Back in the Classroom? These Remote Learning Apps Can Work There, Too
The era of COVID brought about a surge in EdTech. Relying on online tools became a necessity for teachers and their students. Educators were forced to quickly pivot and accommodate the learning needs of their students in a virtual setting. They navigated this alternative method of teaching and discovered different educational apps to use in the new classroom. Check it out here.
Popular EdTech Apps for the Virtual Classroom:
- Jamboard - A digital, interactive Google Workspace whiteboard used for collaboration and sharing ideas.
- Pear Deck - An interactive presentation app and add-on for Google Slides that allows teachers to engage with students and share instructional content.
- TeacherMade - A digital worksheet app that can be used to convert tasks on paper into online activities and engaging virtual class material.
- EdPuzzle - An app for creating interactive video lessons that can be integrated with your school’s LMS.
As life begins to pivot back towards more traditional classroom settings, the question of which apps to retain arises. Educators will have to determine which ones best support their daily routines and instructional strategies. We all understand how important it is to use the same apps frequently so students have familiarity and class time isn’t wasted on tech support.
Since students have lots of familiarity with the apps they used during COVID, teachers should ask themselves if the same remote teaching and learning apps can work back in the physical classroom. After using all 4 of these apps back in the classroom, I learned some of the advantages each one offers.
Integrating New Educational Apps
A traditional class period ranges from 35-45 minutes. Maximizing instructional time during these minutes demands teachers establish set routines, are consistent, and make smooth transitions. When considering the integration of new educational apps back into the physical classroom, educators will have to determine which ones are best.
They need apps that support their daily routines and instructional strategies. It’s important to use the same apps frequently so students have familiarity and class time isn’t wasted on tech support. My high school science classes generally run the routine of opening review, exploratory activities, and final wrap-up. Jamboard is one app that supports my classroom routines.
Jamboard
On the surface Jamboard provides a virtual whiteboard in which teachers can display their work and thought processes to students. It provides the option to open up the session for students to edit and add. Another benefit comes from tracking which students are participating and to which extent. This can be accomplished by viewing the icons that populate the screen. Teachers then have the opportunity to encourage missing students to make a minimum contribution. The app even has options for peer editing and corrections.
Jamboard can benefit classes during in-person instruction in many ways. It allows students to stay focused at their seat and minimizes lack of participation due to not wanting to physically move to the front or anxiety over being watched. The anonymity of the computer offers added bravery for many students, and that’s a good thing for engagement.
Pear Deck
Pear Deck offers complete anonymity for students and the opportunity for the teacher to see specifically how they are approaching a problem. While this can be done in person by walking around to check students' work at their seats, it affords teachers the chance to make corrections without other students hearing those corrections. Any common misconceptions can then be addressed to the class as a whole.
I have found that the individual participation is at its highest with Pear Deck when compared to traditional live openers or Jamboard. Pear Deck sessions can also be saved to track student participation and comprehension. This goes a long way during conference time to provide a concrete set of data to support student grades and progress.
A downside is that this can be time consuming if there are multiple questions you want to assess. The implementation will rely on the educator determining how many review questions are necessary for the lesson and how important full participation from each student is.
When it comes to the exploratory portion of lessons, there is generally a lab in the science classroom. Labs have long been a time consuming process both in live and virtual settings. Labs are to the science teacher what essay writing is to the English teacher. They take a long time to grade.
In my classes, we average 2-4 labs per week in the live setting. This creates a large backlog of papers for me to grade and unfortunately leaves students with too much time between their submission and my feedback. The alternative has been to have students turn in work as partners or small groups but with that, there are the inevitable work inequities and that the weaker students are just “along for the ride.”
TeacherMade
TeacherMade is an educational app for teachers that I recommend because it can erase the grading of many papers and provide instant feedback to students. I found this digital worksheet app during COVID instruction. It completely changed the lab game for me. The app allowed me to take existing lab worksheets and insert a variety of answer options along with answer keys.
Now I have a library of lab assessments that can be completed and graded almost instantaneously. The versatility to offer multiple choice, free response, dropdown menu, or checkbox answers lets educators pick which questions to assess at which knowledge level. Lab sheets can even be pre-populated with data for absent students.
Predicting answers for open response answers can be problematic, but this app offers a quick “update” button for a review as well as an open response option. Using this is helpful for those open-ended questions that will invariably vary by student. These are not automatically graded and the educator can choose whether to award points for the responses or not upon review. The app does make it very quick and easy to grade these.
End of class or topic review is another area that becomes routine within the classroom and, more so than other areas, tends to consistently be part of the time crunch of the class period. If a lab runs long, or too much time is spent reviewing homework at the beginning of class, review can often wind up on the cutting room floor, so to speak. With TeacherMade, the students can do their reviews more quickly and also access them from home.
EdPuzzle
Another fate for the review/reteach portion of lessons is homework. Specifically in these cases, I have found EdPuzzle to fill the gap perfectly. With their wide variety of pre-made video lessons and the opportunity to tailor make your own, this is a perfect way to wrap up a topic and assess student understanding.
A quick 3-6 minute video tutorial with carefully placed questions will not only provide students with the wrap up you may have run out of time for but also give them the chance for guided practice.
The Post-COVID Classroom
As all teachers take some well deserved rest over the summer, I would invite them to evaluate the ed tech they discovered and utilized during COVID instruction. Critique what worked and what didn’t within virtual instruction and begin to imagine how these apps might perform in the traditional classroom setting.
Which apps and programs will serve to enhance in-person instruction and support student learning both in and out of the classroom? How do those apps save educators and students valuable time? How much integration of ed tech do you envision and can you create a routine for students so as to eliminate excess downtime?
This past school year certainly gave teachers a wide range of ed tech options to consider moving forward. Identifying which apps add value to both in-person and virtual learning will help educators find technology that they can adopt long-term.
-------------------------------------------
Tiffany Scholle is enjoying her 13th year as a high school Chemistry and Forensic Science teacher. She holds a bachelor’s degree in molecular biology and master’s degrees in secondary education and teacher leadership in the life sciences. Tiffany has spent her teaching career developing curriculum and designing lessons that engage students in forensic science and promote a continuation in the STEM subjects beyond minimum graduation requirements.