EdTech Shorts

Are you an educator looking to “up” your technology usage in the classroom? Are you too overwhelmed with the daily grind of teaching to look for simple tips to help you do this? Well, EdTech Shorts is the podcast for you. We believe that it should always be about working smarter, not working harder. If you do too, then join us each week for quick and simple edtech tips to up your game in the classroom. And check out our back catalog of shorts, follow links, and support options at EdTechShorts.com.

As educators we often encounter those times when multiple students across the classroom have their hand up waiting for assistance. It is extremely hard at times to keep track of whose hand went up first or even what order they all went up over all. ClassroomQ is a product that helps to eliminate this problem from your classroom. Teachers simply signup, login, create a session, and share their class code with the class. Student head to classroomq.com/students and enter their name and the class code. Now they simply press the button on their screen when assistance is needed. There are both free and paid versions of ClassroomQ. The free version allows up to five students to be waiting in the queue at a time. The paid version ($19.99/year) ups this to unlimited and allows you to export the session data at the end to help with understanding student participation and success along with your own classroom management. There is also a school version available for purchase as well. Head over to their website and try out this tool in your classroom. Also give them a follow on Twitter @theclassroomq.

As educators we often encounter those times when multiple students across the classroom have their hand up waiting for assistance. It is extremely hard at times to keep track of whose hand went up first or even what order they all went up over all. ClassroomQ is a product that helps to eliminate this problem Read More

Flipgrid has published a list of Do’s and Don’ts for getting started using Flipgrid in your classroom. Do’s Do read Flipgrid’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use Do follow your school policies around using the application and sharing with other schools Do clean up the student content when you no longer need it or if Read More

If you are looking to enhance your classroom experience for your students through social media, here are some quick dos and don’ts in that practice: Dos Do use separate personal and professional social media accounts. Putting a boundary between school and personal life is good for your career and less stress on you. Do make sure you Read More

If you are looking for a simple, easy to use, free place to design, publish, and host a website then you need to check out IM Creator. IM Creator makes is really simple to design a website from one of their many free templates that are responsive and intuitive. They provide free, premium, and commercial Read More

If you use Microsoft’s OneNote Class Notebook with your students and have encountered issues with the section permissions there is a simple fix for that. Mike Tholfsen (@mtholfsen) recently shared a link (see his Tweet here) that will allow you to quickly, and easily fix those permissions with the click of a button. Simply head Read More

Microsoft has created a new feature in OneDrive as a part of Windows 10. Auto-Save allows you to automatically redirect your documents, pictures, and desktop folders of your user profile to the cloud in OneDrive. It is easy to setup. Simply right-click on your OneDrive sync icon in the taskbar and choose settings. You’re looking Read More

In the classroom it is often difficult to ensure that ALL of your students are engaged and taking part in the class discussion. Our goal should be for all students to take part in the class discussion at some point during the class period. The larger issue is how to do that. Equity Maps is Read More

Microsoft’s recent update to version 1.7 of the Minecraft: Education Edition (M:EE) software has made it even easier for educators to incorporate the coding aspects into their Minecraft curriculum. Now that Code Builder is built-in to the M:EE software, students no longer need to run a separate program to learn and use Code Builder. They Read More

It’s the time of the year for a short break, but I also have a few announcements in regard to both the Randall Black Show and EdTech Shorts.

With Flipgrid’s recent addition of Guest Mode, Kristin and Joe Merrill, Flipgrid Ambassadors from Florida, shared some fantastic ideas for using Guest Mode in their classrooms that I wanted to highlight on EdTech Shorts. Speak To An Expert Family Homework Schoolwide Challenges #GridPals Thank a Veteran You can check out the blog post where they Read More

With Flipgrid's recent addition of Guest Mode, Kristin and Joe Merrill, Flipgrid Ambassadors from Florida, shared some fantastic ideas for using Guest Mode in their classrooms that I wanted to highlight on EdTech Shorts. Speak To An Expert Family Homework Schoolwide Challenges #GridPals Thank a Veteran You can check out the blog post where they share these ideas here: Welcome to Flipgrid, Guest Mode. You can find Kristin and Joe both on Twitter, and I would recommend adding them to your PLN if you have not already.

