Image Map

Monday, November 9, 2015

How to Lock an Object in Place on an ActivInspire Flipchart

Interactive flipcharts are a fun way for students to stay engaged during a whole-group lesson. But sometimes you want certain parts of your flipchart to stay locked in place so students don't waste time trying to move them. 

For instance, in the flipchart page below, I wanted kindergartners to drag items from the bottom into a box at the top to make a sink or float prediction. However, I didn't want students to be able to move the blue or pink boxes, so I locked them in place.



To lock something in place, right click on the object, and then click "locked," as shown below:

You can also use this keyboard shortcut: Control + Shift + L
As long as you are in presentation mode {the blue box in the top, right corner of your screen, as shown below}, the object will not move.


When you are ready to re-design your flipchart and need to move that object, just click the blue square in the top corner and change it to design mode {red}, as shown below:


Tuesday, November 3, 2015

8 Ways to Quickly Share Links with Students

It can sometimes be challenging to share links {especially long ones} with students, but here are 8 ways to share that will make your life easier.




1. Canvas
A group of CISD employees is piloting Canvas this year. If you're part of the pilot group, Canvas is a great way to share links with your students!


2. Link on your website
CISD staff members already have a pre-built website to customize and store links. For everyone else, I recommend Weebly (a free, super-easy, drag-and-drop website builder).

Teach your students to navigate to your website for everything {they'll get quicker with more practice!}, or save your website on the home screen as an "app" on iOS devices.


3. AirDrop


I've found this to be the fastest way to share anything across newer iOS devices. {Learn more about AirDropping here.} Keep in mind that AirDrop only works for the following devices: iPhone 5 or higher, iPad 4 or higher, iPad mini or higher, iPod Touch 5th generation or higher.


4. Symbaloo
This free tool lets you store a collection of links all in one place. {Click here to read more about Symbaloo.} 

While there is a free iOS app available, downloading it on student devices isn't necessary. My favorite way to share a Symbaloo with students is to link a QR code to the Symbaloo and let students scan when needed. I did this for a webmix of quick EdTech instructional videos for students, and it worked really well. You can also save a webmix of student links on an iOS device screen as an "app."


5. QR code
There are a ton of QR code generating websites and apps, but my favorites are this website and this app. It's easy to print a few sheets with QR codes to all the class links and hang them around the room for quick student access.


6. Seesaw

Seesaw is a free ePortfolio tool that is perfect for the K-12 world {particularly K-4}. One of Seesaw's features includes the ability to drop a link into each student's journal/portfolio so students can access it with one click. Click here to read more about the linking feature in Seesaw, and click here to read my blog post series about Seesaw.


7. Google docs
Create one Google doc or sheet that houses all your classroom links {if using docs, consider creating a Table of Contents}, and share with students.


8. Google Tone


Personally, I have yet to get to try this method, but it sounds promising! Google Tone is a Chrome extension that allows users to send a link wirelessly to other computers with Tone installed. Click here to read more about Google Tone.


Tweetable:



Resources

Thursday, October 29, 2015

Guess My Number Activity

First grade students at one of my campuses have had a lot of fun playing ABCya's "Guess the Number" game. Ashley, one of the teachers on that first grade team, had a cool idea to let the students create their own "guess the number" game using Seesaw and Shadow Puppet, so she called me in to brainstorm during her conference period. 

{Side note: next to teaching the kids, this is my favorite part of my current position. If you are at one of my campuses, please don't hesitate to ask me to collaborate!}

The lesson we came up with sounds like lots of fun {I'm super-excited to help teach it to her kids tomorrow morning!}, so I thought I'd share! 

The Big Idea:
Students pick a number and give clues to their peers and parents to try to help the audience guess the number. 

Apps Used:
  1. Whiteboard Lite
  2. eGourd {optional but fun!}
  3. Shadow Puppet Edu
  4. Seesaw

Steps to Take:

1. Open the Whiteboard Lite app. 

2. Draw a clue onto the whiteboard, like so:


3. Save that image to the camera roll, then clear the canvas.

4. Draw another clue onto the whiteboard, like so:

5. Save that image to the camera roll, then clear the canvas.

6. AirDrop a photo to your students' iPads. Background info: Ashley had actual [physical] tens and ones mats already laminated and was going to have students use base ten blocks to create their number. She mentioned something about how both the mats and the blocks they have are yellow, so it might be difficult for the audience to see. I suggested taking a picture of the mat, importing into Whiteboard Lite, and drawing base ten blocks on top of the picture with a darker color. That worked perfectly fine, but when I went to create my own example this afternoon {to be ready to help teach her students tomorrow morning}, I ended up just creating a digital "mat" myself since I didn't have her picture. This is the "mat" I came up with, if you'd like to use it in your lesson. :)

click to enlarge, then right click to save the image to your computer

7. Import the above-mentioned photo into Whiteboard Lite. Draw on it to represent the mystery number, like this:


8. Save the image to the camera roll. Optional: Create more clues in Whiteboard Lite, saving each clue to the camera roll.

9. Open the eGourd app. "Carve" the number into the pumpkin and save the image to the camera roll:


10. AirDrop students a blank background. {I did a Google search for a plain, black background and saved the image to my device.} They'll use this blank background in their slideshow to write the words, "Can you guess my number?"

11. Open the Shadow Puppet Edu app. 

12. Students can choose the 5 {or more} photos they just saved to the camera roll and import them into their Shadow Puppet Edu slideshow. 

13. Students will record their voice dictating the clues and save the video file to their Seesaw journal. Here's my example {click here for a larger video screen}:



Afterwards, students can view each others' work on Seesaw and try to guess the number {and students' parents can try to guess the number at home, too!}. 

The eGourd app is totally optional, but it's a fun way to add a little fall or Halloween festivity into the lesson. I'm so excited to try this with students!