30 Tech Tools for 2018

I love searching and finding new technology tools that can be implemented into the future ready classroom.  I am always looking for tools that promote creativity, collaboration, communication, critical thinking, and connected that students and teachers can use to showcase knowledge.  The following list of technology tools are just a few of my new and old favorites tech tools for 2018.  

Newsela

Newsela has been one of my favorite tech tools for the last couple of years.  I love the ability to change lexile level, the text sets, and the quick formative assessments.  

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Pear Deck

Pear Deck is another one of my favorite tech tools that I have used for the last couple of years.  I love the ability to share the slides and notes to the Google Drive, grade the assessments through Flubaroo, and allow the students to work through the slides at their own pace.  

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Classhub

Classhub is a new tech tool that I have just started using as a classroom management tool.  I like using the program while working with students in a mini-lesson.  I can quickly see what the other students are doing while working on digital content, lock the screens when a student is taking a test, and send messages to the students to help them keep on task.  

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Sugarcane

Sugarcane.com is a new tech tool for 2018 for me.  Sugarcane is an educational game system that has preloaded games for all subject areas and the teacher can quickly create games that match a specific content subject.  This is free, fun, and easy to for all grade levels. 

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Quickdraw

Quickdraw is a fun vocabulary builder that is a lot like the game win, lose, or draw.  The player will get a word to draw and the computer will start to guess the drawing.  This is free online game that does not require any login.  

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Classroomscreen

Classroomscreen.com is one of my new favorite tools to share out with teachers that have a smartboard or projector in the classroom.  Classroomscreen puts all of your favorite times, noise levels, directions, and whiteboard into one location.  It is free, no log in, and even has an exit ticket feature that is very easy to use.  

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Frontrowed.com

I love frontrowed.com for grades K-9.   Frontrowed provides adaptive practices for ELA, Math, Social Studies, and Science.  All math questions can be read outloud to the students, if a student misses a question, it will redirect them to find someone in the classroom that just got it right or will provide them with a video from learnzillion.com.  The data reports provide quick differentiated groups for the future ready classroom environment. 

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mysimpleshow.com

Mysimpleshow.com is a great way to get the students to start writing out the content for a presentation before designing the backgrounds and photos.  The way mysimpleshow.com works is that after the script is written, the program will find photos that match the concepts.  It is that easy.  I would use this program during my future ready learning activity once my students are ready to showcase what they have learned.  

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Classhook

Classhook takes video clips from the student's favorite TV shows and creates teachable moments that are tied back to the content standards.  This free program provides quick video segments that will hook the students into wanting to learn more about the content.  I would use this program during part of the digital content area during my blended learning lesson plan then I would talk about the hook during the mini-lesson with the students.  

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Baamboozle

Baamboozle is an educational game program that allows students to answer questions in teams to earn varied point values.  This free and easy to use program would be placed in the future ready skills area as a preview to the content or as a group study session that relates to the classroom content. 

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Listenwise

listenwise.com is a great independent activity to use within the blended and future ready classroom.  The students can listen and read the text, answer questions, learn key vocabulary words, and explore graphic organizers that go along with the content.  This free program would work great for grades 4-12 in ELA, Science, and Social Studies.  I love the current event section and tie into google classroom. 

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Padlet

Padlet has made a come back in my book of tech tools to recommend to teachers.  The voting feature, layouts, and the ability to embed the ballet into a website are just few of my favorite characteristics of the program. I would use this in my mini-lesson, independent practice reflection, during digital content as quick reflection and next step tool, and also during future ready activities as a group brain storming activity. 

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Autodraw

Autodraw.com is a free drawing tool that can be used while students are sketch noting, creating posters, need a little help with drawing figures that represent the content.  I would use this during the mini lessons when the students need to take notes, during independent practice to showcase what they have learned, and even during the future ready skills as a away to build and create projects.  

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Build Your Wild Self

Build your wild self is a free creative avatar generator that allows students to create themselves with wings, horns, and other fun features that then can be used for a creative writing project.  The students love all of the fun features of this easy to use program.  

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Avatar Maker

Ideas on how to use Avatar Maker

• Build an avatar for a character in a book
• Build an avatar for fake news
• Create an avatar for classroom progression boards

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Geo Greeting

Geo Greeting brings google maps, shapes of buildings, and global connectedness together for a fun project that students can make to share out messages with each other.  For example, click on this link to see mygeogreeting to you.  I would use this tool during my future ready activity by allowing students to type a message, then pick a building to research.  Where is the building located?  What is the city demographics?  How far away is that building to you?   What is one new fact that you learned about that city?  

