Create Your Own Interactives!

Looking for ways to incorporate interactive media into your lesson, but are short on time? These 3 tools can have you creating an interactive resource for your students to explore in minutes. Providing your students with multiple representations of information, and multiple means of engaging with content can be great ways to differentiate your instruction. Try using one (or all!) of these tools as part of your next lesson!

Tackk (www.tackk.com): Create interactive digital ‘flyers’ with text, images, videos, links and more on any topic you desire. Creation is as simple as typing in your text and adding links. If you already have your content ready, you could create one of these in less than 10 minutes! You can create a Tackk without joining, but they expire after a few weeks. Join (FREE) to be able to save your creations. Here’s one we created using a blog post on teaching students to code: http://tackk.com/sqlcp1

ThingLink ( http://www.thinglink.com/) (FREE):  Create interactive photos in minutes. Embed links for more information on a topic (YouTube videos, Wikipedia pages, etc.). When your students hover over an icon in the photo they’ll see a pop up box with more info. This can be a great way to introduce a lesson or webquest and give students multiple links to explore for more information. Here’s a sample created by Médecins Sans Frontières/Doctors Without Borders (MSF): http://www.thinglink.com/scene/336184843761090561#tlsite

VoiceThread ( http://voicethread.com/) (FREE; paid subscriptions): Of the three tools, VoiceThread requires a bit more effort, but is well worth it in terms of the interactive resources you can create for your students. Free accounts are available, as are accounts for teachers, schools and districts allowing you to create student accounts without needing individual email addresses. Here are a few examples of how teachers have used VoiceThread:

• 7th Grade Edgar Allen Poe responses: http://voicethread.com/about/library/7th_Grade_from_Amy_Cobb_2/
• 7th Grade Exploring Probability: http://voicethread.com/about/library/7th_Grade__Exploring_Probability_from_Britt_Gow/
• 4th Grade Studying Plants in Collaboration with Pakistani Students http://voicethread.com/about/library/4th_graders_study_plants_in_collaboration_with_Pakistani_students/

Are You Prepared to Teach with Technology?

A recent eSchool News article "Aspiring teachers ill-prepared to use ed tech effectively" discusses results from a new survey on teacher preparedness to use technology in the classroom. The survey found that teacher preparation programs are often falling short when it comes to helping new teachers learn to integrate technology effectively into their teaching practice. While many new teachers feel comfortable with using some technology tools, they are not always getting the instruction they need in pre-service training.

The survey highlights several key areas of classroom technology integration and the disconnect between what principals would like their teachers to know, and the types of technology instruction pre-service teachers are receiving. While many of the teachers reported learning how to use technology in fairly traditional ways (word processing, spreadsheets and interactive whiteboards), few had received instruction in the areas that were ranked highly by principals (multimedia creation, Bring Your Own Device/BYOD, social media, online classes). It appears that much of pre-service technology instruction focuses on teacher productivity and less on the innovative use of technology to differentiate instruction.

PowerUp WHAT WORKS can help you learn how to integrate technology tools into your teaching practice in ways that support evidence-based practices, Common Core Standards, and address the unique learning needs of your diverse students.

Teachers:

• Just getting started with technology? Explore our technology articles for simple explanations of strategies for incorporating technology into your teaching.
• Looking for inspiration? Explore our resource database by searching for “Lesson Plans” or “Interactives” to find curated suggestions for great resources online.
• Want ideas for ways to use technology tools to differentiate your content area instruction? Browse our ideas, suggestions, resources and tips in Reading, Writing, and Math strategies.

School Leaders:

• Planning Professional Development for your teachers around technology? Use the resources on PD in the School Planner to help you get started.
• Looking for ideas? Read our short articles on Professional Development and Technology Implementation and browse our suggested resources.
• Putting together resources for your teachers? Consider incorporating pieces of the PowerUp resources on Reading, Writing, Math, Technology, and UDL into a mini-PD workshop. Use sections and ideas that work best for your context and create your own customized workshop.