This past summer Flipgrid introduced the Grid Launchpad and it allowed users to tailor their grid security settings to be unique to their own learning community. Parents have wanted to see what their students were doing on Flipgrid, but could not do so in a way where the educator still had control. Now Flipgrid has Read More

This past summer Flipgrid introduced the Grid Launchpad and it allowed users to tailor their grid security settings to be unique to their own learning community. Parents have wanted to see what their students were doing on Flipgrid, but could not do so in a way where the educator still had control. Now Flipgrid has introduced Guest Mode to help with this problem. Guest mode can be turned on within the topic settings for any topic. Guest mode is granted with a unique guest code. Educators can control whether guests can have view-only access or the ability to view and respond. Educators can share out that code however and to whoever they want and can revoke that code at anytime to remove guest access. A QR code can also be generated to allow guests to scan and have access. If an educator allows guests the ability to respond they will be prompted to enter their first and last name. They also have the option to require an email address be provided as well. Once that information is entered they will be launched into the same recording interface that students know and love.

Microsoft has now integrated their Immersive Reader into Flipgrid. The Immersive Reader is a part of Microsoft’s Learning Tools accessibility tools for the classroom. It allows you to break down a text for students with learning difficulties. Students can begin using the Immersive Reader immediately on any topics. They simply click on the Immersive Reader Read More

Microsoft has now integrated their Immersive Reader into Flipgrid. The Immersive Reader is a part of Microsoft's Learning Tools accessibility tools for the classroom. It allows you to break down a text for students with learning difficulties. Students can begin using the Immersive Reader immediately on any topics. They simply click on the Immersive Reader icon (it looks like a book with a speaker on it) and press the play button to hear any text of the topic played back for them.

If you are looking to enhance your classroom experience for your students through social media, here are some quick dos and don’ts in that practice: Dos Do use separate personal and professional social media accounts. Putting a boundary between school and personal life is good for your career and less stress on you. Do make sure you Read More

Today’s EdTech Shorts features Kasey Bell (Twitter, Website) sharing her 4 C’s Learning Menu. This is a tremendous tool for helping your students share their learning while exploring the 4 C’s (Creativity, Communication, Collaboration, and Critical Thinking). You can quickly access the 4 C’s Learning Menu at http://shakeup.link/4cmenu. Give Kasey a follow on Twitter, check Read More

Today's EdTech Shorts features Kasey Bell (Twitter, Website) sharing her 4 C's Learning Menu. This is a tremendous tool for helping your students share their learning while exploring the 4 C's (Creativity, Communication, Collaboration, and Critical Thinking). You can quickly access the 4 C's Learning Menu at http://shakeup.link/4cmenu. Give Kasey a follow on Twitter, check out her website, and be sure to listen to her on The Google Teacher Tribe podcast with her co-host Matt Miller (Twitter, Website).

Recently on the House of #EdTech Episode 119, friend of the show Chris Nesi (Twitter) shared his list of tips for making great instructional videos. I wanted to quickly share those with you on this episode of EdTech Shorts. Chris’ lists is: Forget the headset Keep it short Prepare well and then wing it Position Read More

Recently on the House of #EdTech Episode 119, friend of the show Chris Nesi (Twitter) shared his list of tips for making great instructional videos. I wanted to quickly share those with you on this episode of EdTech Shorts. Chris' lists is: Forget the headset Keep it short Prepare well and then wing it Position the camera above your eyes Location, location, location Move it out Look right at the camera lens Cover your screen Say “cheese” Avoid overdoing it You can hear his full commentary on each of these tips over at http://chrisnesi.com/119.

Previously on EdTech Shorts we looked at Google’s student selection tool in the Classroom App on Android. On this episode we’re going to look at some other random student selection tools. Richard Byrne at Free Technology For Teachers recently shared a few random selection tools in his post about the update by Google to include Read More

Previously on EdTech Shorts we looked at Google's student selection tool in the Classroom App on Android. On this episode we're going to look at some other random student selection tools. Richard Byrne at Free Technology For Teachers recently shared a few random selection tools in his post about the update by Google to include a student selection tool. Here they are: Random Name Picker Flippity.net Random Name Selector from Primary Technology (Demo on YouTube)

Google has made a new tool available in their Classroom Android App to make it easier for you to randomly select students from your roster and keep track of the students you have, or have not, called upon in class. It is really easy to use. To get started you open you class, tap on Read More

Google has made a new tool available in their Classroom Android App to make it easier for you to randomly select students from your roster and keep track of the students you have, or have not, called upon in class. It is really easy to use. To get started you open you class, tap on the “people” button at the bottom of your class, and then tap the “Random Name” selector on the top of the next screen. The random name selector lets you mark a student as absent if they are not there. You can select “Call Later” if you need to pass on that student for some reason. You can also mark when a student has been called upon so that you won't see their name again until after everyone else in the class has been called upon.

