20 Ways to Use ThingLink in Education

When I first learned about ThingLink late last summer, I was immediately impressed. My mind started racing about all the ways that ThingLink could be used by teachers, students and even beyond the classroom. If you’re not familiar with ThingLink, it makes images interactive. How do you make an image interactive? You upload a still image to ThingLink, and then you can add little icons on top of the image. Those icons become hyperlinks to other web media- websites, articles, videos, sound clips, and much more. Not only can you link to external content, but students can type their own responses onto an icon. I’ve embedded a ThingLink featured example by Molly below, so you can see it in action.

Now tell me that isn’t AWESOME?!

So, now that you’re hooked, what are some of the ways you could use ThingLink in your classroom? I’ve just included the tip of the iceberg below; the ideas are truly endless.

1. Have students create one for a summative assessment in place of a typical test.
2. Use a book cover image and have students include links about the book, characters, plot, etc. for an end of book project.
3. Use the image of a map, and include links with information about the area, like this one, or this one, or this one.
4. Use an image of a person or character and include links about their life and their important contributions to history or the topic being covered.
5. Include an image of a body system and include links about how it works. For example, the skeletal system.
6. Foreign language teachers (or ESL/ELL classrooms) could use an image of a familiar scene, like a family cooking in the kitchen, and include links to recorded sound clips about what’s going on in each part of the picture in the language being studied.
7. Create a “getting to know you” ThingLink using a group photo and include links to teacher’s websites, bios about seniors for senior night, etc.
8. Use it as a beginning of the year/course ice breaker by having students upload a picture of themselves and including links to content that describes them and things they like. Students can comment on one another’s published ThingLinks.
9. Search the database of ThingLinks others have created and shared to see if there’s already something out there you can use.
10. Create an entire lesson in one ThingLink, by including links to sound clip instructions, video content and links to assignments or quizzes.  See a great example here.
11. Use the image of a book cover and include a video link to the book trailer to preview the book before reading it.
12. Scan and upload an image of a worksheet, and include links to videos and websites that will help them solve the problems/answer the questions if they get stuck.
13. Have students create a portfolio by linking to their work in all other webtools you use in class: blog posts, videos they created, scanned images or pictures of non-digital work.
14. Depending on how big your school is, you could create and upload a map of your school. Then include a link over each classroom to information about that teacher, like their Twitter handle, class website, class LMS page(s), a written bio right in ThingLink, a recorded welcome sound clip from that teacher, etc.
15. Create an image collage, upload it to ThingLink and then include links about each image. For example, you could create a collage of different geographic land forms like this one.
16. Upload a picture of the periodic table of elements and include a link to a video or information about each element (or the ones you’re studying at the time). Sort of like the Periodic Videos site.
17. Include links to videos demonstrating how to preform certain skills, like this push up example.
18. Upload an image of your school and include links to information and videos about your school: clubs and activities you offer, your mission statement, academic offerings, promotional videos, and more. Then embed it on your school’s website!
19. Put a twist on Friday’s current events discussion by asking students to not only find an article, but find an image that relates to their chosen event/topic, upload it to ThingLink, include a link to the original article as well as other links, videos, etc. that relate to the article and what you’re studying in class. You could even ask the students to include a link to an audio recording of themselves discussing their current event.
20. Create instructions for a new website, device, or process like this one.

One of the things I like the most about this tool, is that no matter the project or access to technology, you can incorporate ThingLink into your class. You, as the teacher, could create one that students will use to preview/review information or complete an assignment. Students could work in groups or on their own to create one, depending on their access to technology and devices inside and outside of the classroom. If you have very little access to technology in your classroom and you still want students to create their own, you could assign individual students or groups pieces of the project to research and prepare. Then have the groups take turns adding their links to the full class ThingLink image. As you can see with how all over the board these ideas are, there are so many ways you could use this tool in an educational environment.

How are you using ThingLink with your students and in your schools? If you’re using it, please share a link to an example in the comments.

Tech To You Later!
-Katie

Learning to Drive

In February, our district will begin state testing.  Once testing begins, there will be at least one grade level in at least one school in our district testing every single school day until May.  This big span of time marks the third round of testing this year. We are not alone. Toss that around in your head for a minute or two.

