IHMS Tech Tips

"In a  2014 article  published in the  International Journal of Speech-Language Pathology , Tiffany P. Hogan and others review the significant amount of research that indicates that “listening comprehension becomes the dominating influence on reading comprehension,” especially as children grow older."   Podcasting is audioblogging or audio broadcasting via the internet.  Students are responding so well to podcasts in the classroom because they are framed in a conversational tone, unlike audio books.   Listenwise is a site that houses shorter podcasts for student listening.  You log in with your Google account, and can search by content area or keyword to find a podcast to fit your curricular needs.  It even has a link where students can test their listening skills via Socrative.  Links to podcasts can also be posted to Google Classroom using the Listenwise feature: The site also has graphic organizers to correlate to each podc...

Wikipedia has long been stigmatized as the anti-source when it comes to research, but if you're like me, it's the first place you refer to when seeking answers.  And that's okay!  I have long held the belief that Wikipedia is an acceptable starting point when it comes to research.  It should not be the only point, however. First, some background information:  The name Wikipedia is derived from the Hawaiian word "wikiwki" meaning "quick" and the English word "encyclopedia".  The site is exactly that: a free site where anyone can quickly add content on any given topic.  It's understandable why it is FORBIDDEN by so many teachers, but I hope as you read on you might reconsider that.  When Wikipedia first came out in 2001, anyone could put anything on any site, and the pages were often "vandalized" with inaccurate content.  Times have changed, however, and nowadays each page is assigned to multiple editors and those editors are c...

A backchannel is a conversation that goes along with the primary lesson, discussion, or activity.  Some of you may already be using a similar tool to support your daily lessons, but for those of you that this is a new concept, read on!  Kahoot is one that most people are familiar with using, Socrative, and Padlet are other backchannel sites.  I will be talking about TodaysMeet. Neither students nor teachers need to have an account to use the site.  To create a backchannel conversation, a teacher would hop on the TodaysMeet site and give their room a name, and then *share their room's URL with the class. Students can then add responses to the room throughout the lesson as they think of them.  You decide when the room closes down, so if you want to keep it open after school hours for homework, you have that option. *Consider using the new Google Tone extension to share the URL.  You can find it in the Chrome Web Store.  Everyone needs to have the ext...

A blendspace is an online tool where multiple digital tools are combined into one interactive lesson.  For example, in one lesson, students would watch a YouTube video, view a slide deck in Google Slides or PowerPoint, complete an online quiz, and answer questions in a Google Doc.  This is an extreme example, but the possibilities are endless! TES Teach with Blendspace is a platform/template that offers these types of lessons.  It's compatible with Google, so signing up for an account is simple- you simply select "log in with Google."  There is already a Lessons Library if you want to dip your toe in with your students with a pre-made lesson, or you can dive right in and create your own. To create a lesson, the process is very seamless.  You can drag and drop into the template or search from any number of sources such as YouTube, Google Drive, Google Images, Dropbox, etc. The lessons you create can then be shared with your students via Google Classroom, e...