The tools that I chose to explore were snagit, flipgrid and voicethread. In addition to these three I have been regularly using edpuzzle in my classrooms and it is such a valuable tool. One thing I want to try at the beginning of the school year is to create some screencasts about different online procedures for my students and then import them into edpuzzle to embed some checks for understanding. I subbed in a classroom recently where the teacher knew that they were going to be absent and had created the entire lesson as a screencast with directions for the students to follow while the sub was there. It was an incredible lesson and she was not even in the room!
In my role as the technology coach on our campus, I utilized Snagit VERY often. I have the full version on my school desktop and it is SO helpful when creating tutorials for my students or help sheets. I can take a screenshot of my computer screen and lay arrows and callouts over the top of the image. I am so used to Snagit and since I have the full version, it is hard to compare other programs to it that are very limited. It is almost second nature for me to use it on my school computer. I have even learned how to create GIF's using Snagit. There was an Snagit chrome extension in the past that was really awesome but it has gone away. I love Alice Keelers QuickShare chrome extension which takes snapshots of your desktop and automatically imports them into you google drive and they are readily available to bring into any of the google suite products. Flipgrid seems like it is so popular among teachers that I follow online but I have yet to catch the "flipgrid fever" as they call it. I tried it once with my students and it had mixed reviews among my students. I designed a lesson for right after spring break where I am going to give it another try before I decide if I want to pay for the full version. Another goal that I have is to have student create screencasts or voice overs that demonstrate their knowledge. I think the tool I would choose to do this is screencastify since it is so simple to use on our school chromebooks. I also really enjoyed using voice thread on a recent project (thanks Emily!) and I am waiting for the perfect assignment/project to use it with. I think a video on flipgrid or a screencast is a perfect assessment to evaluate student learning. It takes a lot more effort for a student to be able to explain something verbally than to type it out. I think students need a lot more practice in this 21st century skill! One thing I have pondered for a while is creating a mini screencast for each day in class so that students who are absent or parents could quickly understand what is being asked of the students for the day and what content was covered. A 2 minute screencast could never capture all of the directions for a project but it is a lot better and probably faster than typing it out. I think that once parents and students got used to that format it would be really helpful and would eliminate a lot of confused students and parents.
4 Comments
Alicia Martin
4/6/2018 06:01:00 pm
I really loved using Voice Thread when I used it too. It is very easy to use and a great tool. I really like the idea of making a mini screen cast for students especially when students are absent. I had trouble with Snagit when I tried to download it. It started to download and then disappeared and I couldn't find where it went. I ended up giving up on it, but you are saying you really like it so maybe I'll try again.
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Jane Adams Gallagher
4/15/2018 08:53:28 am
I hadn't thought of using videocasts for days when a substitute will be present. That's a great idea that would help keep things consisitant instead of wasted time that can happen. One tool I really liked was ExplainEverything, but the free version was not enough. I could import images, add a voiceover and type if need be. Down the road I may purchase it if I'm going to use it more.
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joseph williams
4/15/2018 10:16:22 am
I really like your idea of using Flipgrid (or some other video/voice tool) as an assessment tool. My co-teacher and I have been talking about this lately as a way for students to show understanding that also allows for them to build verbal communication skills as well as comfort public speaking (even though it is digitally public). Let me know how students take to assessments using these tools.
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Diana Moore
4/15/2018 11:28:04 am
It is so cool to me that you and I seem like we teach using very similar techniques. I absolutely love using EdPuzzle as well. I was fortunate enough to attend CUE in Palm Springs a few years ago and that is where it was introduced to me. Each year it gets even better but I worry that someday they will start charging for their service. (As all of the really good sites eventually do). Thanks for your review of snagit, that sounds like something that I need to check out!
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