By Garrett Derr @GDerrSDOL Does your School District use the American Reading Company to ensure that every student can read, write, and think on grade level? If so, it's likely that you're always looking for ways to progress your students to the "next level". We have to get our Yellow readers to 1G, our 2G readers to 1B, and the list goes on. As we know, though, time is never really on our side. It's difficult to find the time to conference with every student each week, especially if you have a large class size. Even if you're able to find the time, the conferencing in and of itself can be time-consuming. Every second is valuable. What could possibly be out there that helps us maximize the time that we have with our students? Look no further than Seesaw. This interactive platform allows teachers to create or use a curated library to enhance the learning that takes place within the walls of our classrooms. Even better, you can use the platform to help students master their Power Goals and progress to the next color level. Rather than spend time going over long word lists during conferences, simply upload your student Power Words, Category Words, or Tricky Words right to Seesaw. You can even add voice instructions for younger readers who may have a difficult time reading your directions. Here, students are not only able to practice their words on their own time, they can record themselves reading each word, and even mark up the list! Check it out below! The best part? At any time, you can simply open Seesaw and check on your student's progress. You can open SchoolPace and log the words that students know without even conferencing!
When it's time to meet and conference with your students, there is no time wasted! Seesaw provides teachers the flexibility to enter student data during school hours or even at home. Over time, your students will build up their own individual portfolio and be able to show off their hard work! If you're a Seesaw veteran, give it a shot today. If you're new to Seesaw, check out the getting started guide! Follow #SDOLTECH on Twitter to learn more about how we're empowering creative digital learners!
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By Wes Emlet
I'm not sure about you but I often forget Siri exists. Whether it's searching for an app or wondering what the weather is like outside, I'll often find myself searching these things manually and later think to myself, "Oh yeah, I could have asked Siri to do that for me." Who's Siri you may be asking? Without getting too technical, she's the built in intelligent assistant on all of your Apple Devices who uses speech recognition technology and natural language processing to convert your spoken requests into actionable responses. So instead of spending time searching for an app or inputting an equation, we can simply ask Siri to do those actions for us in a matter of seconds. So now that Siri's fresh on my mind it got me thinking, how can we use this type of technology as an instructional tool in our classrooms? Obviously, it's a time saver and we are always looking for ways to save time in our classrooms. So simply asking Siri to open an app is a quick and easy way that even our youngest learners can use to save a few seconds of searching. An excellent time saver for teachers is the use of the built-in timer. Ask Siri to set a timer during station rotations and be on your way. Need a random number? Ask Siri for one! One the best ideas I've seen so far was by Joe and Kristin Merrill this past summer at the ISTE conference in Philadelphia during their "Interactive Classroom" session. They play, "Are You Smarter Than Siri" and have their students use white boards to "race" against Siri. Check it out in action below. The possibilities of using Siri in the classroom really are endless. I added a few ideas to the document below for using Siri in the classroom. What ways are you using Siri? Please share!
Websites for Laptop or iPadGet ready! Follow directions to create accounts and assignments as needed! iPad AppsAll apps can be found in Self Service on all district iPads. Remember to install prior to Hour of Code. All done? Print an Hour of Code 2019 Certificate for your class!
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Wes EmletCoordinator of Instructional Technology Gidget Dejesus Instructional Technology Coach
@MsGMDeJesus Tara Morcom Instructional Technology Coach
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