Arts Education

One of my favorite student response systems is The Answer Pad .  This week The Answer Pad released a new version of itself, a sleeker and cleaner interface with some excellent new features.  I participated in the beta testing and am anxious to start regularly using this new version of a great tool.  The color scheme and graphics look new and fresh, but those changes are just the beginning.     Here's what you can look forward to: Log in to the new version and you are greeted by a new home screen with six choices - set up answer sheets, interactive, reports, portfolio, library or news.  I clicked on Interactive first because that is the way I like to use TAP best.  Here you can send out screens for students to answer the questions you ask on-the-fly during lessons.  There are some significant changes here.  First, a new option for Quick Connect means that students no longer need accounts to use this tool.  Now they can use a 5 letter...

I have written about how much I like using Nearpod several times before today.  Nearpod is a presentation platform combined with a student response system.  Plus, Nearpod has a  feature that allow teachers to keep tabs on whether or not students are participating in the class or checking their twitters - a small persons icon that turns red when someone leaves the herd.  This is a major plus, especially with teachers who are hesitant to try some webtools for fear that students will disappear into the internet and never look back to the day's lesson. One of the things I like best about Nearpod is how responsive they are to the needs of teachers.  With webinars and lots of help available, a content store for ready-made lessons, and features that improve as teachers give feedback, it is obvious that they appreciate teachers.  To celebrate Teacher Appreciation Week, Nearpod is offering some lessons for free in their content store .  Each week between now...

On Friday, during our 5 minute class change between second and third periods, I saw a tweet about a tool called Quizizz that I hadn't heard of.  Intrigued, and still during the class change, I quickly searched and read about the tool.  It was one of the fastest and easiest tools to use I have ever tried; my third period class played it at the beginning of class. Press the green Get Started button to do just that.  I searched for quizzes about the topic I was quizzing on Friday, acid and base theories.  I found several that, when previewing the questions, looked like the right content, but you can also write your own quizzes.  I  clicked on the title of the quiz and arrived at a screen where you can play the quiz or duplicate it to make changes to the questions.  If you press Play, you have a chance to add or remove 5 features -- jumble the order of the questions, show the leaderboard, show answers at the end, time the questions, and show memes after ...

A station rotation in my classroom usually means students are moving through a series of experiments in the lab in order to experience different aspects of a chemistry concept.  Every student completes the same stations, everyone has the same experience.  During my unit on chemical kinetics, I used a stations experience to deliver content in a slightly different way. Students were assigned a reading assignment about potential energy diagrams, activation energy, and heat of reaction through Actively Learn .  As part of the reading, they also watched this short video about the concept.  The next day in class they logged into their Schoology accounts to take a brief, 5-question assessment.  Based on their performance on the assessment, they were assigned a menu of 4 different stations.     Here's what was on the menu: Direct instruction with me about what potential energy diagrams show us A tutorial from the Wake Forest University Chemistry De...