Digital Tools

We live in a digital world and so do our students. It is easy to feel bombarded by all the options out there and very hard to choose the ones that are truly useful. 

Here's my curated list so far. A few of these websites/apps cross over categories and are useful for a great many things. I am still finding new and different ways to use them. Feel free to share how you use them too. 

They are catalogued into...

1. Vocab builders & games
2. Video-making tools (for differentiation or flipped classrooms)
3. Interactive classroom tools. 
4. Assessment
5. Student voice
6. Feedback & feed-forward
7. Foreign language teaching tools

If you find that there are still TOO many options, you might want to start with just the ⭐ stars in each category and take it from there. 

1 Vocab-builders and games

All of these are useful tools to introduce, consolidate and give students agency over vocabulary. 

They are all fairly easy to make and offer different game experiences. Different classes might have favourites but my advice is that variety is key against the boredom gasp. 

Wordwall

This is an amazing website to create interactive, fun teaching resources for any and all subjects that are easily adapted and printed. It is so versatile that I have included it twice in this list and not by mistake. 

Although the free version allows you to make only five resources, you can still use any of the many others already made by the community. 

Cool because: 

• Loads of interactive, game-like templates.
• Easy to set up and use.
• Easy to share.
• Plenty of data afterwards.
• Customisable assignments.
• Lots of options for printables. 
• 🤩 The themes!
  
  
  
  
  
  

Quizlet 

Cool because: 

• Good for delivery, revision, and even for student-made sets. 
• Gets students physically active and collaborating -- Sign me in.
• Three engaging games, plus all the different ways you can play with Quizlet Live (google it!) 
• Can be printed as quizzes or glossaries.
• Sets can be easily exported
• The diagrams option
• The paid teacher version will track student work.
• Easy to share with students
• 🤩 Quizlet Live!

⭐Quizziz

Quizziz provides perhaps the most complete product for teachers, and most of it for free. 

Cool because: 

• Live games can be teacher-paced or student-paced. 
• Google Classroom scheduling and integration (including importing grades!)
• Student-paced quizzes encourage accuracy.
• Gamified homework with full tracking for teachers. 
• Gives tonnes of very specific data post games, which makes it great for assessment.
• The Flashcards & review options 
• You can look for and import individual questions from other people's quizzes.
• It offers the most variety of questions (multiple choice, open answer, text input, etc.)
• Easy to add audio to questions.
• The new Lessons feature.
• The premium account allows for explanations, video, audio slides and more.
• 🤩 The memes!!

Gimkit

Cool because: 

• The game is incredibly engaging. Students don't even know they're learning (that sounds bad but is actually good). 
• There are many incredibly fun different modalities to keep it varied.
• Streak bonuses that reward accuracy rather than speed
• It is very easy to import and make games (have a go at using the Import Flashcards option and just write or copy/paste a whole list)
• Easy to switch from multiple choice to text-input. 
• 🤩 The "Trust no One" mode! (a.k.a. that Among Us game we love, Miss. Can we play it please, please, please, please!!)

Kahoot

Cool because: 

• It injects energy to even the most sedated class.
• The paid version has new modalities, including unscrambling sentences.
• There are many kahoots already available.
• There is a new modality for presenting new information. 
• 🤩 Kahoot Homework!

Memrise

Cool because: 

• It uses SRI (spaced repetition instruction) to consolidate vocab
• It's fully free
• It allows you to introduce Levels
• 🤩 The leaderboard!

2 Video tools (for differentiated and distance learning or flipped classrooms)

⭐ Loom 

Cool because:

• The Chrome add-on allows several modalities and has no time limit
• It hosts the videos, so you won't need to sacrifice space or worry about uploads.
• It tells you how many people have watched it and even who.
• It allows students to record a video response and add comments/questions to specific points in your vid. 
• You can easily add a clickable timestamps menu in the description. 
• Best for last: it adds itself to GMail and links you send will play inside your emails. 
• 🤩The in-video reactions!!

Screencastify (and Screencast-o-matic)

I personally like the first option better because:

• The Chrome add-on allows for very quick and is very user-friendly.
• It uploads to your G Drive automatically.
• Easy to trim, label, and to share.
• It plays inside Google Classroom.
• It integrates with EdPuzzle, YouTube, and other options.
• 🤩 Screencastify Submit!

3 Interactive classroom tools & boosters

These tools are incredible for maximising communication and collaboration, which is very important in a language class but useful anywhere. 

⭐Flipgrid

I could go on and on about this one. It has started a whole movement in certain parts of the world, and with good reason. It's probably one of the most promising platforms out there. 

 

Cool because: 

• It is fully free and designed for education
• It allows for delayed multidirectional interactions with and between students. Even with experts outside of school. 
• It allows you and students to add all sorts of attachments to videos, even split screen drawing boards.
• Teachers can monitor student videos before making them public or keep them hidden from the community.
• Lots of topics on all subjects already out there.
• Very creative options for students to personalise their vids.
• Super easy to give students video feedback.
• Automatically generated, editable subtitles.
• You can share links or codes with students for specific topics. No need to have them join your grid.
• It is easy to set up and use, especially for students. 
• It creates QR codes of your and their videos with many possible applications.
• 🤩 The augmented reality option!!

