Technology Connections. Hot Technology for the Summertime

It is summer and time to relax and reflect on your school year, as well as take a few days to possibly forget about it all together. Peruse this selection of great technology tools to get you excited for the upcoming school year. You do not have to use them all, but even those you don’t use might get your creative ideas flowing and get you excited for when you meet new students, peer educators, administrators, and parents.

Flipgrid: https://info.flipgrid.com/

If you have not been able to try Flipgrid now is the time. Flipgrid start out as a trial/subscription based tool and in early 2017 began to offer a free option to educators. This online tool is a way to get students discussing topics using short 90-second video posts. Teachers and teacher librarians can post question prompts and students, peer educators, and peer teacher-librarians can respond via video. An amazing tool that can be used across platform and device. Each video is transcribed for accessibility purposes. Think of using this digital tool for book discussions, fake news and information literacy debates, professional development ideas, and so much more.

Vizia: https://vizia.co/

I was introduced to Vizia in late 2016 and have been a big fan ever since. Vizia is perfect for flipped and video embedded learning. It takes using videos to an entirely new level. With Vizia, grab a video from YouTube, and then proceed to add questions throughout the timeline of the video for when students view it. You have the option of multiple choice, open-ended, and poll-style questions. As your participants are watching the video, they can answer questions in real-time and Vizia collects all the answers in a spreadsheet that you download or open in Google Sheets. Use Vizia for flipped learning, student comprehension, or to make a video a little more interactive.

My Simpleshow: https://www.mysimpleshow.com/

If you are looking for a great presentation/video style site, My Simpleshow is the online tool for you. The strength of this particular site is in creating explanatory videos. It can be a process, a product, a public service announcement, a book trailer, or a welcome to the library, but explaining is the name of the game with My Simpleshow. Using the site is easy. Write a script, choose the characters or icons you wish to use in your video, and My Simpleshow puts it all together. It will narrate for you or you can do the voiceover yourself, you also have great accessibility options such as transcriptions.

Write the World: https://writetheworld.com/

This site is dedicated to a specific group and purpose. Write the World is all about improving the writing skills of high school students through community writing on a global scale using a guided interactive method. Writers are encouraged to discover their voice through writing, work on their editing skills, and publish in a digital, global platform. Write the World is pointing students toward writing for life. This site offers material for educators and teacher librarians to encourage writing in schools, classrooms, and libraries. If you are looking for new ideas in the area of creative writing, this is the place for you.

Listenwise: https://listenwise.com/

I am so excited to share this last site. Listenwise is a tool that shares public radio stories, which cover current as well as historic events. Along with these stories, educators and teacher librarians have the option of lessons, objectives, essential questions, and vocabulary from the radio stories to use with classes. Listenwise offers two options: a free version with curated podcasts for student comprehension and a premium option with quizzes, assessment reports, and more. All radio stories are free for your student’s learning and listening pleasure. A great site for student comprehension and another delivery method for student learning.

While you are taking some time off this summer and planning for next year, I hope you will look and play with these great sites.