Monthly Tech Tips
Websites and Apps to checkout for use in the classroom
Welcome Back - September Edition
eduCanon
Free basic accounts and can be linked to your Google accounts.
What is eduCanon?
eduCanon is an online learning environment to create and share interactive video lessons. Teachers begin with any YouTube, Vimeo, or TeacherTube video content (screencasts, Khan Academy, Minute Physics, TED, NOVA, etc.) and transform what is traditionally passive content into an active experience for students. By time-linking activities that students engage with as the video progresses the content is segmented into digestible components - increasing student engagement and, through our real-time monitoring, informing the next day’s lesson planning.
edcite
Completely Free for teachers.
What is Edcite?
Our mission statement: Empowering Teachers. Engaging Students.
Edcite is a comprehensive education platform equipping teachers with customizable content and quality Common Core resources. Our platform is built by teachers, for teachers to tackle the classroom challenges of today and strengthen the quality of education tomorrow. Edcite is about access, not ownership; we believe all students and teachers deserve top quality digital tools and content, and our site will always be free for teachers and students.
Edcite is about enabling teachers to engage their students better. We believe that this is key to improving student learning and reducing teacher workload. The upcoming transition to Common Core standards and web-based assessments creates a need in education, and an opportunity for us, to deliver on our objective.
To this end, Edcite provides a web-based platform for teachers to design interactive Assignments that are aligned with the rigor and style of the Common Core. The more that teachers use Edcite, the more useful the product becomes!
We have a continually expanding library of Questions and Assignments spanning various grades -- and these can be tagged to specific Common Core State Standards (CCSS).
Classcraft
Free version as well as paid option
Classcraft is a free online, educational role-playing game that teachers and students play together in the classroom. By using many of the conventions traditionally found in games today, students can level up, work in teams, and earn powers that have real-world consequences. Acting as a gamification layer around any existing curriculum, the game transforms the way a class is experienced throughout the school year.
Over the course of an hour, game management occupies roughly five minutes. The Classcraft web-based and iOS platforms enable teachers and students to easily manage all the complexities of the game. The class is taught normally, and the game runs passively in the background, collecting points and managing powers. Classcraft can be played with one computer and a projector or deployed on every student’s tablet or laptop.
Classcraft is relevant to students because the risks and rewards in the game are real. Do well academically and help your teammates with their homework, and you can gain experience points that can unlock real powers like eating in class or asking a question on an exam. Show up late too many times, and you might fall in battle and need to come to detention. In Classcraft, participation is a must to survive!
* Powers and consequences are customized by the teacher.