On October 8, 2018 Google announced a new feature that a lot of educators are going to love. Automatic, real-time captioning is now available in Google Slides. If you are presenting in full-screen and have a microphone connected to your computer, you can enable the captioning feature and Slides will display captions of your speech Read More

On October 8, 2018 Google announced a new feature that a lot of educators are going to love. Automatic, real-time captioning is now available in Google Slides. If you are presenting in full-screen and have a microphone connected to your computer, you can enable the captioning feature and Slides will display captions of your speech in real-time on the bottom of your slides. Currently the feature is only available in the Google Chrome web browser and in US_English. Google noted that captions may not be accurate if you do not speak clearly, have a distinct accent, or there is a lot of ambient noise in the room. Having a microphone (like the ATR-2100, Sampson Q2U, or a decent lapel mic) will make it easier for the computer to pick up your voice and produce those captions. This will help you to make presentations more accessible to your students. For hearing impaired students the captions help them to follow along in class as your present content; but can be valuable for students with a hearing impairment by making it easier for them to follow along and take notes based on your presentation and your lecture.

In starting off the new school year, Microsoft has announced some new features for OneNote Online to enhance creativity, productivity, and collaboration. Insert from Camera – This feature is extremely popular in the Windows 10 OneNote App and has now been imported into OneNote Online. To use it, simply choose Insert -> Camera and the Read More

In starting off the new school year, Microsoft has announced some new features for OneNote Online to enhance creativity, productivity, and collaboration. Insert from Camera – This feature is extremely popular in the Windows 10 OneNote App and has now been imported into OneNote Online. To use it, simply choose Insert -> Camera and the image will be placed on the current page. Emoji Keyboard – Students will love this new features. Simply go to Insert -> Emoji to see a small sample of the available emojis. To see the full emoji keyboard, click “More Emojis” from the bottom of that menu. Autocorrect – You have the ability to control the autocorrect functions in the Windows 10 and Office 2016 apps, but not in OneNote Online. Click Home -> Spelling -> Autocorrect and you can now edit your settings for autocorrect and auto format options. Copy a Link to Section – You had the ability to copy and paste a link to a page in OneNote Online to link between pages quickly and easily. Now you can right-click on a section and do the same. OneNote Online recognizes those links when pasting and will format them down to a much smaller hyperlink, rather than the huge amount of text actually copied. These new features were announced on Oct. 3, 2018 and should be rolled out to 100% of OneNote Online users in the coming days or weeks.

Are you an educator using Microsoft’s Teams to manage your course content and assignments? Did you know that you can now build grading rubrics directly in the Teams interface? To build a rubric, simply create a new assignment. Click the + Add Rubric button. Fill-in all the criteria and point values for your rubric. Then Read More

Are you an educator using Microsoft's Teams to manage your course content and assignments? Did you know that you can now build grading rubrics directly in the Teams interface? To build a rubric, simply create a new assignment. Click the + Add Rubric button. Fill-in all the criteria and point values for your rubric. Then press the Attach button to add it to your assignment. Assign the assignment to your students and they will now see the rubric as part of the grading criteria and know what you will be grading for. You can use the rubric to score their assignments quickly and easily with it's “Click to Select” interface all while not leaving the Microsoft Teams interface.

Are you a math teacher looking for a way to create online assessments with the tools provided to you by Microsoft as a part of Office 365? You can now build a math assessment in Microsoft Forms. It is really easy to build your quiz. First navigate to https://forms.office.com and login using your Office 365 Read More

Are you a math teacher looking for a way to create online assessments with the tools provided to you by Microsoft as a part of Office 365? You can now build a math assessment in Microsoft Forms. It is really easy to build your quiz. First navigate to https://forms.office.com and login using your Office 365 Education credentials. Next click New Quiz to get started. Click on the Add Question button to create your first question and pick either Choice or Text for the question type. To display the equation editor, click on the ellipses (…) and then click Math. Click in the Enter an equation text box and a virtual math keyboard will appear for you to input your equation. If you picked Choice for your question type, some equations will trigger a correct answer suggestion automatically. Simply click on it to add it to the list of possible answers.

