CSDNR Instructional Tech Weekly

Edpuzzle is back in the approved column of CSDNR software. After many months, the vendor finally agreed to sign our Data Privacy Agreement and Parent Bill of Rights. Access has been turned on and teachers should be able to login with their Google credentials.

Edpuzzle has some new features. They have started to create their own videos for teachers to use with students. Edpuzzle Originals are a part of the platform. They address a variety of topics and include questions with each video. You can search by topic. It then will link to other videos related to that topic and provide links to those videos.

Once you login to Edpuzzle with your Google credentials, you should be able to see your library. The video lessons that you created should still be in your listed under "My Content." Click on that tab and your videos should appear on your landing page.

If you are not familiar with Edpuzzle, it allows teachers to show video content to students. This application has its own videos and it is easy to retrieve videos from YouTube and utilize them as teaching tools. You can also add questions the students have to answer during the viewing of the video. You can create classes within Edpuzzle and assign videos and use the questions to assess understanding.

Edpuzzle works with Google Classroom. Teachers can sync their classes from Classroom into Edpuzzle. Then you can assign video lessons and post them in the Classroom. The link for the Edpuzzle assignment will be located on their Classwork page. You can also toggle the button on to prevent students from skipping questions and watching the entire video.

Flocabulary is an application that includes hundreds of videos that address a multitude of topics. Each video is a rap song that help students to understand various concepts or skills. The ELA Flocabulary videos address such concepts like; cause and effect, short and long vowel sounds, Shakespeare and irony to name a few. In Math, topics include probability, place value, equivalent fractions and pi.

In order to access Flocabulary, you only need to login to your Nearpod account. Nearpod purchased Flocabulary in 2019 and now they are part of one platform. You can access all of the videos from the Flocabulary Menu on the left side of the landing page.

Once you select Flocabulary in the menu, you can search for terms or topics. When you locate what you are looking for, you will be able to add each Flocabulary video into your own Nearpod library. This will allow the user to customize these videos.

Many Flocabulary videos have embedded questions, just like in the Nearpod Original videos. If you click edit for a Flocabulary video, it will ask you to duplicate that video so that you can make changes to it. Then you will be able to add questions, delete questions or add the video to a lesson.

Nearpod offers a game similar to Kahoot. Teachers can assess student knowledge on a particular topic, create an interactive exit ticket or obtain formative assessment information. Teachers can create simple Time to Climb activities and launch them a live lessons in front of a class. Students use their devices to play. Time to Climb lessons are engaging, fun and easy to create. If you are interested in creating your own Time to Climb, take a look at this five minute video. It will walk you through the steps to creating your own game.

Don't forget to check the list of District Approved Applications to see what is approved. The list is always being updated. The list includes third party vendors who have signed our Parent Bill of Rights and Data Privacy Agreement in order to be compliant with Ed Law 2D. All vendors who collect student personally identifiable information (PII) must sign these agreements. If you are interested in new software not on the list, fill out the Software Approval Form. If you are looking for training on software that is approved, fill out the Request for Training Form.

The Instructional Technology Website is always being updated. Recently, the site was overhauled to feature the professional learning resources that are available to all CSDNR faculty and staff. Last spring, the Team began vetting and creating resources to help educators learn how to use software applications. The resources include step-by-step videos as well as Google Slide Decks. There are also Google Docs and PDFs. Over the last year, we have added many resources to this collection.