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Yippity - Yippity
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
Use Yippity to quickly create and share quizzes or provide materials for review based on text or websites. Because Yippity identifies important information, it is a helpful tool for students to use as a study aid; add a link to Yippity on your class website, and encourage students to use Yippity as a study tool for upcoming quizzes and tests. Consider creating a Google Keep, reviewed here, to create a collaborative list of study tools for students to access at school and home. Include additional resources such as Knowt, reviewed here, and Summarize This, reviewed here, to help engage with content through several methods.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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YoTeach! - PALMS
Grades
7 to 12In the Classroom
Use this site to connect to other classes to open up a discussion between your students in one convenient place. Safety is not a concern with this site since only those with an email invitation/link or the QR code can participate in a chat. (Your students need not have email. You can simply email the link to yourself and share it with students to enter into their browsers.) Teach good digital citizenship of chat etiquette while using this activity to learn. Connect with other classes to learn about other locations, learn various perspectives, find animals that are similar yet different, learn about the different books others are reading, or survey students on various economic, political, or environmental topics. Be sure to plan content ahead of time, so students have the opportunity to think through the material and formulate a response. Discuss appropriate ways to communicate with others before connecting with another classroom.Use backchannel chat on laptops during a video or student presentation. Pose questions for all to answer/discuss in the backchannel, or ask students to pose their own "I wonder if..." questions as they watch and listen. Keep every student engaged and THINKING as an active listener. The first time you use backchannel, you will want to establish some etiquette and accountability rules. The advantage of backchannel chat is that every student has a voice, no matter how shy. Use this in world language classes, ESL/ELL classes, or autistic support classes for backchannel chat. Challenge students to use their new language skills to describe a scene from a video or the feelings of the actors. When studying literature, collaborate with another class to have students role-play a chat between two characters. In a history class, create fictional conversations between soldiers on two sides of the Civil War or different sides of the Scopes Monkey trial.
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YouTube Teachers - Learn. Teach. Share - YouTube EDU
Grades
K to 12YouTube is very valuable to educators looking for great educational content. There are videos for early elementary concepts like safety up through college-level courses. YouTube has the ability to stream content into channels based upon your viewing preferences, and videos are easily marked as "favorites" to find in your history. It offers suggested channels based on your watching history including trending and popular videos. Parents can filter out objectionable content and comments using Safety Mode -- which is often disabled.
Create a YouTube channel to collect videos for easy access by students. Upload teacher-created videos for your class to your channel. Do you know a great video not featured on YouTube EDU? Suggest it for the EDU collection.
In the Classroom
Use YouTube Teachers/EDU to create a channel of appropriate videos for your class. Consider creating your own videos of content that can be uploaded to your YouTube channel. Use videos to introduce topics, dig deeper into the content, and review for exams. You may even want to try "flipping" you class so students view the video information as homework and practice with concepts in class the next day. Students can be given the task of finding suitable videos that take the content deeper for better understanding. Create video guides that go with the videos or quizzes that can be given at the end. Assign videos for students to view and give them time to use the information to create a presentation for the rest of the class.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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ytCropper - 10 Best Design
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Use ytCropper to highlight specific information from YouTube videos for student use. After creating a shortened clip, encourage students to predict what comes next or use the segment before showing the entire video. Flip your classroom and ask students to use ytCropper to share important information from videos or highlight portions that need further clarification. Using shorter video segments offers many opportunities to use video clips within other online tools. For example, have students enhance their learning by uploading an image related to their science research and add annotations. Use Google Drawings, reviewed here, to include shortened video clips, images, and text to describe the stages of plant growth, introduce a political figure, or provide background for a novel. Google Drawings allows you to annotate an image with links to videos, text, websites, and more. Not familiar with Google Drawings? Watch an archived OK2Ask session to learn how to use: OK2Ask Google Drawings, here. Google Drawings presents a variety of levels for technology use depending on teacher requirements for the project, or even student ability; it allows for adding narration, videos, text and links to help explain what certain parts of the topic are about. Ask students to include shorter clips within multimedia projects created using a tool like Adobe Creative Cloud Express for Education, reviewed here, to redefine classroom technology use and their learning and understanding.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Z-A Quiz Generator - ClassTools
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
In the Classroom
Use the Z-A Quiz Generator as a motivating way to introduce a new unit to students (even as a formative assessment for the class), or to review information before quizzes and tests. Instead of asking students to memorize a set of dates or events, help them by organizing the information into common features. For example, during a Civil War unit group together events taking place in different cities as a way to help provide context for students. Include a link to your quizzes on your class webpage or blog for students to practice at any time using the URL or embed code. Enhance technology use and learning by having students create their own Z-A quizzes to share with peers when studying for tests or use as an introduction with class presentations. When sharing student-created multimedia presentations, modify technology use by using a tool like Sway, reviewed here, to share their final projects including a Z-A quiz for viewers. This quiz generator is also a great resource to use during professional development sessions with your peers. Create a quiz to increase your viewers' interest in your topic as you begin your discussions or as a final activity to review information shared.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zapier - Wade Foster
