academy, at least in the math section, is the videos can be pretty boring and not as engaging. If students had to watch these videos every day I think they would be bored with it, but I do think it is a good tool to mix into your curriculum here and there. I would recommend this tool to use for my school district. It is free to use and has many good features, just using it daily could become monotonous. I would rate this website 4/5 stars. ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ]]> 2022-11-13 15:07:35 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381602085 Castle Learning kevinvibbardjr https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381614788 Castle learning is an online assessment tool that can be very useful for a teacher to use in their classroom. Castle learning could be used at any grade level. In Castle Learning you are able to create classrooms for each of your classes. You can then create assignments and assign it to your class on castle learning. This way students are able to complete assignments at their own pace.  Students work is instantly graded and sent back to the teacher so the teacher does not have to grade any of the assignments. Castle learning has already thousands of questions for each subject. Including all the past regents questions in regents level courses. They have the questions broken down into categories so it is easy to find relevant questions to what you are working on.  Students can make “flash cards” for different questions as well. Once students complete their assignments they are able to move onto the next lesson.
 I once had a long term sub position in a 6th grade math classroom that  used a flipped classroom approach and it was all run through castle learning. It was easy to step in and manage without any prior knowledge of the website. They use a wide variety of questions supporting all cultural backgrounds throughout their assessments. I believe you can change the language as well. It works well in differentiating learning as some students could be well ahead of other students. The classroom I subbed in had a student on Unit 4 with another student still way back on Unit 2. This would be a student you would want to give more attention too. 
I like the built in questions and how easy it is to access certain questions based on category. I wish there was more of a gamification on the website however. It is pretty bland and boring looking in my opinion. I would recommend this as a tool for teachers to use to assess students once in awhile however, I would not recommend using this as a main platform in a classroom. I would rate this 3/5 stars ⭐️ ⭐️⭐️]]> 2022-11-13 15:26:45 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381614788 SpellingCity dspadoni1 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381698688 SpellingCity is a website that can be used with grades K-12.  
The website is a wonderful tool that allows educators to make vocabulary lists, and then assign students games based off their vocab list. There are four different games you can assign- spelling (where you hear the word alone and being used in a sentence, and then try to spell it. Writing (where you must create sentences that use your words), phonics (where you match the sounds of your words to other words- I.e., cat to crab as they both have the “ka” sound. Lastly, there is a vocabulary game, where you must find synonyms based off the words you are assigned, 
This site has many different tools. You can easily use it as assessment or an instructional game, as well as drill and practice. The educator creates the list and can then assign these games. Students can play them over and over until they are happy with the score they receive or for practice before an exam.  The site provides automatic feedback, which is very helpful for both the learner and educator. The teacher can also assign it as an assessment and collect scores to a “vocab test” in a much easier way than creating and grading written tests.  
This site is not culturally relevant. I tried typing in Spanish words and then Italian words and was told both times to enter “valid words”. This prevents any teachers from assigning foreign language terms on this site. It cannot be switched to a different language. 
This tool can be personalized for specific students' needs. Their website claims that educators can differentiate vocabulary, phonics & spelling instruction for students.  
I like how much this site comes with. Teaching vocabulary can be very challenging to make engaging. This website allows educators to make 700 lists with a maximum of 51 words per list. These lists can then be practiced with in the different games repeatedly. The site also comes with pre-made lists which teachers can easily adopt into their practice. What I find worst is how the site does not allow for foreign language terms. It is very restrictive to only allow English words to be used! 
I would recommend this for my district to use. It may be too childish for high schoolers, but middle school and below could have a wonderful time teaching vocabulary this way. The games are engaging, and everything is spoken aloud, which can help students with the terms before they even try independently.  
I would rate this tool 3/5 stars. 
]]> 2022-11-13 17:27:37 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381698688 Ditch That Textbook dspadoni1 https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381719090 Ditch That Textbook is a website for educators of all grade levels. This site has tools for primary-college level educators. 
This website is full of videos, pdf’s, blog posts, podcasts, templates, and other links meant to help revolutionize classrooms. The creator wants teachers to get away from stagnant ways of teaching, and instead, “ditch their textbooks” and create engaging, tech-based, lesson plans. This website is full of lesson plans to implement, or places to share your own. 
This tool can be used in lesson delivery. This entire site is meant for educators to go through and find lessons to use or new tips/tricks in how to make their lessons more relevant. While educators can find lessons that hit on different types of activities and assessments, this site is just for educators to find and share lesson plans and ways to deliver them. 
Again, this site is just a compilation of lesson ideas, so it has no immediate cultural relevancy. However, upon some digging around, I discovered many lessons with cultural relevance. I found a video on how to use skype to connect students in different parts of the world; another one sharing how to expand school cultures, how to use Google Maps to take students on tours of new locations, etc. The site itself has lots of culture and diversity-based lesson plans, especially on how to use technology to enhance our knowledge and appreciation of different cultures! 
This tool is for teacher use, not the students, so it is not personalized for student needs. However, many of these lessons' plans are personalized for teachers' needs. They have lessons taking you through how to create a Google Classroom, and then how to make the lessons in that digital classroom fully engaging. By having content for all levels of educators, it is easy for one of any background to try and apply their tips! The lessons they provide can easily be personalized as well. Educators can add or remove sections and can personalize the lessons to fit what they would like. The best selling-point of this site is how it can benefit teachers of all different levels of using educational technology or digital/asynchronous classrooms. 
I like how video based this site is. I really enjoy listening to podcasts or watching videos while I cook, clean, do work, etc. Being able to have access to hundreds of videos on how to be a better teacher, how to use more technology, and how to keep kids engaged makes learning all this information very accessible. What I do not like about the site is how much of it is pushing the creators' books, or to work for him. I would rather the sites first two tabs be about their Google tools or other resources so it feels more helpful and less like an advertisement. 
I would recommend this site to my district. This site can really help educators who get stuck in their routines to revolutionize their classrooms and make them more engaging and modern. A quick breeze through this site at a PLC meeting could really change how a curriculum is taught!  
I would rate this tool 4/5 stars 
]]> 2022-11-13 17:57:32 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381719090 Blooket kevinvibbardjr https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381840778 Blooket is an online interactive gaming experience where students are completing questions while playing fun games. Blooket could be used in all grade levels and in any subject as well. Teachers can create a set of questions and then choose 14 different game options for students to complete. Some of the game options students are on teams, while some game options have students are competing by themselves against their classmates. Students are able to join using a code similar to Quizizz or a Kahoot.  The games can be live while other games can be assigned for Homework. It is essentially used for as an assessment activity or as a review activity for students. Teachers can discover other previous assessments made by other teachers or create their own while using others questions as well. Questions can be culturally relevant and can be changed as well. I do not believe that the website can change the language settings, at least not that I could find. It can be personalized for students based on their level. You can make teams for the students or have them compete against a student similar in level to the other students. I love that students think they are competing playing games on the computer but in reality the are being assessed and reviewing material they have previously learned. I would definitely recommend this to my school especially to the middle school level teachers. It is a free website to use and easy to make questions and assess student learning. I would rate it 5 stars.]]> 2022-11-13 21:18:57 UTC https://padlet.com/jakeschechtman23/5xibb5v8pu022aa3/wish/2381840778