I’ll spare you my soap box about too much testing and where the focus has gone in education; you likely feel the same way (if you’ve got some time, or you’re just as passionate as I am about these issues, I do suggest you head on over to Nancy Chewning’s blog response to TIME Magazine’s Rotten Apples article that was featured in the Washington Post).  However, it is worth mentioning for the point of this blog post that with so much time dedicated to state testing, which influences districts’ report cards and teachers’ evaluations, there obviously becomes a heavy focus on testing and preparing students for the test.

Teachers are working so hard not to teach to the test, while at the same time making sure students are as prepared as possible for the tests- the scores of which will directly impact their own livelihoods.

I’ve gotten a lot of questions the past few months for websites that teachers can use with students to help them practice the PARCC tests and the digital skills needed for these tests. Many students in our district have had very little experience with technology outside of the school building. Even inside the buildings teachers have to share carts, so it is possible for students not to use any devices for a day or more at a time. Teachers and administrators want students to practice skills like typing, using the trackpads, dragging and dropping, typing in text boxes, etc., so they are prepared for test day since they have had such limited experience with these skills. Many have asked for practice test sites, which mirror the actual tests in order to practice these digital test skills.

I wholeheartedly agree that students should be exposed to these types of activities before seeing it for the first time on a high-stakes test. But I do not think students should be practicing these skills alone, with the exception of learning to keyboard initially.

Take the following example. When you learned to drive, you learned what to do at a traffic light: red means stop, yellow means slow down (or speed up for some lead-footed folks), and green means go. You did not have to practice driving in a new city before you could actually drive there and navigate those traffic lights, right? You now apply your traffic light knowledge when you approach all traffic lights, even though they may not be on the exact streets where you initially learned to drive.

If I am creating a digital learning environment for my students to the best of my ability and with the resources available to me, at the very least they will have experience with text boxes, dragging and dropping, using a trackpad and more. If I’m a math teacher, I can create lessons where students are measuring the angles of a baseball field using a protractor and other digital manipulatives. If I’m an English teacher, I can have students use the TextHelp Study Skills add-on in Google Docs to highlight certain parts of speech in certain colors to practice using a highlighting tool. These examples would give students real experience using those specific tools on a regular basis- not just experience using them on a practice test question inside of a practice test.

Students will learn digital test skills when they are infused in instruction; those skills do not need to be practiced in isolation. When students are familiar with digital tools and skills in your classrooms, they will be able to navigate and use the tools on any assessment- even if they look slightly different. After all, we still know what to do at street lights when the colors are slightly brighter or more dull, the posts in which they hang on are higher or lower than what we’re used to, or the traffic lights are hung on a street post near the sidewalk or above the street, correct? Our memory recall kicks into action and processes what to do at the lights, even when they are slightly different from our own home towns. The same thing goes for using digital tools on assessments if we use them in daily/frequent classroom activities and then see them on an assessment.

We learn through experience. We apply what we know. We adapt when necessary.

So what do you think? Do you agree or disagree with me about practicing “digital test skills?”

Tech To You Later!
-Katie

5 EdTech Tools in 5 Minutes: Episode 8

Okay… so it’s less than six minutes!  During June and July (and almost August), I put the 5 in 5 screencasts on hold.  Well, it’s that time of year again.

By no means are these five minute episodes a comprehensive overview of the tools, but it should be enough to let you know what the tool is, what it can do, and if it’s worth your time looking into and learning more about. I’m all about helping teachers save time where they can!

This episode features the following tools:

1. ThingLink
2. NearPod
3. Remind
4. Print Friendly
5. One-Click Timer

For the videos, the Prezis, Diigo links to all the sites featured in the episodes and more, visit my website. If you don’t want to miss another episode, subscribe to the iTunes podcast channel here.

Tech To You Later!
Katie

5 EdTech Tools in 5 Minutes: Episode 7

It’s that time again: time for the next episode of 5 EdTech Tools in 5 Minutes.  Normally I feature 5 edtech tools, but this month I decided to do a spin on the normal screencasts.

This episode features 5 edtech books to read this summer! I won’t be creating a new episode in June or July, so I thought I’d share some of my favorite edtech books and some books on my own to read list.

