Ed Tech Blog
News and Information related to Ed Tech
Almost all of the resources listed offer an amount or a duration of free services. There are paid resources in this blog. The presence of these resources on this blog does not mean that CESD has provided licensing for said resources. Choices regarding technology resources are made at the school level, just as decisions regarding textbooks are handled there.
Plickers – Top App for all grades
This app is a super cool use of technology in the classroom in that you only need ONE DEVICE to engage an entire class. The teacher needs a cell phone or a tablet - that's it.In a nutshell (and it...
Sick of Kahoot?
I know in my classroom last year, kids were getting pretty sick of Kahoot. They loved the engagement, but it was the go-to app that EVERY teacher used. It wasn't novel any more. It was common. I'd...
Google Classroom Hack You Need
I discovered this little trick by accident. But it made a HUGE difference to me as a teacher. For the past 18 years, I have taught Technology in a junior high. I had my students twice per week for...
Free Math Apps for Chrome
Fractions? Geoboards? Clocks? Vocabulary cards? Number Frames? The Math Learning Centre offers a small, but high quality selection of Chrome apps to assist with teaching mathematics. Have a student...
Coin Games – Learn About Money
Learning about money has always been challenging. It may perhaps be even more challenging to a generation who sees adults using much more plastic and now even cell phones as a mechanism for payment....
Desktop Publishing with Lucidpress
One of the most common challenges new users to Chrome face is finding a replacement for a desktop publishing program. While there are many such programs on the market, one of the more familiar ones...
Catch Plagiarism with Draftback
Plagiarism is a serious consideration in any classroom, and it can be tough to conclusively catch. Obviously, teachers can copy/paste the segment in question and do a Google search of the content...
Math Pickle
Math Pickle is an amazing online resource containing math puzzles, games a mini-competitions, organized by grade! This site is aimed at TEACHERS. It is not a site to set your students loose on to...
What if there is no Wifi?
There's a widespread misconception that without Wifi access, Chromebooks are useless. This is simply not the case. Teacher Chromebooks will allow for "offline use", whether it is at home or at...
Chrome Music Lab
Chrome music lab makes learning about music more accessible through its myriad of sound resources through which children can experiment and learn. Your students can experiment with song making,...
Recreating your “Desktop” in Chrome
It's a bit different, but just as effective. In addition to being able to use colours on folders to assist with organizing, there is another handy trick. You may have already discovered...
Text on a Screen and Meaning
The image shown on this post provides a valuable classroom lesson regarding the loss of meaning when communication occurs primarily, predominately, or only in a digital environment. If I had texted...
What are Extensions & Add-ons?
I think we've all heard the phrase "There's an app for that!!" - the GSuite/Chrome environment is part of that vein of thinking. If there is something you have in mind to do with your document or...
Gamification Field Trip
The Battle for Scientia Terra On March 11, a small group of educators from CESD took a professional field trip to Fort Saskatchewan to visit the classroom of Scott Hebert (@MrHebertPE ) to witness...
Free Math, LA, Science Resource
The CK-12 Foundation is a California-based non-profit organization whose stated mission is to reduce the cost of, and increase access to, K-12 education in the United States and abroad. CK-12...
Insert a Page Break – New Feature in Google Docs
As has been mentioned previously, one of the great things about Google is that when a new feature is rolled out, you immediately have access to the new tool(s) without having to pay any money,...
Overnight, Automatic Notebook File Conversion
In an effort to ease the stress on teachers to convert their .notebook files to .pdf files (animation is lost, but content preserved), Myles in the CESD technology department wrote a script (aka...
Coding Resources
There are many ways to approach coding with young people. And the good news is that you don't need to be a coder. You don't actually even need to know anything about coding to expose the students in...
Moving Files from Your Windows Laptop to your Chromebook
You will be glad to be reminded that this is an easy task. Launch the Chrome browser on your Windows computer Slide it off to one side so that it only takes up 1/2 your screen. Go...
Self-Grading Quizzes in Google Forms
Make a new quiz & answer key In Google Forms, click Plus (+) . At the top right, click Settings . Click Quizzes -> Make this a quiz. Optional: To collect email addresses,...
CESD Kami Handbook
As questions arise regarding Kami, I have begun to assemble some of the ins-and-outs into a Printable "handbook" that includes screenshots to try to assist. The handbook will be updated as new...
The CESD Online Field Trip Form
Photoshop Replacement
One of our brilliant tech EAs alerted me to the existence of Photopea today - https://www.photopea.com/ - The screen actually looks exactly like Photoshop, and while it lacks a few of the "bells and...
I want to Print Photos from a Chromebook
OCR Scanning for Read & Write and Kami
OCR = Optical Character Recognition - it means that the letters on the pdf represent letters to the software as opposed to "dots" (You know you don't have an OCR scanned document when Kami reads...
Google’s Teacher Center
Chromebook Cheat-Sheet
Attached is a .pdf file of keyboard shortcuts for your chromebook!! I have used Kami to annotate (highlight in this instance) the most useful shortcuts for classroom use. For more details on Kami,...
Jeopardy Made Easy
“Jeopardy” Made Easy
More Free Digital Math Manipulatives
Free Digital Math Manipulatives
Embed Audio Files in Google Doc
Pear Deck for Google Slides
Google Calendar Tricks
Organizing Google Drive
Tips to assist with organization in Google Drive There are a few things you can do to assist with organizing your Teacher Resources in Google Drive. You don't need to do all of them, but to...