Sunday, January 26, 2014

Delicious

                                                                  Delicious icon:  Inline image 3

I hope everyone enjoyed the long weekend!  Today's tip is about the app, Delicious.  Delicious is a free, Chrome Extension that saves and organizes your links.  Looking for a central location to store your reference tools and educational sites?  A site at your fingertips for quick and easy access? Delicious is for you!  Delicious allows you to tag your links so you can find a great site even if you can't remember them!  For instance, if you tag or label a site 5th grade, division, or teacher resource, at a later date when you are looking for a site with great resources for division, you can find it quickly.

The Delicious icon will appear in the top right corner of your browser.  If you find a site you like, just click on the icon and Delicious will automatically add the link.  You can tag by subject area and mark as private or public. When planning lessons and looking for some ideas or resources, you can search using a key word, tag name or username.  You can search within your own resources or search sites open to all Delicious users.  

Delicious is another great tool for organizing your resources!  

A peek at Delicious.......
Inline image 1  Inline image 2

Feedspot & Feedly - RSS Readers

Here's a great item to add to your ToDoist.....RSS Readers use the standard web feed to bring you the most up to date information from your favorite sites, blogs, or news headlines.  The RSS Reader collects recent posts and articles of interest for you and streamlines them in one location.  Today, I am highlighting two RSS Readers:  Feedspot and Feedly.  Feedspot will send you a daily email (if you wish) with your newsfeed.  Both readers are user friendly and will help you build your personal learning network by keeping you up to date on the latest ideas, thoughts and experiences in your field of interest.  




Dan Meyer referenced Feedly during our Professional Development on December 2.  We have attached his tutorial on Feedly to our Westwood Educational Technology Website.  

Todoist

Happy New Year!  Time for a fresh start, new energy and re-organizing!  If your New Year's resolution is to be more organized this year, check out ToDoist. 

ToDoist is a free Google Extension (available in the Chrome Web Store).  This electronic "to do list" icon will appear to the right side of your Google Search Bar.  You can prioritize, set reminders group projects and manage your tasks in one location.  Found a great article but no time to read it?  ToDoist will link directly to your article! You can also add emails to your to do list directly from your Gmail account, reminding you to respond or complete email related tasks.


Check out this brief video for more ToDoist tips!  (Video provided by 1st Productivity.)

Think how great you will feel as you check off each task!






Awesome Screenshot

I hope you had some time to explore the Chrome Web Store.  Awesome Screenshot is a great extension which can capture your screen.  You can also annotate, embed images or any document and then annotate on top of it.  This screenshot capturer tool allows you to capture the visible part of your screen, all of your document or just a selected area.  

Why would you ever need Awesome Screenshot?
  • show your ITC what is happening on your computer screen!
  • emphasize a specific piece of s student's writing or an article
  • sharing on your blog or website
  • demonstrate for a student or parent 
  • much more!

Inline image 1

Thursday, January 23, 2014

Chrome Web Store

The Chrome Web Store is Google’s online marketplace for Chrome extensions, apps and themes.  Extensions are useful features that you can easily add to Google Chrome.  Extensions let you customize your Google Chrome with features that are of specific interest to you. The Chrome Web Store includes specific categories such as Education or Teacher and Admin Tools.  Most extensions are available free or for a small fee.  


I will highlight specific Chrome Extensions in future Tuesday Tech Tips.  For now, do some window shopping and exploration in the Chrome Web Store.  You may find just the right tool for you!

Downloaded extension icons will appear the top right corner of your browser.  Just a click away!

Google Community



I'm sure yesterday's professional development workshops were filled with reflection and growth.  But sometimes professional development workshops do not leave enough time to share experiences, best practices or challenges.  Looking for a way to connect with your grade level colleagues?  Check out Google Community!  You can share ideas, experiences or brainstorm together.

Video Tutorial



Explain Everything

Looking for a quick and easy way share your students' work.  Explain Everything is an app which allows you to create presentations, movies, and interactive lessons.  Students can import pictures, annotate or record on-screen drawings. Explain Everything is a user-friendly interactive whiteboard which also records via the iPad microphone.  This app is appropriate for all grade levels.


Possible lessons:
  • Annotate and explain the life cycle
  • Record poetry or story correlating with students' graphics
  • Students can create mini tutorials to share math strategies
  • Unit projects/assessments
  • Categorizing nouns, shapes, spelling patterns, animals, etc.

2MM Thanksgiving Is.......mp4
Sample Math Strategies.mp4

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Smore


Today's tip is about a free resource called Smore.  Smore is an electronic poster which students can create to publish or share information.  Our fifth graders created book reviews.  As well as their review, they have embedded images, links to the author's website, book trailers and more. These book reviews are now on a website and will be shared across the district and in the public library. Fourth graders may create a Smore for the Regions Unit or persuasive writing.  Smore is very user friendly.  The possibilities are endless!  Let me know if you are interested in Smore.  

Tip Introductions

Each Tuesday, I will send out a quick Tech Tip.  These tips may pertain to Google changes, curriculum project ideas, app and extension resources, and much more.  If there is anything in particular you would like me to focus on or a resource you want to share, please let me know.