This episode features the following books:

1. Untangling the Web
2. Web 2.0: How-To for Educators
3. Flip Your Classroom
4. Out of Our Minds: Learning to be Creative
5. Digital Leadership: Changing Paradigms for Changing Times

For the videos, the Prezi, Diigo links to all the books featured in the episodes and more, visit my website. If you don’t want to miss another episode, subscribe to the iTunes podcast channel here.

Tech To You Later!
Katie

Lunch & Learn: Teachers Spotlight EdTech Successes

April marked the last of this years monthly Lunch & Learns, where teachers were invited to bring their lunch to the library during their lunch bell on a designated Thursday each month.  I wanted the last session to spotlight some teachers throughout the building, and allow them to present some of their edtech success stories.  I’m happy to say that I had trouble narrowing it down to 4-5 teachers from each lunch bell!

Teacher presenters ranged from 5 to 40 years of experience teaching, and the tools they presented on also ranged in tech-ability level. I asked teachers to answer the following questions in an 8-10 minute presentation of the tool.

• What was the activity/project and how did you decide on having students use this particular tech tool? How was this different than the traditional project/activity you previously used? How would you change the project for future use?
• How much were you involved with setting up the technology portion of the project for students? How long did it take? How difficult was it?
• What were the results? How did this improve/enhance student learning? How did the students respond?
• If there is an opportunity to quickly interact with your tech tool, I’d like to do that with the teachers.

I filmed each of the teachers’ presentations and uploaded them into the corresponding Lunch & Learn resource folder on Schoology.  Teachers asked the presenters a lot of questions, and there was a lot of great brainstorming going on.  I know some teachers have already implemented some of these tools after seeing them presented at the Lunch & Learn.  A brief summary of each of the highlighted tools are below.

Word track changes/review tools– Word has a handy feature that allows you track your and student changes, add comments and more. This is a great way to grade papers, so your students can easily see all your comments and suggested changes. It’s also a great way to see peer-editing progress.

Screencasting– Screencasting records whatever you’re doing on your screen and you can also record your voice giving instructions. Screencast-o-matic (screencasting tool) allows you to download your video to your computer or upload your video to the their website or YouTube and share the link with anyone.

VoiceThread– VoiceThread is like an audio discussion board. You can upload a picture or even a PowerPoint presentation and record your voice over each slide. Students can create audio comments on each slide too. Both you and the students also have an inking option that is recorded/played back as you speak as well.

Weebly– Weebly allows you and your students to create websites/portfolios. It is an extremely easy platform to use. There is also a blog feature. You can manage your students sites and they can be password protected.

Symbaloo– Symbaloo is a visual bookmarking site. It’s an easier way to keep track of all your favorites and website resources for students.

Kahoot!– Kahoot is an awesome, interactive, quiz game. It’s similar to a BDubs trivia game; the less time you take to answer the questions, the more points you get. You can download the results to see what each student answered, how much time they took, etc. It’s really easy to set up and the kids LOVE it!

Wikispaces– Wikispaces has a great educational side to their wiki platform. Wikis are a great place for students to complete group work because you can track all the changes they make and students can work on the wiki from anywhere-they don’t have to be together. They have a project side to the wiki that allows you to put students into groups, and only those students have access to their group pages.  Wikispaces was highlighted at a Lunch & Learn earlier in the year and caught this teacher’s eye to implement.

Blogs– Our creative writing teacher showed off her student created blogs in WordPress and how she manages them.

Minecraft– Our Latin teacher talked about how letting his students use a tool they were comfortable with (and he was not) transformed an okay project into a really awesome experience. His students researched important buildings and places in Roman/Latin history.  Previously they had to create the building out of a clay, a diagram, a drawing, etc.  He allowed his students to use Minecraft and was blown away by the detail they were able to put into their creations.

Read about all the Lunch & Learns this year by clicking here. How do you spotlight teachers and encourage teachers from different subject areas to engage in conversations about best practices together?

Tech To You Later!
-Katie

5 EdTech Tools in 5 Minutes: Episode 6

It’s that time again: time for the next episode of 5 EdTech Tools in 5 Minutes (okay, okay, less than six minutes).  By no means are these five minute episodes a comprehensive overview of the tools, but it should be enough to let you know what the tool is, what it can do, and if it’s worth your time looking into and learning more about.  I’m all about helping teachers save time where they can!