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Use Zapier to manage everyday online work. Have Zapier send you an email each time student blogs are updated, add documents automatically to your Google Drive as they arrive in your email, or get email reminders before upcoming calendar events. The variety of actions makes this a convenient tool for automating any number of activities to save you time and maintain the organization of your information.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zeemaps - Zee Source
Grades
4 to 12In the Classroom
If you teach geography, this one is a must. It is also helpful for showing students WHERE a story or news event takes place. Teach map skills by letting students explore and annotate their own community. This site is great on an interactive whiteboard or projector. Create multiple markers for various points within your community. Annotate the markers with specific information that students research. Remember to create an admin password (and save it somewhere safe!) for others to collaborate on the map. Research various places around the world, and create markers of must-see places, historical finds, and other locations of interest. Create a map of news hot spots around the world. In Biology, find places where environmental or biodiversity concerns are occurring. Collaborate on a map to include annotated information of student research about these problems. Create a map to introduce various cultures around the world. Enter video, audio, information, and links that students can use to "uncover" the content to be learned.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zencastr - Zencastr
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
Learn more about ways to incorporate podcasting in the classroom by viewing the archive of the OK2Ask: Podcasting 101: Using Podcasts in the Classroom, available here. Engage students in upcoming lessons by creating and sharing short podcasts as a preview for books to read or about historical characters featured in an upcoming unit. Use Zencastr to create videos for flipped or blended learning lessons. Enhance learning by asking students to create podcasts to share their learning and understanding of topics in a new way. For example, instead of writing a report about George Washington, ask students to create a multi-episode podcast that features important events in his life. Share student and teacher-created podcasts on your class website. Find several free and easy web page makers on TeachersFirst Edge.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zentation - Karl Siegert
Grades
5 to 12This site includes advertising.
In the Classroom
Use your existing presentations along with video of you narrating them (or other video) and upload them to Zentation. Zentation is perfect for use in your BYOD or 1:1 classroom. It does use Flash, so iOS devices will not display the results. Use during your presentations to increase student interest and interaction. Share with students for use to combine their own slides and video to create a more dynamic presentation. To find Creative Commons images for student projects (with credit, of course), try Vecteezy, reviewed here. Use Zentation as an excellent resource for creating and sharing review materials on your website. It would also be a great way to "flip" your classroom. Use the video area to include examples of a scientific process (found on YouTube) or even video of students themselves explaining student-created review or presentation slides in a format you can easily share and archive on a class web page or wiki. Anything you can put on video can go in the left video box! If you have students who are too shy to present in person, this would be a great way for them to record and combine slides with video of themselves. Teacher-librarians could record students doing booktalks alongside slides of images from the book or illustrations the students draw themselves.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zight - Zight
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Download and use Zight in many ways in all classrooms. Make screen recordings to share how-to information on navigating websites. Use the annotation tools to highlight important information and the location of website tools. Have students use Zight to share their screens when facing difficulty using sites. Create collections of videos for students to access, including instructions for logging in to various websites, searching effectively, or sharing information digitally. This feature is especially handy when you need to share video instructions for any purpose.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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ziplet - ziplet
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Use ziplet to engage students throughout your lessons and to provide feedback on student understanding. ziplet is also perfect for use as an exit ticket response or use as an informal formative assessment. Use ziplet to create pretests that allow students to "opt-out" of material they already know or use it to create review activities that students participate in as teams.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zoho Online Surveys - Zoho Corporation
Grades
3 to 12In the Classroom
Copy/paste the link to the poll or use the embed code to place in a wiki, blog, or a site. Be sure that students use the poll appropriately and know that personal information is not acceptable in poll responses. Use polls anywhere to record quick responses to questions. Have students create a poll about their interests and allow time to analyze responses and report findings. Use this site to vote for correct answers in math class, project ideas for science or social studies, social issues in current events, and practically any other subject area. Students should be encouraged to incorporate polls during class presentations. In an elementary math class, collect quick data to show use of graphs. Share the graphs on your projector or interactive whiteboard in "real time." Provide options for students to gain confidence in generating and analyzing statistics they have created. Include a quick parent poll, on a class website, to keep the lines of communication open. An iPad app is available for easy use in mobile settings.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zoho Show - ZOHO Corporation
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
To use this site, you will need to create an account. You will need to navigate using onscreen instructions. There is a video tour of the features if you would like to view it, but it is just as fun and easy to play with the tool. Slide themes are limited, but the tools are simple and it is easy to publish to a URL that can be shared with everyone.Use this tool to create presentations when students will need more than class time to finish. Have students make individual presentations. Instead of presenting on projector, have them share to the class wiki or within their zoho group to promote discussion and peer review. Assign a round-robin peer review so everyone gets some feedback.
