Explaining with Skitch

 As some of you may be aware, the Texas Panhandle is covered in snow today!  I've decided to take this opportunity to talk a little bit about Skitch, a awesome tool from Evernote.

What is Skitch?

Skitch, initially a web tool on it's own but later bought by Evernote, is a image markup tool that makes explaining images much easier.  It is available on Mac, PC, Android, and IOS.  You can markup images with text, arrows, highlights, and different shapes.

Here's a snap shot of what tools are available from Skitch:

Explaining simplified

As I mentioned previously, the Texas Panhandle has been hit with a huge snow storm today.  With Skitch, instead of just saying what the snow is like, I can show you!  

By simply adding the overlay of text and arrows, the image is already explained.  This also to engages students more than just listening to you explain it.  When the student sees the image and notice the text and arrows, they are already processing what they are looking at and what "snow drifts" are.

Skitch mobile

If you have a mind of a teacher, you'll get a lot of ideas while you are out and about and want get a snapshot of whatever you find.  Skitch, available on Android and IOS, allows you to capture pictures via your smartphone and markup the image right there.  Plus, once you are done with the markup, you can share right from your smartphone to Twitter, Google +, email or several different other options.  Here's a good video from Evernote.com about the Skitch app for Android (there are several other Youtube videos over Evernote and Skitch available at Youtube.com):

     

Evernote and Skitch

Best of all, any image that you markup or capture will automatically be saved into your Evernote account.  Once you have saved the image, your image will be uploaded to your Evernote account where you can do editing with Skitch on your PC or Mac and share when you are ready.  Once it's in your Evernote account, you'll have it until you delete it.  

Want more info on Skitch?  Here's some more resources from myself and Evernote:

Evernote for the Social Studies: Evernote and Skitch

Evernote.com/skitch

Evernote for Educators Livebinder

P.S.

If you are curious, here's a another photo I took of the snow at my place.  I stand 6'6 and the snow drift was up to my knees:

10 free Social Studies Android Apps

Android devices can be extremely useful in the classroom.  Just as IOS devices, student can connect and engage with content with apps on their smartphones or tablets.  Here's a list of 10 free Android apps for Social Studies:

1.  United States Constitution - This app allows students to explore the United States Constitution along with other historical documents.  Here's a list of the listed features via Google Play description:

Features:

- Searchable US Constitution and Articles of Confederation

- Resizable text

- Ratification Dates of Amendments

- Bios of the signers

- Constitution timeline

- Declaration of Independence

- Articles of Confederation

- Gettysburg address

- Mayflower Compact

- Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

- Star-Spangled Banner

- Emancipation Proclamation

- I Have a Dream

2.  Smithsonian Channel - The Smithsonian Channel app provides full videos from an assortment of topics like Science, Nature, History and Culture.  Some videos can be over a hour long in length.  History videos range from documentaries about Abraham Lincoln to documentaries about the Great Depression.

3.  Google Earth - An excellent tool released from Google.  Google Earth allows you to explore the globe and even points out points of interest from the area that you are looking at.  Bring a breath of fresh air into your Geography class with Google Earth!



4.  History Pin - History Pin is a great way for students to explore areas beyond geography and demographics.  With History Pin, students can explore areas through photos that other people have "pinned" or even capture a photo from a event that is happening at the time they take the photo.

5.  White House - The official White House app provides everything from videos, photos, and articles from the goings on around the White House.  This would be pretty useful in Government class.




6.  America's Economy - This app from the US Census Bureau provides information based on 16 key economic factors about the current status of the US economy.  This is really good if you are teaching Economics and about how the strength of the economy is determined.  Here's a list of some of the features of the app from Google Play:

Key Features

• Quick overview of indicators measuring the U.S. economy

• Detailed page for each indicator with trend data

• Share indicators on Facebook, Twitter and via email

• View release schedules for indicators

• Set up notifications and custom views  

7.  US Presidents - A great app to learn about the president of the United States.  The app includes facts about the presidents, vice presidents, and their years in office.






