Day 18 of Lent 2020

I am taking a quick break from the “40 Things to Give Up for Lent and Beyond” by Phil Ressler. As I am sitting at home because our Governor closed all schools for at least a week (it might be more) for the COVID-19 pandemic, I am thinking of my fellow teachers who now have to teach from home.

I am fortunate to be a computer teacher and have researched ways to teach from home. We live in an amazing age of technology. With email, Schoology, Google Classroom, Google Hangouts, and FaceTime we as teachers are still able to reach our students from the comforts of home. The only disadvantages are those students in our rural communities who may not have access to technology.

So I am going to list some of my favorite websites and tools I use. And in the coming days, I will have step-by-step instructions on how to use different apps (MacBook) and websites I use in my classes. Unfortunately, with our school district, our teachers have to take extra steps when using YouTube videos since it is blocked for our students. So my list is going to be pretty limited to what our teachers and students can use.

Schoology

This is by far, my favorite website to use for getting assignments to and from my students. I can create assignments, tests, quizzes, upload any file (there are size limits), and if a teacher would like, give badges to students for achievements. Tomorrow I will be more in-depth on how I use schoology.com.

Google Classroom

I don’t use this as much but many teachers across the country use this as a way to upload assignments for students and use the Google Tools for Education Suite. A fantastic website on how to use it is HERE.

Kahoot!

Students LOVE it when I tell them we are doing a Kahoot in the classroom. Now, during this pandemic, Kahoot is offering its Premium version to teachers. Instead of just live games, you are able to create a Kahoot Challenge and the student will be able to complete the questions on their own time and you will be able to get results of all students who completed the Challenge.

Code.org

Have the kiddos code while at home. Teachers who sign up their students at Code.org will have a dashboard to see who is completing the coding lesson challenges you set for them. The best part, the entire site is FREE!

Typing.com/Nitrotype.com

Keep up their keyboarding skills by assigning them lessons, games, and tests on typing.com. I have found that the boys in my classroom love Nitrotype.com. They love to race each other and it fills their need to compete while at the same time work on their keyboarding speed and skills.

Symbaloo.com

Need a place to put all the websites you want your students to use? Symbaloo.com is your answer! You create tiles with the websites the students click on and it opens into a new tab for them.

Canva.com

Canva.com is a fantastic place for students and teachers to show their digital creativity. The possibilities are endless here (although there are some paid elements to the website)! Students are able to create posters, infographics, invitations, photo collages and more. Teachers can create letterheads, newsletters, and worksheets. Logging in is easy with a Google email account.