Edge Features:
Parent permission advised before posting student work created using this tool
Requires registration/log-in (WITH email)
Products can be embedded
Products can be shared by URL
Multiple users can collaborate on the same project
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Zoom - Eric Yuan
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Use Zoom to set up virtual parent/teacher conferences with participants located anywhere in the world. This is especially useful when multiple teachers are involved or when parents may not reside in the same location. Share your screen as needed to provide information on assessments and student work. Connect whole classrooms across the country for book clubs. Collaborate with experts such as authors and scientists with classrooms of children. Create connected learning experiences with other students, especially those in older grades. Connect world language classes to classes in other countries. Teachers can hold "office hours" for homework help and asking questions. Create a collaborative space for homework help before or after school or on snow days. Students can meet whenever help is needed or teachers can create a session that can be accessed on any device easily by those who need it. Consider using a tool such as Remind, reviewed here, to alert parents and students when your sessions are open. Use Zoom for group work - no more excuses about not being able to meet for cooperative learning projects! Buildings can collaborate and share professional development with others in their own district and beyond!Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zoom In! - Education Development Center
Grades
5 to 12In the Classroom
Take advantage of these free lesson plans for use in teaching social studies aligned to Common Core Standards. Even if you cannot use whole lessons, browse through to find resources to add to your current lessons. Create classes and assign different lessons to different groups of students based on ability and interest. After completing a unit, have students make a multimedia presentation using one of the many TeachersFirst Edge tools, reviewed here.Edge Features:
Includes an education-only area for teachers and students
Parent permission advised before posting student work created using this tool
Requires registration/log-in (WITH email)
Includes teacher tools for registering and/or monitoring students
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Zotero - Center for History and New Media at George Mason University
Grades
8 to 12In the Classroom
Depending on school computer settings, you may need to have tech support install the program for you. Use Zotero to collect and organize classroom resources. Share with older students as a resource for gathering and citing information. Demonstrate how to use the site on an interactive whiteboard or with a projector, including showing the quick-start video. One of the advanced features of the site is the creation of groups. Share this with students who may be capable of using the feature to collaborate with others.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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ZoteroBib - Corporation for Digital Scholarship
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
Include this tool on all classroom computers and as a link on your class website for student use. This bibliography tool help students properly format their Works Cited pages. Use this tool to help keep your students (or even yourself) organized! Make sure you teach plagiarism lessons about paraphrasing and proper citation of sources, so students use this tool properly! As teachers, we need to be aware that such a tool exists, since savvy students may compile a "paper" without a logical thought pattern simply by clicking to include suggestions from ZoteroBib or other citation creation tools. The best strategy for such a tool is to show students how to use it well. Take the drudgery out of writing formal papers by emphasizing thinking over mechanics. Whether teaching beginning research or seniors in high school, introduce them to ZoteroBib. For younger students, seeing all the formatting and citing done correctly, from the beginning, makes sense whether it is the body of the writing or the bibliography. With either age group, give lessons about each part of a paper or letter. Demonstrate on an interactive whiteboard and think out loud as a group to pull together ideas, sources, quotes, and more to support an argument and build a paper. You can use it, too, when you write for your graduate program. Since you can choose from MLA, APA, or Chicago Style, you do not have to worry about memorizing punctuation and double checking the format.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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