8.  50 States - Need to brush up or learn the 50 states of the United States of America?  This app provides information for all 50 states including: population, state flag, state bird, geography, etc.  Another great app for your Geography students.




9.  Countries of the World - If you are studying in World Geography, this app will help you study different countries across the globe.  Information includes: capitals, populations, languages, GDPs, religion, and other useful info.  Certainly more engaging that reading all that info from a text book!




10.  Congress - If you want to engage your students in happenings of legislation, this app is great.  Here's a list of features from Google Play:

Keep on top of Congress.

* Find your representatives, see how they vote
* See what bills are coming up for a vote next
* Search for bills and votes you should know about
* Stay on top of floor activity, committee hearings
* Be notified of just about everything

Building a digital portfolio with Livebinders

With today's classrooms starting to use more online resources to enhance the learning experience, the question could be raised on how we showcase and catalog what teachers and students are doing in the classroom.  If students create an online project or online document, how can they share that with their fellow classmates and others around the world?  Thanks to Livebinders, this question has been answered - all while being free and extremely easy to use.  

Livebinders is a free online service that allows you to collect resources and create online binders to share via social media and embed on your blog or website.  Here's a great post from the Livebinders blog about how educators are using Livebinders: 10 Great Ways that Educators are Using LiveBinders.  

Digital portfolios is a excellent way to showcase what students are doing in the classroom.  Remember when you were in elementary school and you drew a picture or got a good grade on a paper - where did it usually end up?  Mine typically was pinned on the refrigerator by my parents or got placed in a folder - which I only looked at it every so often.  Thus, this raises a question, "What is the point of doing a project or any other activity that will just end up getting thrown away or put aside for only one or two people to see?"  

That is what I love about the idea of having students create digital portfolios - they can go back at any time and reflect upon their learning and they can share what they did with everyone they want.  Part of the learning process, I believe, is to discover, create, and share.

For example, here's my Educational Technology Livebinder shelf:


As teachers, we should focus on learning ourselves.  Thanks to Livebinders, I am able to discover, create and share resources on things live educational technology, social studies, pedagogy, etc.  Now, put this tool in the hands of students - do you think this would engage students more if they were to create their very own "digital portfolio" for what they were doing in class?

Students can make their Livebinder their own - adding photos, website links, Youtube videos and upload documents.

Once the student has added content to their binder, they can share via social media, email, or simply grab the link or embed code for the binder:

Here are some of my favorite ideas that students can use Livebinders for:

1. Collect/organize blog posts - their own or fellow classmates
2. Create a "My Evernote" tab - students can insert links to certain Evernote notes
3. Research - students can use the "Livebinder It" browser extension to add a website link to their binder
4. Comment on fellow classmate's binders - Livebinders allow you to add comments to a binder, which is great for peer review. 
5. Upload lecture notes - whether it be a Evernote note link or a MS Word doc, students can upload/insert their class lecture notes.

There a ton of ways teachers and students can use Livebinders.  If you are also concerned with customer service, from a teacher standpoint, to help you with the website, Tina and Barbara (makers of the website) are my favorite by far.  A few months ago I need to make a correction to my user ID - I simply contacted them via Twitter (@livebinders) and within a hour or so it was done.  I've contacted other websites that I use at least twice about technical issues I've experienced and never heard back.  Tina and Barbara actually do care about you and your students and the experience you have on the website.  I've been a member of the website going on two years now and I've been blown away by the service and experience I've had.  

If you do plan to use technology in your classroom, Livebinders would be one of my top picks to use. 

Here are some other blog posts I've done over Livebinders in the past:

5 reasons why you should be using Livebinders

Don't grade students binders, grade their Livebinders

Livebinder It Tool

5 ways to use Evernote in 2013

Happy new year!

