50 Education Technology Tools Every Teacher Should Know About

Technology has transformed our lives. It has helped us to become more efficient thus increasing our productivity. It has given us a lot of freedom and a lot of ways to save our time and money. Sometimes teachers in our country use only popular tool e.g. Google Doc, YouTube, Skype, Dropbox but they do not know about NearPod, ClassDojo, Qoura. 

I found useful article "50 Education Technology Tools Every Teacher Should Know About" which provide 50 different educational tools. The main goal of this article is to show the most innovative tools that can immediately transform to the teachers' classroom.

There are three types of educational technology tools such us social learning, learning and lesson planning.

Social learning tools use to help students learn and teachers connect. Here are some of them:

EdModo (it is a tool for within-class communication, but it also provides several ways for teachers to connect with other teachers).

Wikispace (the teachers can share materials, lessons and media online with their students. Also, Wikispace let them to build their own educational wiki).

ePals (learners all around the world connect, learn languages and work on projects that often focus on issues of global culture).

Quora (the best answer to the any question. Quora connect with professionals to engage students in discussion after class).

Another type of tools is learning tools. These learning tools can help you to make lessons fun, interesting, and more effective. Here are some of them:

Animoto (create video-based lessons or presentations for the classroom and to share them with students).

Khan Academy (here you can find collection of languages, math, science, and finance lectures and quizzes which teachers can use in their classroom).

Lesson planning tools help to create projects and organize the lessons. I like a Planboard tool. 

Planboard (organizes teachers' lessons, semesters, weeks in a useful timetable that is with you everywhere).

I hope this information will be useful and interesting to you all.

References:

https://globaldigitalcitizen.org/50-education-technology-tools-every-teacher-should-know-about

http://www.canisius.edu/grad-education-technologies-emerging-media/technology-tools.dot

ClassDojo

The new school year is beginning and it is critical to have good classroom management. Classroom management is one of the biggest challenges that the teachers face. One of our classes was about great and useful tool ClassDojo which can solve teachers' problems with classroom management. ClassDojo is a system that helps teachers save time, improve student behavior and enhance classroom engagement.

Each of your students is chooses a monster to represent them in the class. Also, parents can be invited to view their child's Dojo account. It is easy to use and this tool is so fun and motivating for students.

This video will provide you a better idea about ClassDojo.

ClassDojo have three major goals:

• Sharing data. ClassDojo gives a behavior-tracking reposts that you can shared with you parents or directors.
• Improving behavior. Easily award feedback point for behavior in class in real time. Students get immediate feedback to their behavior by the distinctive sound made when their avatar is clicked. It can be positive and negative feedback. 
• Saving time. ClassDojo recently added some great new features which are attendance, a timer, messaging and etc.

You can see some positive points which teacher can use.

It is worth trying it - https://www.classdojo.com/ru-RU/

References:

http://www.edutopia.org/blog/classroom-behavior-classdojo-app-lisa-mims

https://www.classdojo.com/ru-ru/nyt/?redirect=true
http://www.joebower.org/2014/11/6-reasons-to-reject-classdojo.html
http://www.teachingace.com/thinking-about-classroom-dojo-why-not-just-tase-your-kids-instead/

Nearpod

Yesterday we had a class with Monica. She presented a new app Nearpod. I was shocked at this new app. Nearpod is an interactive presentation that we can use in the classroom. The app’s concept is very simple. The Nearpod is free for teachers and students to use. Teacher can collaborate with colleagues, sharing multimedia content, and exchanging ideas in the class by using Nearpod.
It was interesting for me to know that the name Nearpod represents the need for “close” interactions.
I had used Nearpod and I had found some benefits:

• Easily to create interactive lesson
• I can monitor student activity in real time via the Nearpod Teacher app
• Check attendance
• I use interactive content includes pictures, videos, activities, questions
• I use live and formative assessment, e.g. quizzes, open ended task

This video will provide you why teacher choose Nearpod.

References:
http://www.learninginspired.com/10-ways-of-using-nearpod-in-the-classroom
http://www.speedofcreativity.org/2013/11/28/lessons-learned-using-nearpod-presentations-on-ipads-with-students/

Digital Citizenship

This video will provide you information about encouraging digital citizenship.

Digital Citizenship

About Digital Citizenship

Digital Citizenship

Digital Citizenship is about building safe spaces and communities, realizing how to manage personal information. Nowadays, technology is a main part of our life. The teacher and children must know about digital citizenship. Digital literacy, ethics, and etiquette will guide children in communicating responsibly online.
For instance, in the USA the teachers dicuss about digital citizenship with children but in our country some teachers can not do. Sometimes our school don't have an Internet access or the computers had broken because of these the students use Internet at home. The main idea of the teacher making the students feel safe while using Internet at home, school or university.
The advices for the teacher are:

• Distinguishing between credible and deceptive information
• How to identify if information is private and secure
• How to move from consuming information to creating it

Moreover, teacher can prepare special units, activities for children or students. The teacher provides students with a list of approved Web sites to use in class or at home.

This video provide useful information about digital citizenship.

References:

https://www.commonsensemedia.org/videos/the-importance-of-teaching-digital-citizenship

http://lrrpublic.cli.det.nsw.edu.au/lrrSecure/Sites/LRRView/13772/documents/citizenship_domains.pdf

http://www.promoteprevent.org/sites/www.promoteprevent.org/files/resources/digital_citizenship.pdf

http://www.itworx.education/digital-citizenship-important/

Social Media

Introducing Social Media to Elementary Students

All we know is that media influences all aspects of modern society. Every day, we use a lot of social networks applications which have become a key part of our life, e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Google, Instagram. But what about our children? Do we need to introduce children to the social world? When I was a child I didn't know about social media. We had tried to create new games and activities.

I absolutely agree that we can use technology in our classroom, but what about social media? The students can lose their learning interest.

Beth Holland and other elementary teachers created three examples of how to use social media to extend learning context.

Extend the classroom 

Kristen Wideen a teacher at the grade 1/2 students. Her class have been exploring frogs and tadpoles. Children use social network Twitter for education. They are teaching from their classmates by creating videos, video conferencing, books and blogging. Kristen created a special rule for this class. Moreover, she introduced for students QR code reader. The results of this class was high than others. The students has begun to develop a huge project about frogs and tadpoles.

Connected, powered learners

Kristin Ziemke is a teacher at first grade class in Chicago. She presented how to use Twitter and KidBlogs for her students. Children started to comunnicate with parents and teacher by using Twitter. The main idea was preparation crildren to the broader learning community. Children must discuss their learning experience in the class before writting their ideas, questions. 

Getting started: developing voice
Ashley Johnston is a teacher who create a new type of blog. She created physical blogs on the walls. She used a paper and a pen. Ashley, wanted that student had opportunity to create a post, tagg, comment, and analyze another posts.

What do you think? Can we use Twitter account for children?

Reference:
http://www.edutopia.org/blog/introducing-social-media-lower-elementary-beth-holland