This episode features the following tools:

1. OneTab
2. Weebly
3. Google’s search by reading level feature
4. IFTTT
5. Symbaloo

For the videos, the Prezis, Diigo links to all the sites featured in the episodes and more, visit my website. If you don’t want to miss another episode, subscribe to the iTunes podcast channel here.

Tech To You Later!
Katie

E-waste Recycling Poster Contest for #Digcit Day

As part of our school-wide Digital Citizenship Day on February 24th, all science classes had a research/poster contest (special thanks to one of our science teachers-Lauren Wulker- for the idea!).  The students were given a reading prompt and some guiding questions over the weekend and returned to DigCit day on Monday to talk about responsible disposal and recycling of electronic waste. The end goal is that the top poster(s) will be displayed somewhere in the building with a place to recycle electronic products like batteries and cell phones.

Students were able to team up with a couple of their classmates or work alone on their posters.  They were also allowed to create a poster on any material they wanted- poster board, electronic, etc.  Most chose to create theirs on an actual poster board or paper.  They were displayed in the library and teachers came in Tuesday and Wednesday to vote on their top three favorites.

I was so impressed by the results!  The following pictures are just the top 4-5 posters from each teachers’ classes.

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The top three winning teams received a pizza lunch from LaRosa’s.  And the winners are…(drum roll please)…

e-waste poster winner

e-waste poster winner

e-waste poster winner

How do you promote the responsible disposal and recycling of electronic waste is your school?

Tech To You Later!
Katie

5 Edtech Tools in 5 Minutes: Episode 5

With our school-wide Digital Citizenship Day, February was a little crazy and I never got around to making a 5 in 5 episode for February. Now that things have calmed down, I can resume making the monthly 5 in 5 screencasts, which highlight 5 edtech tools teachers can use with students in 5 minutes (okay you caught me-less than six minutes!). By no means are these five minute episodes a comprehensive overview of the tools, but it should be enough to let you know what the tool is, what it can do, and if it’s worth your time looking into and learning more about.

This episode features the following tools:

1. Big Huge Labs
2. Kahoot!
3. Pinterest
4. Visuwords
5. Piktochart

For the videos, the Prezis, Diigo links to all the sites featured in the episodes and more, visit my website. If you don’t want to miss another episode, subscribe to the iTunes podcast channel here.

Tech To You Later!
Katie

#DigCit Day Reflections

It’s been over a week since the area’s first ever Digital Citizenship (DigCit) Day took place. It was a complete whirl wind and worth every second of the time put into planning it. I’m not really even sure where to start this post-my head is still spinning!

If you’re looking for a little more background information on digcit day, check out my blog posts leading up to the day.  Essentially, the entire school day and every class was dedicated to different topics relating to digital citizenship.

Throughout the day, we used the hashtag #MCNDCD on twitter.  Check out the Storify including tweets from the day here.

I first started writing about the DigCit day in July of 2013 with my post about free resources from the FTC. Since then, I’ve been brainstorming with people at work and my PLN on Twitter, collecting resources, making a case to hold the day with administrators and teachers, planning, and meeting with teachers to share the resources and finalize their role in the day.

One of my favorite fun pieces to the day were the temporary tattoos, which represented students’ digital tattoos, and the T-shirts every employee in the school wore all day.  The front of the T-shirts had our “McNick students T.H.I.N.K.” logo and the back had our “Is it…. True, Hurtful, Illegal, Necessary, Kind?” logo for the day. The tattoos read “I’m a responsible digital citizen.”  Our librarian and web master, Anne Jones, designed all three logos.  We uploaded the art for the tattoos to Tattoo Fun and purchased them for a very reasonable price.

During the first 20 minutes of school, students received their tattoos and their “digital passports” which served as their guiding light throughout the day. Each teacher had previously received a stamp (each department had a designated color) in order to stamp the students’ passports as they entered the class.  In order to prevent any student from receiving the

Some completed digital passports.

same session twice, there was some predetermined shuffling for some students to different areas of the building than their normal schedule.  For example, if a student had two math classes, they would show their math teacher for the second time that day that their passport had been stamped for math already, and they would proceed to the library session. The front of the passports had an area for each of the 10 different sessions, and the back included a schedule for the day and any major class changes.

Steve Smith from CBTS got our day started on the right foot.  Many students and even more teachers have commented on how interesting he was.  There’s always skepticism when bringing in a guest speaker for an all school assembly, and he definitely exceeded expectations. If you live in the Cincinnati area, you’ve got to reach out to him to bring him to your school- you won’t regret it!