As we begin a new year, some people might be looking for ways to "go digital" and have everything organized in a easy and simple program.  With so many tools out there today that allow you to do just that, one of my top picks is Evernote.  I've been using Evernote for a couple of years now and I'm still finding ways to use Evernote to organize everything I need to.  If you are curious about Evernote, here are 5 ways you can use Evernote in 2013:

1.  Organize your Tweets on Twitter

Planning on using Twitter a lot this year?  Twitter is my main social networking site for my professional development in education - and I've run across a multitude of resources shared from people I've followed.  So many resources in fact it would take weeks to go through them all.  If you are looking for ways to organize your tweets from Twitter, Evernote can take care of that.  First, you'll want to follow @myEN on Twitter.  Once you've done that, @myEN will send you a link to sign in to your Evernote account and from there you can connect your Evernote and Twitter account.  From that point, simply put @myEN in any tweet you send and it will automatically be put in your Evernote account.  

With that being said, however, there are apps you can use on your tablet/mobile device to share your tweets to your Evernote account.  Here is a blog post from Evernote.com that suggests some apps that will help you do that, "9 Things to Capture from Your Twitter Stream and Apps to Help You Do It".  

2.  Scan your paper documents into Evernote

Have a ton of paper documents that you wish you could digitize?  With Evernote, you can get make all of those hard copies into digital copies and organize them so you can easily and quickly access them wherever you are at.  I recently introduced Evernote to one of my former students and explained how it could help her with her studies and also catalog and organize her lecture notes (my full guest post about this, Evernote for the Social Studies: Evernote in History Class, can be found on Melissa Seidemann's (@mseidemann) blog, notanotherhistoryteacher.edublogs.com).  Here's a snapshot of one of her lecture notes that she captured with the Evernote app on her Iphone:

You can do this via the Evernote app or another app compatible with Evernote.  One app I recommend is CamScanner (IOS & Andorid), which allows you to share in the cloud and save as a PDF file.  Once you have captured the document on your mobile device, it will be in your Evernote account - which will be with you whether you are on your phone, computer, or tablet.  You can also scan documents into your Evernote account with other devices besides a phone or tablet.  Here is a list of devices that will streamline the process, truck.evernote.com/hardware.

    

3.  Clip articles while browsing the internet

Ever run across a interesting article or recipe on the internet and when you later try to find it you can't?  With the Evernote webclipper, you can clip the article and have it whenever you need it.  Here's an example of a article I clipped using Evernote:

What is also great about Evernote, is that it also provides a way to clip only the article without the clutter of the ads or page features.  Using Evernote Clearly (another browser extension), you can clip the article itself and get rid of any ads that are on the page that it is located on.  Here's an example of how a article looks using the standard webclipper and the same article using Evernote Clearly: Standard vs. Clearly (links open in Evernote).  Either way, you can "clip" the article into your Evernote account and have a copy of it in your account.  

4.  Explain with Skitch

It's one thing to describe what you are talking about, however, if you are trying to explain something to someone it can be a lot more effective to show them what you are describing instead.  With Skitch, you can capture your computer screen or markup a photo and place arrows or dialogue on it to describe in detail what you are explaining.  

Here's an example I provided in another guest post on notanotherhistoryteacher.edublogs.com, Evernote for the Social Studies: Evernote & Skitch.  What is great about Skitch is that you can take the photo and mark it up directly from the Skitch app (available both on IOS and Android), which makes life a lot easier.  As with this photo that I took while at the Palo Duro Canyon, I am able to show what "Red Claystone" looks like.  This works especially well in the classroom in trying to accommodate your lessons to include examples of the topic.  Skitch, now owned by Evernote, also allows you to upload your markups and photos directly into your Evernote account.  This way, if you are on the run and want to snap a photo and mark it up later, you can easily access it from your Evernote account and modify it when you are ready.  You can also do the same thing while on your computer and want to show examples of something or even trying to help someone with tehnical support.    

