Assisted Technology
Seeing AI – Microsoft – The most common use for Seeing AI in the classroom will likely be reading text — short, long, typed, or handwritten — for students who are blind or have a visual impairment. However, the multiple channels open up many possibilities for use in and out of the classroom. According to Commonsense.org: Seeing AI uses a combination of technologies to narrate text, people, objects, and scenes for blind or visually impaired kids. Main channels include a short text reader, document reader, scanner, and person identifier. Experimental channels include the scene, color, and handwriting readers. There are tutorials for every channel, but the tool’s not hard to figure out. Just choose a channel, point your device at what you’d like to hear narrated, and tap the screen or wait for the capture.
Rewordify – Teachers can use the website to scaffold reading tasks. Using a tiered model, teachers can enhance students’ comprehension by offering a variety of levels of the same text. According to Commonsense.org: Rewordify is a free reading and vocabulary tool for building reading fluency and vocabulary. Rewordify’s main feature is its automatic simplification of texts. Users import text by pasting it into the website or using a browser bookmarklet. Once the text is imported, it can be customized to make reading more accessible to a variety of learners. The website uses a computer-based natural language processing system to simplify the text while maintaining the meaning. The reading level can be changed at any time and aligns well with Lexile reading measures.
E-Book Software
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Educational Technology & Theories
Spiral – I think this tool would be very useful in the collaboration of students on projects and the data that is collected from informal, summative, and diagnostic assessments. I like the way teachers have the ability for instant feedback or the option of sending feedback to students independently at a later time. I also liked the ability for all students to answer a question; rather than just one student raising their hand. It gives all students a voice in the class and the teacher is able to see at a glance who is in need of additional information/guidance. The program also has a lot to offer in that it is not just a meeting board, or an online quiz, but also allows students to upload and view videos and create/present PowerPoint presentations. It is very interactive in that students can take over and make presentations.
Formative – I think this tool would be great for a flipped classroom approach. It tracks students in real-time and allows teachers to give instant feedback. Progress can also be tracked over time for both individual students and the full classroom. Formative easily integrates into Google Classroom. Teachers can upload their own documents, presentations, and videos; or select from a vast library of pre-made lessons. The Dashboards appear to be easy to navigate and retrieve data.
Mobile Apps
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Social Networking
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Software Support
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Technology Services
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Video Integration
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Spiral
Recommended for Grades 3-12
According to Commonsense.org: Spiral allows teachers to freely create learning activities that inspire the four C’s — creativity, communication, collaboration, and critical thinking — while promoting understanding and accountability. Teachers can quickly assess students’ understanding of concepts by asking open-ended questions and seeing all answers at once. Teachers can also ask a student to improve an answer with one click, enhancing the learning strategies of iteration and feedback. The ability to launch and populate learning activities within seconds prevents lost instructional time, though creating effective content will take a good amount of effort from teachers up front.
Formative
Recommended for Grades 3-12
According to Commonsense.org: There’s a remarkable opportunity for scaffolding here: Teachers can provide as many resources as they wish to support student learning. Students will love how easy it is to use the tool, no matter which device they have in hand, and teachers will love how the features for assignment creation, distribution, and feedback are all thoughtfully designed with the end user in mind. The growing library of premade assignments has potential to be a game changer, but teachers will have to spend some time digging through them to find the gems. Assignments cover a range of topics, and teachers can help curate quality content on the site by rating them. As with any assessment tool, this site’s learning potential is only as good as the teacher behind it, so it’s up to the teacher to design thoughtful lessons that demand meaningful engagement and thoughtful feedback.
Janeal Grosinger 