Digital Assessments: More than an online quiz

There is a sea of assessment tools out there in the EdTech world: Kahoot, Google Forms, GoFormative, Nearpod, Socrative... the list goes on and on. All of these types of tools are good. They can give students instantaneous feedback, and can become more engaging. The but the question is, how are these tools more than just a digital worksheet?

There are many reasons that districts jump on the 1:1 digital bandwagon. The biggest arguably being that technology allows for great support of Personalized Learning. So is taking a quiz and putting it in Google Forms personalized learning?

EdTech gives us the opportunity to add Voice & Choice to how the students want to be assessed. We now have audio, video, graphic design, and many other tools at our students fingertips!

Thinking "Outside the box" on Assessments

1. Graphic Design Displays - Designing posters and infographics no longer takes hours of time with scissors, construction paper, and poster board. Students can use tools like Canva, Adobe Spark, & Piktochart to easily create graphics to display and/or explain their learning. Wouldn't your students take more ownership in their learning if they were developing a social media graphic about the causes of the Civil War as opposed to filling out a google form?

2. Video & Multimedia - There are so many video and media tools available these days. Screencastify, Explain Everything, Educreations, SeeSaw, and FlipGrid are all simple tools for students to record with. With these tools, we can ask every student to explain how they solved a problem as they submit an answer. When the student reviews their video explanation before submitting, they are checking their metacognition! How often does a multiple choice test do that for us?

3. Global Publishing - This option comes with a disclaimer - students under the age of 13 are not legally permitted to use social media accounts.
For our middle - high school students, we can allow them to share their learning through a blog, mini blog (twitter), or other social media outlet. This allows them to ask for feedback from others. Think about the effect of meaningful conversations with others, including experts, would have on the learning of a topic.

Presentation Tools that Ignite Student Creativity

I am an educator who is constantly in search for tools that promote student creation over student consumption. For years PowerPoint, Prezi, and Google Slides have been the "go to" presentation tools that allow for some student creation in the classroom. At times, many teachers and students look for something different to use, something a little more engaging for their audience.

There are many free online presentation tools out there, but I am going to highlight a couple that your students can use to create with.

Adobe Spark

Example of a Adobe Spark Web Story

Spark offers 3 different presentation types: Social Media Posts, Web Stories (similar to a PowerPoint), and Videos. All three types are simple for students to use. Students can search for media and information without having to leave the application. This allows for a more efficient presentation development time. At the end of the presentation, all of the photos are automatically cited. For students wanting a professional looking product, Adobe Spark is an amazing option.


Buncee Edu

Buncee is a fun and simple tool for students to create engaging presentations. The platform is set up like PowerPoint/Google Slides but caters to kids more creative side. As with Adobe Spark, backgrounds, pictures, animations, stamps, and several other media types can all be searched and found within the app.

Buncee's click, drag, and search options are simple to use for all learners.

Picture Surfing for Students and Teachers

Part of the purpose for student usage of technology in the classroom is to allow students to become creators not just consumers. A large part of this creative process for our learners is the resources that they find to put into their product. In this case we are talking about visual resources, or images.

Many students and teachers go directly to Google and search images. They then copy and paste away. As many of us know, this can rise several issues. Two of them being:

1. Inappropriate images appearing within the search.
2. The use of pictures without permission of the rightful owner.

These issues (and several others) have created the need of safe searching creative commons photos for educational use. Luckily there are several websites that students can go to for that very purpose!

Photos for Class - Just as the title says, this site allows students to search for photos that are appropriate for classroom use. The photos also include auto citation, and creative commons photos for use. If a student search does bring up an inappropriate image, it allows teachers to report it to be removed.



Pics4Learning - Pics4Learning is another safe place for students to search for needed photos. The organization of the site is excellent, and allows students to easily search by category.

Pexels - Pexels is full of large sized creative commons stock photos. Some of them are truly breath taking. Pexels was created for student and adult usage, so it isn't quite as filtered or safeguarded. There isn't anything extremely inappropriate, but some images could contain things like alcohol usage and mild adult situations. Students, especially younger students, should be monitored during the usage of this site. Nevertheless, landscapes, citiscapes, and other stock photos are excellent on this site.

*Addition to original post: These sites try their best to filter out inappropriate photos. As with anything online, there is nothing completely safe. Inappropriate pictures could still appear on these sites. However, they are still safer than simply searching google photos.

Graphic Design Tools for ALL Students

Students are constantly bombarded with graphics in their daily lives. Social media, web page adds, video game consoles, and the environmental print around them all use graphic design tools to give our students information. So the question quickly becomes, how can our students create graphic representations of the information we want them to report and present?

While there have been tools like Microsoft Paint and Adobe Photoshop out there for years, they haven't always been "student friendly." The thought of a student quickly using those tools to make a short presentation or exit ticket was hardly an option.

For the last couple of years, I have really began to enjoy using 2 specific graphic design tools with students of all ages in the Springdale School District: Canva and Piktochart. They are both relatively easy to use, and allow students to create various types of Infographics, Presentations, Exit Tickets, and more. Both sites have several templates to get students started, and several free icons and graphics for students to use. The ability to import their own images is also easy.

If you are in a Google Apps for Ed domain, you can sign in to both sites through Google!

Check out a few examples that I was able to quickly make with these two programs, and give the sites a try for yourself. Your students will enjoy using these tools to creatively display what they have learned.

Newspaper Report - PiktoChart

Short Book Review - Canva

Time Lines - PiktoChart

Student Generated Vocabulary Cards - Canva