From the assembly, students progressed through their normal schedules where teachers taught a designated topic relate to digital citizenship based on department. English focused on email etiquette and online privacy; Religion classes discussed sexting, snapchat and selfies; math discussed cyberbullying and how to become upstanders as opposed to bystanders; science classes had a department wide research and poster contest about responsible disposal and recycling of e-waste; fine arts classes learned about copyright and fair use; business and technology classes looked deeper into the ramifications of a poor social media presence; health and gym classes learned about the effects of technology abuse on the mind and body and then played a game of dodge ball to reiterate the importance of stepping away from our digital devices; and our S.A.I.L. classes, study halls and any students who would have received a repeat session attended a critical website evaluation session in the library.   For more information about teachers and students’ reactions to the day, please check out our school’s news info about the day.

We had a wonderful line up of 13 guest speakers (including Smith) throughout the day in our foreign language and social studies classes: Matthew Wallace, Hamilton County Prosecutor’s Office; Jennifer Kinsley, Chase College of Law; Andrea Smythe, Cincinnati Police Officer; John Greiner, Graydon Head; Brett Renzenbrink and Matt Worth, Strauss Troy; Anthony Reese, Union Township Police Department; Scott Griffith, School Outfitters; Josh Welsh, Matt Shoulta, Lauren Lonce, Jeff Thomas, and Chris Styles from Total Quality Logistics.  The legal professionals spoke to all social studies classes about laws associated with cyberbullying, sexting and child pornography, while the HR professionals spoke to all foreign language classes about social media’s impact on the hiring process. Based on many students’ post- digcit day survey responses, these sessions were not only their favorite sessions, but also the sessions they felt they learned the most.  I imagine it has something to do with the real world speakers that don’t see the kids every day. 

Along with the real world speakers, we also had real data to share with the kids based on a completely anonymous student survey sent to all students before digcit day.  Out of 640 students, over 200 responded to the survey.  As with any high school student survey, I think there is some room for error based on students responding to be funny or lie because they’re afraid they’ll get in trouble.  But, based on some of the national averages, our students are not far off. The infographic to the right was shared with all our teachers, students and the parents at the parent portion of the evening.  It shows we’ve got some areas to improve upon, but we’ve also got some good things going to too, such as students ‘defriending’ or blocking someone who hurt their feelings online.  I created the infographic on Piktochart (very easy to use), and I think it really helped some of the teachers answer the, “why do we need to do this? We already know better!” questions and remarks they received from some students.  It also served as a wakeup call that our students (along with every other teenager across the country) are not exempt from these issues.

Along with our school infographic, I had some other images, infographics, and our three digcit logos hung up around the building. Between these images, the T-shirts, and the messages in all classes throughout the day, the importance of positive digital citizenship was at every turn throughout the day. We kept many of the signs up throughout the remainder of the week, and will leave some permanently displayed in the library.

Some of our teachers, counselors and Principal on digcit day.

Based on survey feedback from students, there was a feeling that a portion of the day was repetitive.  This certainly wasn’t my intention since each department had a designated area/topic to discuss, but it also speaks to the fact that many of these topics overlap and are intertwined with one another.  On the flip side, many students enjoyed the day and felt like they learned a lot of valuable information that would not have normally been taught in a classroom setting.  Others also felt they received a direct and much-needed wakeup call in some of the other areas they’ve been hearing about for quite some time (online privacy, etc.).  The majority of teachers I’ve spoken to or that filled out the post teacher survey also felt like this day was very beneficial to the students. In my opinion, I think this was one of those days and lessons that some students may not realize the impact it had right away, but they’ll realize it down the road when they go to apply for colleges and a job and decide not to post that picture or status.  There have been a handful of students who have already signed up for LinkedIn, per the suggestions of our HR guest speakers, to begin building their resumes and documenting awards and achievements.  Way to start making a purposeful and positive digital tattoo, guys!

Q&A during the parent DigCit Night to conclude the day.