PearDeck and Nearpod

Not the only options for interactive slides, but they are the two that I have chosen. Bear in mind that both have a premium option and the costs can be high, but Pear Deck's free version is pretty decent. I know that is the one I use. Here's why:

• You can get them working from Slides directly, no need to export to or from their website.
• You can play the lesson from your Drive too.
• They allow collating a great deal of input from students.
• They are great to get kids producing language, and for delayed correction. 
• Pear Deck is really easy to use and offers some very simple options.
• Nearpod has AI and can be used to create whole lessons for distance learning and differentiation. 
• They allow for tracking of students and exporting results. 
• 🤩 Student-paced too!

Jamboard and Padlet

These are the best free and paid interactive boards in my opinion.

 

JAMBOARD is cool because:

• It's free
• It's part of the GSuite so it is saved to your Drive, and
• integrates with G Classroom.
• Like with every other Google product, you can share in different ways, including making a copy for each student.
• 🤩 The page-swipe!

• PADLET is Cool because:
• It has many templates, which means that you can use it in many ways.
• It makes collaboration visible
• It keeps information organised
• 🤩 The backgrounds!

Coggle

Mindmaps are useful for all subjects but truly essential for language learners.

Cool because:

• They are interactive
• The free account allows for unlimited public maps
• Easy to share or embed
• Public coggles can be  copied or used as templates
• Easy to put together
• Presentation mode
• Chat included
• 🤩 The export options!

4 Assessment & interactive classwork

⭐ Liveworksheets 

I'm a big promoter and fan of this website. It was started by an ESOL Spanish teacher who knew exactly what teachers need (all teachers). His humble website has become particularly relevant in 2020 and will hopefully soar now that others are clicking on. (¡Gracias, Victor!) 

Cool because:

• Worksheets are self-making (Top marks!)
• It takes what you've got already and makes it look super cool.
• You can make whole interactive Workbooks.
• Lots of ready-made worksheets from other awesome teachers round the globe. 
• You can do pretty much everything for free.
• 🤩 The custom links!

(English)                                                                                                                     (Español)

EdPuzzle

Cool because:

• It tracks students progress to the minute!
• It integrates marking with Google Classroom
• It allows for flipped classroom lessons. 
• 🤩 The community library!

Wordwall

I had it at the top but here we go again. Wordwall can easily gamify your classwork and homework too. 

Cool because:

• All the games
• Easy to edit and make 
• No fuss sharing with students
• Lots of resources available
• Downloadable results
• 🤩 The Leaderboard!

Learningapps.org

Cool because:

• It is free
• The apps are super sleek, just like professionally made apps. 
• They are easy to make and share with students.
• Easy to find and copy templates from others
• Versatile and clutter free website
• Gives QR codes and links
• 🤩 The full page format!

⭐ Google Classroom (the GSuite) 

This one may seem odd but I would argue that, as a tool, it should probaly be at the top. 

Google's tools and apps may not be the most impressive in isolation but, together, they provide the most robust online teaching platform to date. No wonder it has become the default option post-2020. 

Cool because:

• It has so many tools, apps, add-ons already integrated...
• including Google Drive. (which you should download and manage from your computer!)
• Simple to use but very versatile if used and organised effectively.  
• 🤩 It is free!

5 Polls & Student voice

Mentimeter or Ahaslides 

These are similar to PearDeck and Nearpod, except for the fact that they are web-based. 

Cool because:

• Quick and easy to set up.
• Fun way of getting quick feedback
• Real-time feedback is visible too the whole class
• It can be stored and shared later
• Allows for anonymous (honest) feedback 
• Great visuals for polls and quizzes
• 🤩 The wordclouds!

⭐ Google Forms

Cool because:

• Did I mention the GSuite is free? Well, isn't that the coolest thing ever?
• You can make copies from your drive.
• Versatile.
• Easily exported.
• They allow for lots of questions.
• You can use them for self'marking quizzes from Google Classroom, which means
• it will allow you to importort their grades to GC!
• Forms are for more than just gathering voice and information. 
• 🤩 The progress bar!

6 Feedback & Feed-forward

⭐ Mote & Kaizena

Mote is the one I use nowadays because of how it attaches to EVERYTHING! but Kaizena is a really good option too. 

Cool because:

• Super easy to use.
• It´s a chrome extension and will basically attach itself to G Classroom. 
• The full version is free with an education account!  (but even the other version is just as awesome)
• You can send voice messages, voice shout-outs, voice instructions, and feedback too. 
• It is incredible for differentiation. 
• It integrates with GC all across!  (inside docs, slides, private comments, class comments, and so on). 
• It can be used for about 1 million things.
• 🤩 The clickable icon!

7 Foreign Language teaching tools

There is a long-standing belief that one can learn a language from just reading it, or otherwise listening to it, and effective text-based pedagogies have shown the idea to be generally true. 

These two websites are text-based learning... on steroids. Rather than just watch a video or read a short text, these apps exploit the language to its fullest potential by engaging students in a plethora of games that tackle the new text from all angles.

⭐ TeachVid

Cool because:

• The free version is very versatile
• Play as little or as long as you want.
• The premium version is in fact very affordable.
• It is designed for language learning.
• Lots of different interactive activities for students to practice the language in videos, rather than just focusing on the content. 
• 🤩 The challenges!

Textivate

Cool because:

• It is amazing for text-based approaches and self-study.
• It has enough activities and games to last for hours. 
• It is expensive -- but worth it for seniors and higher levels. 
• It works with language at both lexical and text level.
• 🤩 The sequences!