5.  Share your resources from Evernote with note and notebook links

Now that you have a plethora of resources, how do you share them from your Evernote account?  You have two options at this point, you can either a) share an individual note or b) share an entire notebook.  All of the following images were captured using Skitch for Windows PC: 

   If you choose to share an individual note, you can choose different options, as per the given example below:

If you choose to share an entire notebook (which you can do this by simply "right clicking" the notebook in Evernote you want to share and select "share notebook"), which is really useful if you use it to gather resources which you want people to be able to access at their convenience, you can create a public notebook link that will allow anyone to view or join the notebook:

Conclusion

Hopefully these are some good starting points for you if you are interested in using Evernote this year.  With so many different things you can do with Evernote, you'll find out that it can make life much easier.  You can find out more about Evernote and about other apps that work with Evernote at: www.evernote.com. 

If you are a educator and would like more resources for Evernote, please feel free to visit my Evernote Livebinder, Evernote for Educators:

Evernote for Educators

QuestGarden - easily create webquests

QuestGarden is a online website that you allows you to create "webquests" for your classroom.  

If you are unfamiliar with what a webquest is, a webquest is a what it sounds like - a quest on the web.  When you put a webquest together, it requires students to go out and seek information about a certain topic.   I put together a webquest when I was student teaching Economics over labor unions and my kids really liked the variety of activities that was incorporated in it.  Feel free to check it out by clicking on this link here. 

This is a great way to teach or reinforce a certain topic you want to go over with your students because it allows the students to go out and do the research and it allows you, the teacher, the ability to break down the lesson into different required parts (Introduction, Task, Process, Evaluation, Conclusion), as per the given example above. 

What is also cool about creating webquests in QuestGarden is that QuestGarden allows you to download your webquest into a zip folder - that way if you ever need to download the files for the webquest you can do so as you please.    

Most of the resources I live to share are free to use, however, QuestGarden does have a minimal (very minimal) cost to use.  For $20.00 you can have a 2 year membership to create and share webquests with your students and fellow teachers.  The return you will get from the $20.00 membership will definitely pay off.  When I was done student teaching, most of my students told me that this was one of the best activities they had done in awhile.  

You can register for a free 30 day trial with Webquest today and try it out.              

Easy Notecards - create and share flashcards

What is Easy Notecards?

Easy Notecards is a free online website that allows you to create flashcards and share them with your students or fellow colleagues via link or embed into your website or blog.  

What is great about Easy Notecards is that it allows you other options to utilize the flashcards than just flashcards themselves, you can also create a quiz, matching game, or a bingo game.  

If you need to as well, you can print out the flashcards and have a physical flashcard set.  

From a teacher's standpoint, I could see this working really well with students due to it's different options of sharing and different options of studying.  With the ability of making studying into a game (quiz,matching game, bingo) it allows students ways to break up their study time and look at it from different view points.  

Here's a example of what a embedded note card set looks like (click on the green arrow to go to the next flashcard):

With the option of being able to embed any flashcard set, you could easily put this in your classroom website or blog for students to study at their leisure.

I highly recommend Easy Notecards for your classroom, you can create a free account by going to the website, www.easynotecards.com.  

Livebinder it Tool

Livebinders is a excellent way to gather and organize information.  You can create separate binders for whatever topic you may be working on--i.e. education, finance, cooking, etc.  

If you are searching on the web and run across a website or article that you find interesting or useful, Livebinders gives you a very handy tool to simply click and save the URL into one of your livebinders, the Livebinder it tool.  Here's the "livebinder it" extension I use for the Google Chrome browser:

When you click on the extension, it will provide you with the ability to organize the content into a livebinder you've already created or you can choose to create a new one.  You can also choose whether to put it as a new tab or put it as a subtab into a existing tab:

What is also nice is that Livebinders also provides another handy tool, the "livebinder it button" for your website or blog.  If you have anyone who visits your blog or website and you want to give them a way to save a blog post or article you have posted, you can add the "livebinder it" tool to provide them the means to save that content.  Here's a screen shot of it on my blog:

These tools are definitely something that you should utilize to make your life so much easier online.  And, of course, this is free from livebinders.com, just as the website itself is free. Check it out!