To conclude the day, we had a Digital Citizenship Night for parents of our students and invited grade school teachers and parents to attend as well.  There was one teacher from each department who talked to parents about what their department focused on during the day and a few things parents should know about that area.  Many left the evening telling us how thankful they were for this program, and we’ve received many requests to do this again and pass on information and our presentation from the evening.  We left parents with the hard copy of the Living Life Online magazine from the FTC, raffled off a couple copies of the FTC’s NET CETERA book and a T-shirt.  And of course, everyone likes sweets as an incentive (and I know our teachers needed a pick me up after such a long day), so everyone received a 3 Musketeer candy bar for being one of the “3 Musketeers of #digcit!”

Each candy bar reads “Teachers, students and parents working together to become responsible digital citizens. Thanks for being one of the ‘3 Musketeers’ of #DigCit!”

All in all, I think the day was a huge success!   I know discussing digital citizenship with students is not something that can be done in one class or one day, but this was a great introduction to many conversations that were either overdue, or needed to be had again.  It sent a loud message to students and to parents that this is important to us, as a school, and the topic is here to stay!

For more information and press about our Digital Citizenship Day, please check out the following articles:

• Strauss Troy Attorney Brett Renzenbrink and Law Clerk Matt Worth Present at McNicholas High School Digital Citizenship Day via Strauss Troy
• McNicholas Holds Digital Citizenship Day for All Students: First of its Kind in the Greater Cincinnati Area via McNicholas High School
• McNick Promotes Digital Citizenship via the Catholic Beat
• McNicholas to hold Digital Citizenship Day for all Students via Around Anderson Township

So what would you have included?  What would you not have included? What do you think of the idea altogether? I’d love to hear your digital citizenship ideas.

Tech To You Later!
-Katie

McNick Promotes Ditgital Citizenship | The Catholic Beat

This post was originally published as McNick Promotes Ditgital Citizenship via The Catholic Beat.

To celebrate its first-ever Digital Citizenship Day, McNick staff posted photos all day long with the hashtag “digcit” on Twitter and other social media. This is the first one of the day. Photo courtesy McNicholas High School.

McNicholas High School (Mt. Washington/Cincinnati) held its first Digital Citizenship Day Monday. It was the first school in the region to devote a day to the perils — and promises — of life in the digital age.

Organized by Director of Educational Technology Katie Ritter, “DigCit Day” meant special presentations, speakers, and discussions of computer use in every class, all day.

Ritter said the idea came to her through many discussions with students, parents, teachers, and sessions from the International Society for Technology in Education conference she attended last year.

“We needed to do something BIG to make a statement that we, as a school, think digital citizenship is very important,” Ritter says. “As a one-to-one Tablet PC school, it is our responsibility to teach our students how to navigate the online world and be responsible global citizens, which now includes their digital life.

“In the same way we wouldn’t hand the keys to a teenager to begin driving without proper training, we shouldn’t hand them these devices without proper guidance.”

A focus of the day was the “digital tattoo” each person creates through posts and other online communications, giving an impression to others of who they are and how they think and behave.

Every classroom discussed digital citizenship. Here, an accounting class discusses the implications of online activity.

The day began with a presentation by Cincinnati Bell Technology Solution’s Steve Smith about the ramifications of creating a “negative online presence” through social media posts. Throughout the day,  speakers addressed topics such as cyberbullying, sexting, legal and job-related ramifications of posts and more. English classes discussed email etiquette, fine arts classes discussed copyright and fair use law, science classes discussed “e-waste” and responsible disposal of digital devices, and heath and PE classes discussed the mental and physical effects of too much or inappropriate computer use (obesity from too much online gaming, depression from cyberbullying).

Religion classes were not left out of the DigCit conversation. Topics addressed included what digital communications say about a person’s spiritual and moral life, the temptations of appropriate sexual conduct online with photos and snapchat, and craving online affirmation.

But the opportunities for fun and friendship through digital communications weren’t left out. Students received temporary tattoos with the message “I’M a responsible DIGITAL CITIZEN” (the day’s theme) and tweeted messages and photos about the event all day long.

A followup event for parents Monday evening let them know what their teens learned and Ritter, who writes a technology blog for McNick, also created a resource page on digital communication. Thanks to the positive side of digital technology, students anywhere can use it to find out about copyright law, privacy, and other topics at her Digital Citizenship Resources page.

Photos courtesy Archbishop McNicholas High School. To see photos taken throughout the day and posted on Twitter, search #digcit and #MCNDCD.