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Top *Other Websites I used in 2014

We all know about Teachers Pay Teachers and Pinterest… and we usually have those grade level appropriate blogs bookmarked, blessing the names of those individuals who are insanely good at writing and sharing their ideas—on a consistent basis. (Pointing finger at myself and shaking head.)

I decided to reflect back on 2014 and look at the websites I used that strayed from the go-to ones on my list.

1. Kahoot– This website allows you to create an online quiz, survey , or discussion on anything. I have used it weekly or bi-weekly to create a comprehension quiz on read aloud books. Once the quiz is created students log into kahoot.it (another kahoot website, but different address than the first link) on an iPad/laptop/desktop. My school has a one-to-one iPad program which makes this activity really convenient. It’s free to sign up. Make your own Kahoot today! You can also search kahoots other people have made for public use.

2. Google Images and Pixabay– I know, the first one listed here sounds weird, or like “duh”. But what I have recently discovered on Google images is that you can refine your searches to use pictures and images that are labeled for reuse, and I didn’t know that until a few months ago (oops). Once you search for an image you can click search tools, usage rights, and then labeled for reuse. There is also a site called Pixabay that has a lot of really beautiful and interesting photos, all available for use.

3. Handwriting Worksheets– I am not a huge fan of all the advertisements on this website… but it’s free! I believe that handwriting will never die, but man— do my students need a lot of help in this department. This website allows you to make several different kinds of handwriting worksheets. You can choose Print, D-Nealian, or Cursive for your students to practice. You can create letter, word, or paragraph form worksheets and you can include characters from languages other than English.

4. Sparklebox.co.uk– I am pretty sure I have talked about this website before, but I still think it is a hidden gem for some. I haven’t used this one as much this year as I have in the past, but it has a LOT of resources available.

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If you have some hidden, or not so hidden, websites you use for resources, please share in the comments. 

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Google Summit in Singapore

This weekend, I attended a google apps for education summit held by my school here in Singapore. It was pretty nice to have it hosted at my school campus! There were people from various schools in Asia here for the conference, plus a lot of amazing google presenters. Here are a few fun videos shown at our first keynote by Suan Yeo and some important nuggets of information from the workshops.




Two funny follow ups to that…

One of the workshops I attended was called Harnessing the Power of Youtube by Patrick Green, who is our middle school technology coordinator. Here is his link for the presentation:

Harnessing the Power of Youtube

He goes through the steps of how to create your own youtube channel and making your own youtube playlist! It was a really helpful and useful session. I really liked that he gave us time in the workshop to actually do some of the things he said.  So I updated my youtube channel profile and started subscribing to a few different educational youtube sites! Take a look:

Ms Kim’s Youtube Channel

One of the best ideas I heard today was using google forms as a way of assessing students. You can use them for short start-up/do now questions, and get the instant feedback. You can also use them for quizes and exit slips! I’m definitely going to try that with my students.

Learn with us by following the twitter #gafesummit and/or checking out the google summit’s resources pages. I have a few more technology related blog posts in my head to write this week! Stay tuned for more from the summit.

What are some ways you use google apps in your classroom?