Students and teachers often times struggle to remember the various formats for citations of sources they may be using for work in their classes. Today on EdTech Shorts, we’ll look at a few options for creating citations of your sources using Chrome Extensions. Apogee (Link) Apogee is a citation maker that will cite your source Read More

Insert Learning (Chrome Extension) saves teachers and students time while keeping students engaged. Teachers can insert questions, discussions, and insight directly into any website. When students go to that website, they can respond to those questions and discussions, see that insight, and take their own notes. Here are some tips on how to use Insert Learning: Read More

Insert Learning (Chrome Extension) saves teachers and students time while keeping students engaged. Teachers can insert questions, discussions, and insight directly into any website. When students go to that website, they can respond to those questions and discussions, see that insight, and take their own notes. Here are some tips on how to use Insert Learning: Click on the extension button to make the toolbar appear. This button has the Insert Learning logo and is located at the top right of your window. To insert a question, click on the question icon on the toolbar and then click on a paragraph. Inserting a question within an article is a good way to assess what your students are learning as they read. To insert a video, the first step is to insert a sticky note. To do so, click on the sticky note icon on the toolbar and then click on a paragraph. After inserting a sticky note, either paste in a YouTube link or an embed code from another video provider. Inserting a video is a good way to address different learning styles in your classroom. As the previous tip suggests, you can also insert other interactive items with sticky notes by pasting in an embed code. Again, interactive items are a good way to address different learning styles. To insert a discussion, click on the discussion icon on the toolbar (looks like two speech bubbles) and then click on a paragraph. Inserting a discussion is a good way to have students learn from each other. To highlight text, click on the highlight icon on the toolbar (some people think it looks like a pencil) and then select the text you want to highlight. You can add a comment to a highlight by clicking on the plus that appears when you first make a highlight or whenever you click on the highlight. Similarly, you can change the color of a highlight by clicking on the paint brush that appears when you first make a highlight or whenever you click on the highlight. Students can also highlight text and insert sticky notes. Having them annotate like this can be a good way to assess what they are learning. If there are student annotations available to view, a button will appear at the top left of your screen with an icon that looks like a group of people. Click on this button and then select a student to view their annotations. When you have a student selected, you'll even see what they annotate in real time. To assign your lesson to a class, click on the Insert Learning logo on the toolbar and then click on the class you want your lesson assigned to. Once your lesson is assigned to a class, every student enrolled in that class will be able to see the things your inserted into the article. During the assigning process, you can choose to share your lesson to Google Classroom. Below the list of your classes, is a button that says “Share to Google Classroom.” Click on that button, select the classes from Google Classroom you wish to share to, and then click the button that says “Share to these classes.” After doing this, a link to your lesson will appear in Google Classroom. Also, if you haven't already imported your class, this process will import your roster from Google Classroom into Insert Learning. Use Insert Learning (Chrome Extension) to turn any website into an interactive learning experience!

If you are looking for a way to connect and collaborate with other educators, find trainings and lessons for your classroom, and earn badges and certificates to better your skills with technology in the classroom; then you need to check out the Microsoft Educator Community. Some of the awesome things on the Microsoft Educator Community: Read More

If you are looking for a way to connect and collaborate with other educators, find trainings and lessons for your classroom, and earn badges and certificates to better your skills with technology in the classroom; then you need to check out the Microsoft Educator Community. Some of the awesome things on the Microsoft Educator Community: Microsoft Innovative Educator (MIE) MIE MIE Expert MIE Trainer Skype Master Teacher Earn badges Certificates for CE Credit from Course Completion Courses on Various Topics that are FREE Office 365 OneNote Sway Apps Surface Devices Windows STEM Minecraft Skype in the Classroom Pedagogy Skype in the Classroom Community Virtual Field Trips Guest Speakers Lessons Online Collaboration Mystery Skype Lesson Plans and Video Tutorials Connect and Share with Other Educators School Leader Toolkit Higher Education Signing up is easy with a Microsoft Account or an Office 365 Account.

How do we get Minecraft: Education Edition? West Virginia If you’re an educator in West Virginia then you may be aware that in June of 2018, the West Virginia Department of Education was able to license Minecraft: Education Edition (M:EE) for ALL (approximately) 300,000 users in our Office 365 tenant. All users have successfully been Read More

Previously on EdTech Shorts we shared Tozzl as a replacement for the recently shut down Today’s Meet. On today’s episode we’ll be hearing about another free alternative call Yo! Teach. To share this tool with us is Chris Nesi (Twitter, Website)from the House of #EdTech podcast. He recently featured this tool as his #EdTech Recommendation Read More

Previously on EdTech Shorts we shared Tozzl as a replacement for the recently shut down Today's Meet. On today's episode we'll be hearing about another free alternative call Yo! Teach. To share this tool with us is Chris Nesi (Twitter, Website)from the House of #EdTech podcast. He recently featured this tool as his #EdTech Recommendation on Episode 117 of his show. On this same episode he had a great conversation with his son Miles, looking at education from a “first-grade perspective.”