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ClassroomQ.com

Classroomq.com is a free classroom management tool that allows students to place them in the Q when they have a question or when they are ready for a checkpoint mini-lesson with the teacher.  Think of this like taking a number a the deli counter. 

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Seesaw.me

Seesaw.me is one of the first tools that I recommend to any teacher from grades K-12+ that is planning on implementing blended learning into the classroom setting.  This free tech tool will help to manage the paper work, help to keep students on task, and provides a learning portfolio that can be shared with the parents.  This is on of my must haves for anyone who wants to cut down on the amount of paperwork and grading within any classroom setting.  

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Mentimeter.com

Mentimeter.com is a free tech tool that can be used as a quick exit ticket, a vocabulary builder, a summary tool, and a brainstorming activity for group activities.  I use the word cloud feature as an exit ticket out of mini-lesson and also a reflection tool once the students have finished reading a Newsela.com article. 

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Learn Around The World

Take your students on virtual field trips with learnaroundtheworld.com A free online program that will allow students to explore other parts of the world during the future ready activity or in mini lessons.  Participate in planned events or watch virtual trips.  

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Rewordify

  Rewordify, takes any article picks out the main ideas and summaries the content.  I showcase this program to teachers with high ELL students or as a differentiation tools for the independent practice area.  The program also provides key vocabulary words, a dictionary, and many other features for free. 

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For All Rubrics

ForAllRubrics provides easy to use rubrics for students and teachers along with badges that show mastery of content.  I showcase forallrubrics as a classroom management tool for grading future ready skills.   The program is very easy to use, and it has already broken down all common core standards from grade K-12 into rubric form.  

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Smore.com

Provide options for the students for when they build a poster to showcase their understanding of the content.  I love using Smore.com as a poster generator because the student can publish the content and watch to see who visited the poster, what links they clicked on, and how long the visitor stayed on the poster.  Fantastic tool for global connectedness in the future ready skills area.  

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Edshelf.com

Are you looking for specific tech tools by content area?  Are you looking for a place to keep track of all of these tools for students?  I would recommend edshelf.com. Edshelf is like a tech Pinterest board for technology tools.  I like it because I can embed the tools right into Schoology, Weebly, and link them into Google Classroom.  Follow my boards at www.edshelf.com/profile/blcb and see example boards below. 

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Quizizz

Quizizz.com is one of my favorite formative assessment tools because of the gamification aspect.  The students can answer the questions at their pace but still compete with each other while reviewing the content.  In a blended learning lesson, I would placeQuizizz.com in the independent practice section of the phase 2 checklist. 

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Blabberize

Blabberize.com is a quick and easy way for students to make something talk.  That's right, turn any image into a talking avatar with the student's voice explaining the concept.  In my blended learning lessons, I would place this activity in the future ready skills area.  The students would create a talking blabberize that would summarize the main idea of the concept that they learned that day.  The students would then place the blabberize character into Seesaw.me or a group padlet.  

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Toontastic

Toontastic can be used in grades K-12 for showcasing the understanding of any concept through the creation of a cartoon.  The students can retell a story, create a story, reenact a part of history, demonstrate foundamental science concepts, and much more through this free online application.  I would place Toontastic in the future ready skills area as a group project at the end or middle of a unit. 

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Videonot.es

Videonot.es provides the students with the opportunity to watch a video and take notes on the concepts that are covered during the video.  The notes will then be added directly to their own Google Drive as well as shared out the teacher.  One of my favorite aspects of Videonot.es is the fact that all of the notes are timed stamped.  The time stamp feature comes in handy when the students are studying for a test.  I would use videonot.es during the digital content area of the blended learning lesson plan.  

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Dollar Street

Dollar Street places families from across the country on one street.  The poorest at one end and the richest at the other end.  The global connected website then allows the students to explore the houses, types of toys, types of food, jobs, and much more within each household.   I would use this website as a future ready activity where the students would pick one family, explore their current resources, and create something from the 3D printer to send to that family.  I would then tie in economics, global locations, politics, health and wellness, and much more into my mini lessons that would relate back to the family that the students picked.

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Learn more about how to implement blended learning into your classroom enviroment through the following links