Thinglink - Annotating Pictures and Videos

Thinglink for education is a platform for making your images come alive with video, text , images and Google tools. It is one of my favourite Web 2.0 tools. The great advantage of Thinglink is that you can integrate Google tools in the picture and still stay in the same platform without leaving it. Thinglink can be viewed well on a smartphone and is great for mobile learing and BYOD.

Watch this short tutorial on how to create a Thinglink:

 

Collaborating on a Thinglink
In this tutorial you will see how you can enable collaboration on a Thinglink interactive image. 

Adding Google Tools to Thinglink

Here is a very simple explanation how to add Google Tools to your Thinglink picture. Click here.

Creating a channel in Thinglink
A channel is a collection of a few interactive pictures. It's especially useful if a student wants to show his e-portfolio in order to show evidence of learning throughout the year. Teachers might find it useful when they show a collection of sites and pictures.






Application in the classroom:

See how you can create a project with Thinglink - hover your mouse over this picture to discover layers of information in it.




Thinglink is a great tool for doing collaborative projects and useful for alternative assessment. Not only can students create their own projects easily but also teachers can present materials in an interesting way! See how this elementary teacher used Thinklink to present her students with activities about clothes. Instead of giving the students a list of many websites, she gave a link to one picture
Thinglink is great for:

• projects
• Storytelling
• presenting information in a very aesthetic way
• BYOD
• mobile learning - great on mobile phones.
• great integration with Google tools. Students don't leave the platform.

-- 91 interesting ways to use Thinglink in the classrom.

You are welcome to write in the comments section below.

Tricider - A Brainstorming Tool

Tricider 

Tricider is a free brainstorming tool to collect ideas and reach a decision. Ask a question on Tricider, share and get ideas. People can propose ideas anonymously if they wish, add arguments and vote on the idea that they like best. There is no need for registration.

This is a short tutorial




Right below is a Tricider that I have opened so that we can practise and see how effective it is. You are welcome to share your opinions and add arguments. Click on Add new idea, add argument and you can click on the agree sign (thumb up icon) and finally vote. This is a direct link to it.




Application in the classroom:

• Teachers can use for brainstorming on a topic 
• Teachers can get feedback from students on different topics
• Teachers can present a dilemma and students share their opinions
• A great way to collect ideas quickly from teachers in staff meetings
• Students can suggest different endings to stories and then class votes on the best one
• Students can brainstorm ideas to create a shared project

You are welcome to add your comments in the comments section below.

Blogger - Updating Blogger from Email

Blogger is the easiest blog to use and update. One of the most useful features of Blogger is the ability to update Blogger via email.

How to email posts to Blogger ?

Log in to an administrator account for your Blogger blog.
Click the "Settings" tab and then click "Email." Scroll down to the "Mail-to-Blogger Address" section.

Enter a secret word in the Mail-to-Blogger Address box. The address is in the format of "username.secretword@blogger.com," where "username" is your Blogger username and "secretword" is the word you entered in the box.
Choose Publish email immediately or Save emails as draft post Save

How to email post to Blogger

Log in to your email.

Enter your mail to blogger address.

Compose mail normally. You can attach photos if you wish.

Click send to send your post to your blog.

Please comment in the comments sections below.

Google Spaces

Google has just released a new messaging and small group sharing app called Spaces. You can open a Space in the Spaces app or just login to spaces.google.com. 

What is Spaces?











Spaces is a place to have a conversation on a specific topic. You can create Spaces on diverse topics and add images, videos, and links. You may also open many spaces on different topics. It's a great way to share and collaborate with people.

What can you do with Spaces?

You can create a space for any discussion topic of your choice with just a single tap.

You can quickly invite people by sharing a link through email,  Facebook, or the Spaces app itself.

 Google Search, Google Photos and YouTube are built in. 

Any member of a space is eligible to post comment on the topic.

By quickly searching of keywords, you can find anything of your interest in Spaces.

Here is a tutorial on how to use Spaces

How to use Spaces in the classroom?

• A place for students to collaborate on a project.
• A place for brainstorming. A teacher asks a question and gets many ideas on a topic.
• A platform for submitting collaborative homework.
• A Space for students to collaborate with students from other countries.
• A Space for teachers to brainstorm on lesson plans

How else can we use Spaces? Join my Space to brainstorm.

This is a Space I have opened to share ideas on how to use Spaces in education. Click here to Join my Space.

If you would like to ask a question or comment, please write in the comments section below.

The Use of Instagram in Education

What is Instagram?
Instagram is a social network made for sharing photos and videos from a smartphone and commenting on them. There is no limit on the length of the comment. Do any of you use Instagram in the classroom?