In addition to announcing that Flipgrid was now 100% free in June, Flipgrid has listened to feedback from it’s users and made some awesome updates. Grid Launchpad With Grid Launchpad now released, passwords are no longer needed to setup your grid for your community. There are various ways to do so. School E-Mail Domain Use Read More

Flipgrid has published a list of Do’s and Don’ts for getting started using Flipgrid in your classroom. Do’s Do read Flipgrid’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Use Do follow your school policies around using the application and sharing with other schools Do clean up the student content when you no longer need it or if Read More

Flipgrid has published a list of Do's and Don'ts for getting started using Flipgrid in your classroom. Do's Do read Flipgrid's Privacy Policy and Terms of Use Do follow your school policies around using the application and sharing with other schools Do clean up the student content when you no longer need it or if you leave your school mid-year. Do be sure to collect consent forms from all students before onboarding them on the platform, completed by parents/guardians. Do comply with any student requests to take down Flipgrid content. Do let students know that the tool is for educational purposes only. Don'ts Don't share student information outside the classroom or the school. Don't use Flipgrid to request students to buy things (for example, don't encourage them to use Amazon to buy a book or download a paid app).

While doing some professional development recently on Flipgrid I was asked a couple of questions that I wanted to share here on EdTech Shorts. Can a student hide or delete a video? There are a few ways that a video can be hidden or deleted. If a student included their e-mail address when they submitted Read More

While doing some professional development recently on Flipgrid I was asked a couple of questions that I wanted to share here on EdTech Shorts. Can a student hide or delete a video? There are a few ways that a video can be hidden or deleted. If a student included their e-mail address when they submitted their response they will have gotten a confirmation e-mail. In that e-mail is a link to deactivate the video, giving them the ability to hide it from the grid, but the video is still available for the grid owner/educator. A grid owner/educator can go in and hide or delete a video from the grid as well. They simply access the Flipgrid Admin dashboard (https://admin.flipgrid.com), click on the Grid, then the Topic, and using the Actions dropdown they can choose to hide or delete an individual video that has been added to the topic. Can students upload a custom video? Flipgrid does provide some great tools that allow students to record video, pause while doing so, add stickers to selfies, and flip the camera to share the world around them. But yes, students have the ability to upload a custom video rather than record one in the native interface. To do so, students will: Access the topic their response will be posted to. Rather than click on the red record button they will click on the cog wheel next to it. Next they will click on Upload Video and select the video they wish to use. They will then follow the prompts and their custom video will upload in place of a recorded one. Flipgrid currently supports MP4, MOV, and WEBM video formats but has an upload file size limit of 250mb.

Not all students are 100% comfortable in front of the camera. Using Flipgrid can be hard for them. On this episode I am sharing tips for helping students who may be a bit camera shy (shared from Flipgrid’s own help pages (https://help.flipgrid.com/hc/en-us/articles/115003079854-Camera-Shy-Tips-for-all-Students). Use the moderation settings Cover the camera Use props to make them more Read More

Not all students are 100% comfortable in front of the camera. Using Flipgrid can be hard for them. On this episode I am sharing tips for helping students who may be a bit camera shy (shared from Flipgrid's own help pages (https://help.flipgrid.com/hc/en-us/articles/115003079854-Camera-Shy-Tips-for-all-Students). Use the moderation settings Cover the camera Use props to make them more comfortable Work in groups to allow collaboration Appsmash with other tools to produce custom videos to upload to Flipgrid Flip the camera on a model device to share something else while recording their voice Allow them to post with only their initials Create a Flipgrid recording booth

Flipgrid provides you with a great platform for students to practice digital citizenship and netiquette (net etiquette) in a protected, controlled environment. Melissa Dills (Twitter) created this amazing guide for students to help them follow Flipgrid Netiquette. Looking for video response and @Flipgrid netiquette for students. Couldn’t find much so I created this… Feel free Read More

Flipgrid provides you with a great platform for students to practice digital citizenship and netiquette (net etiquette) in a protected, controlled environment. Melissa Dills (Twitter) created this amazing guide for students to help them follow Flipgrid Netiquette.   Looking for video response and @Flipgrid netiquette for students. Couldn't find much so I created this... Feel free to change for your needs : ) https://t.co/hrLTZsGITc #FlipgridFever #DigitalCitizenship #edtech pic.twitter.com/t4Xvd88Y26 — Melissa Dills (@DillsMelissa1) February 7, 2018