Educationals Technology and Mobile Learning

September 11, 2017 As a new emerging technology that is being integrated in education, augmented reality has such a huge potential for enhancing students learning and making your instruction engaging  and lively (watch these TED talks to learn more about the educational potential of AR). There are now several educational platforms and mobile apps that allow you to integrate AR in your teaching, most of which are free, simple and easy to use. This chart features some of our favourite titles. In today’s post we are adding two more apps to the list: these are Field Trip (updated) and Aug That. 1- Field Trip ‘Field Trip, your guide to the cool, hidden, and unique things in the world around you is now on the iPhone! Field Trip runs in the background on your phone. When you get close to something interesting, it will notify you and if you have a headset or bluetooth connected, it can even read the info to you. Field Trip can help you learn about everything from local history to the latest

September 10, 2017 Kiddom is a free iPad app that is similar to Google Classroom. It provides a collaborative learning space where teachers can plan, assess and analyze learning. It is ideal for blended learning or flipped learning classrooms. It is also integrated with Google Drive allowing you to easily create and share documents with students. To help both teachers and students stay organized, Kiddom automatically creates folders for documents and assignments shared through Google Drive. Teachers can use Kiddom to monitor students progress using the app’s integrated gradebook. Based on generated progress reports, teachers can track students learning and assess classroom performance. Also, Kiddom ‘comes loaded with national and state standards (like Common Core). You can even add and track your own custom skills.’ Kiddom’s assessment library provides ‘a vast library of free standards-based quizzes, videos, assessments, lessons, real-world exercises, and more. Use content for differe

September 8, 2017 DocsTeach is a great website that provides teachers and students access to thousands of primary sources that include things such as maps, videos, photographs, census records, draft cards, graphs, legislation letters, posters and several other document sources. We have already featured DocsTeach in several posts in the past. In today’s post we want to draw your attention to these excellent tools provided by DocsTeach that allows you to create your own document-based activities. The purpose is to help you engage your students in an active process of document reading. “Rather than passively receiving information from a teacher or textbook, students engage in the activities of historians — making sense of the stories, events and ideas of the past through document analysis.” Before you start using any of these tools you need to read “ Guide to Creating Your DocsTeach Activity ”. Below are the links to the tools together with a brief description of what you can do with them

September 8, 2017 Here are three good websites to help you bring to life your science classes. These are basically portals where you can access tons of interactive activities, video tutorials, guides, lesson plans, and news articles covering the latest in the world of science. We invite you to check them out and share with us your feedback in our Facebook page. 1- Young Scientist Lab This is an interactive platform where students and teachers can have access to a wide variety of educational resources to bring science to life. These include engaging activities, interactives, teaching tools, and several other standards-aligned resources. The site also host a section for parents featuring a number of family interactives and activities. 2- Live Science ‘Live Science offers a fascinating window into the natural and technological world, delivering comprehensive and compelling news and analysis on everything from dinosaur discoveries, archaeological finds and amazing animals to health, innova

September 7, 2017 In yesterday’s post we covered some excellent video tutorials that can help you learn more about how to use Google Classroom in your teaching. Today we are sharing with you these three guides from the same source which is Google for Education. These are step by step visual guides that cover a number of tips, guidelines, and activities on how to make the best of Classroom in your own instruction. The guides are available for free download from Google for Education Training Centre, you will find them under the title ‘ Handy Guides ’. Here is a short overview of what each guide has to offer you: 1- Getting started with Google Drive This visual guide will help you learn how to set up a class and add students in Classroom. More specifically, you will get to know how to: set up a class, add students by email or code, create an assignment, add materials and assignments, add grades, and how to share feedback with students. 2- Google Classroom Tips This is a one-page PDF featu

September 6, 2017 Google Classroom is an excellent educational platform to use with your students in class. It provides you with a virtual space where you can organize your teaching materials, create and gather assignments paperlessly, communicate with your students and provide instant feedback. Students can use it to view their classes, collaborate with their peers in real time, and access and review their assignments.  We have already shared a number of interesting resources to help you make the best of Google Classroom in your teaching which you can access from this page and today we are adding this excellent resource from Google for Education . In ’ Welcome to Your First Day of Classroom ’ you will find a number of video tutorials, visual guides and tips on almost everything you need to know to tap into the educational potential of Google Classroom. You will get to learn how to set up a class and add students, how to assign and grade work in Classroom, how to reuse your syllabus, h

September 5, 2017 Below is a chart we have been working on for the last couple of days. It features a number of key resources to try out in this new school year. We arranged these resources into four main categories: iPad resources, Android resources, Chromebook resources, and Web resources.  The purpose is to help you make the best of educational technology in your reaching. Check out the chart and share with us your feedback. Categories Resources iPad Resources iPad apps for preschool and kindergarten learners iPad apps for elementary students iPad apps for middle school students iPad apps for high school students iPad apps for university students iPad apps for librarians Apps perfect for every classroom Apple’s educational  interactive guides iPad apps for students with special needs Android Resources Android apps for kids Android apps for elementary students Android apps for middle school students Android apps for high school students Android apps for students with special needs An