We are always thinking of creative ideas how to encourage students to write. We can encourage students to write by using Instagram. Many of our students who are over 13 years old already use Instagram. Why not ask them to take a picture of their Purim costume, post on Instagram with the hashtag ‪#‎EnglishPurim16‬ (or any other hashtag that you decide) and write why they chose their costume, how they made it, how much it cost, etc.

Students will use their Instagram account to post Purim pictures anyhow...

How to Use It
1. I suggest you create a new Instagram account that is used exclusively for education purposes. The username that you choose should be professional and simple. A handle like @MsDanaCohenYud1 communicates the educational nature of the page. Ask your students to follow your account.

2. I also recommend that you keep your page public so that users and non-users of Instagram can access it from a mobile device or PC.

3. It's also a good idea to post a few interesting pictures for your students to view and read and comment from time to time...

4. Choose a hashtag # that identifies messages on a specific topic.

Application in the classroom:

• We often look for authentic ideas to teach English. What can be more authentic than sending pictures of things we like for example things we did on our holiday, our hobbies, a book we read etc...
• Students can send pictures and videos to a student who has been absent for a long time.
• Teachers can send pictures of interesting sayings and quotes on Instagram and ask students to express their opinions on them. See this one.
• Teachers can send items of grammar as explanation for example this one.
• Teachers can post a picture with a clue to a topic that will be discussed in the next lesson and students have to guess. This one for example.

These activities can be done when students are not in class. What is the incentive for students to participate? Students that participate can get a small prize, bonus points, a certificate or breakfast with the teacher/principal ( in my school, once a month, the principal eats breakfast with students that earned it).
Some good ideas on how to use Instagram in class are on this site.

Do you use Instagram with your students? If you do, please share in the comments section below. :)

Voice Typing

The users of Google Drive can use voice typing. This is a great help for LD students who find writing difficult. This only works in Chrome but it also works on most smartphones.

Watch this useful guide

Make sure that under File -- the language chosen is English. Short written instructions are here.
I have used voice typing and it works very well, my students really like using it.

Application in the classroom:

LD students and especially 07 students can use this tool to write projects and submit written assignments at home. They can also use it during class on their smartphones.

How to Copy a Google Doc

See how you can make a copy of a Google doc, in this link you'll find more information.



Let me know how you managed with it, write below in the comments.

Wordle

Wordle creates word clouds from text that you provide. Wordle is a powerful way to really get through to visual learners.

How to use Wordle:

• Select all of the text that you would like and then copy it to the clipboard.
• Go to http://wordle.net.
• Click on Create your own.
• Paste the text.
• Either use a screen capture program to obtain the Wordle as a graphic or save the Wordle in the public gallery and use the code provided in your blog or web page.

Applications in the classroom:

• students write a story/poem based on the Wordle
• teachers create a Wordle and review vocabulary that was previously taught
• as a pre reading exercise ask students to predict what the main ideas of the reading will be about based on a Wordle
• Find what ideas are most important in a famous speach/poem/story

If you have any other good ideas please write in the comments below.

Piclits for Creative Writing

Piclits is a great easy to use tool to encourage students to write creatively.  It revovles around attention grabbing images and word banks for writing a caption, a short paragraph or a short poem/story. Word lists are categorized by nouns, adjectives, adverbs, verbs and a universal list.

Piclits offers a fun way to learn new vocabulary and play with word forms and sentence structure.


See the full PicLit at PicLits.com


There are two options for writing: one is by dragging and dropping words unto the picture and the second is by clicking on the freestyle button. You can save and edit a Piclit if you sign up. If you don't sign up you can still save your Piclit by using the Snipping tool in windows (here is a short video explaining how to do it).


Application in the classroom:

• Students find a picture that relates to current events and write about it
• Students write a short poem 
• Students write events that happened before a story that they read
• Students write about a different ending to a story that they read
• Students create a slogan/banner for a campaign
• Students find a picture that relates to the way they feel and write about it

If you have any more ideas, write to me!

International Project on Epals

I have started an international email project using ePals and my 10th graders communicated both with students from Poland and the United States. I'll share a few points about it.

In order to be able to collaborate with other classes across the world, teachers need to use a site that will provide them a platform with which they can monitor their students' communication with a classroom that has the same interests as their own. In general, the most important thing is to find a teacher who shares similar interests, has the same age group students, and is available to work with you at the same time. One of the biggest sites for online collaboration is www.epals.com.

The projects can be done through email, Skype, a live chat, recording asynchronously (not at the same time) and by using different tools that are on the Net. In general, teachers need to pay attention to the difference in time zones if they intend to have live communication via Skype for example.

Class sizes should be more or less equal so that students can be matched to work in pairs with a student in the other country with whom they can exchange emails.

What can students write about? They can write about different cultures and holidays, describe their city/country/family, special foods, hobbies, the view from their living room window, a movie or book they have read, etc.

This is a tutorial that I prepared:

To learn more about how to use Epals click here.