Socrative Software

I just heard about Socrative from Cool Cat Teacher which is a smart student response system that empowers teachers to engage their classrooms through a series of educational exercises and games via smartphones, laptops, and tablets.

If you have a few moments, watch the video demonstration on their site and consider how you could use this in your classroom. I could certainly think of some great opportunities to use it daily in a classroom with 1:1 laptops or weekly in the computer lab. Even in small groups around a computer as part of an Inquiry-style learning project, to assess their understanding.

It's exciting to see new ICT tools being designed to meet teachers needs.

Scoop.it all up and place it in one spot!

Trying Scoop.it today for the first time - a great time saving idea.
Check out my Primary ICT page at http://www.scoop.it/t/digital-pedagogy-in-the-primary-classroom-p-3

The power of interactive exercises

 A great video by Salman Khan talks about how and why he created the remarkable Khan Academy, which you can find on You Tube (teaching videos on just about everything!). He calls for teachers to consider flipping the traditional classroom script - to give homework during class time and lectures for homework - which is an exciting concept!

Beebots - great early Primary ICT tool!

Thanks to 'Mrs G' (who posted on my Wallwisher) I've taken some time to look into Beebots.

What a great little educational tool Beebots are for P-3. I can think of so many uses for them from basic one-to-one correlation counting, understanding and using direction, science, literacy and much more. Now I'm looking to get my hands on some and try them out!

Please share any great lesson ideas you have for Beebots - how have you used them?

Triptico success with any Smartboard

Triptico is a wonderful tool which the lovely Rebecca Nicholas (check out her great blog at Mind's Wondering: Education and Technology) introduced me to at an ICT 1:1 workshop recently.

What an amazing (and free!) tool to use with a Smartboard in any classroom! Easy to download, navigate and use - I can't recommend it enough. I've spent most of today playing with the functions with my 7 year old son looking on. All of these tools he thought were "excellent" and "cool" and if they excite and engage a 7 year old then I think they will be a hit with any students.

Brightly coloured and adaptable - these tools would be quick to set up and easy for students to navigate themselves making them a great piece of software for any Smartboard. My favourite tools so far are the timer, group picker and quick quiz tools, however, I'm sure I'll find more and more uses for them.

Wallwisher

Wallwisher.com is a great little tool for use in the Primary classroom. Simply set up your account, select background, picture and title and then you have your own url you can share with students. Ask students to share their thoughts on any issues, canvas ideas or just use as a tool to gain anonymous feedback from your own students (gah!). Fun and user friendly students will love it. You can also password protect it and approve all posts. Check out my own Wallwisher I've just set up (top of this blog) and share your own thoughts about ICT use in the early classroom.