September 4, 2017 Collaboration and team work are at the centre of meaningful learning experiences both inside and outside classroom walls. Luckily technology provides us with various tools and applications that support and enhance collaborative realtime work.  In today's post, we are sharing with you 6 good web-based whiteboard platforms you can use with your students and peers to collaborate and coordinate your work in realtime. 1-  Jamboard ‘This Google’s latest collaborative tool. Jamboard is designed specifically to enhance realtime collaboration and brainstorming among teams across the globe. It is basically  ‘a collaborative, digital whiteboard that makes it easy for your team to share ideas in real-time and create without boundaries’.’ 2-  Web Whiteboard ‘A Web Whiteboard is touch-friendly online whiteboard app that lets you use your computer, tablet or smartphone to easily draw sketches, collaborate with others and share them with the world.’ 3-  Mural Mural is another gre

September 4, 2017 Below is an interesting periodic table created and share by the Beacon .The Periodic Table of Technology is created to help students learn more about science and technology. Each element featured in the table is explained in terms of how it is used in actual life outside of chemistry class. Simply hover over any of the elements to learn more about its ‘role in the tech world and click on the pop up to read more ’ about it. This interactive guide is a supplement to the other learning resources listed on our video page . Click on the image below to access the original Periodic Table of Technology.

September 3, 2017 Here are three interesting free resources for science teachers using iPad with their students in class. These are courses provided by Apple Education featuring various tips, ideas and content designed specifically to help teachers integrate iPad in their science instruction. You will get to explore curated science collections, discover relevant apps, books and iTunes u materials and lessons to compliment your classroom instruction. We invite you to check them out below and share with us your feedback in our Facebook page. 1-  Elementary Science with iPad ‘This course provides tips and resources for discovering and integrating great elementary school science content into everyday instruction with iPad. ’ 2-  Middle School Science with iPad ‘Learn how other teachers have taught science with iPad, and how you can integrate a variety of content for iPad into your own classroom. You’ll find examples of science lessons to complement your instruction and help you understand

September 2, 2017 Here is a handy infographic by  Kudoswall  to use with your students in class. The visual features a number of interesting tips to help students build and manage their digital portfolios. You can also check this ‘ beginner’s guide to student portfolios ’ to learn more about the educational importance of portfolios in learning. And if you are looking for web tools for creating portfolios,  this collection  embeds some good options to start with.

September 2, 2017 Living in a digitally focused world brings with it a number of serious concerns especially for patents and one of these concerns is kids interaction with technology. Too much exposure to screen time can be detrimental to kids overall health. The American Academy of Paediatrics (cited in the guide below) suggests that ‘ screen time has no positive benefits for children under the age of two, and recommends no more than one or two hours of screen time a day for older children' (p. 1).  However, before you introduce your kids to technology, and especially apps, there are a number of key considerations to take into account. These include thinking about the purposes behind using apps with kids, their learning benefits, and determining interests of your kids and when and where apps can be used. These and several other considerations are all explained in more details in the guide we are sharing with you tonight. Family Time with Apps  is an excellent short guide to help p

September , 2017 In this short  interactive guide , Daniel Toms (One Best Thing team ) walks you through the different ways you can use iPads in your class to provide students with effective digital feedback to improve their learning .  Referencing both John Hattie’s popular book  Visible Thinking  and the  Sutton Report , Daniel highlights the importance of digital feedback in students learning stating that it has a huge impact on students progress. He went on to talk about the three iPad apps (namely Showbie, Explain Everything, and Notability) they use at his school for assessment purposes. Daniel demonstrates how you can use each of the three apps mentioned above to gather, record and share feedback with students. He explains the features they provide and how you can use them in your own teaching setting.  For more options on apps to use for digital feedback, check out  this page . For those of you not familiar with One Best Thing, this is an interesting collection of books authore

August , 2017 The web is a treasure trove of interesting resources to use for a variety of educational purposes. To leverage the educational potential of the web and be able to make the best of it in your instruction, you need to be equipped with tools that will enable you to curate, save and share the content you come across online. To this end, we are introducing you to 7 of our favourite web tools that will allow you to not only bookmark and save digital content but also organize it in beautiful visual boards and collections that can be easily shared with students. 1-  Padlet Padlet is a great web tool that allows you to curate, bookmark, organize and share digital content online. You can collaborate with colleagues and invite others to contribute to your Padlet. Padlet supports different forms oc content including text, notes, images, videos and drawings. You can also upload files and documents. 2-  Educlipper  Educlipper is a website where teachers get to curate and organize digit