E-Learning Tools

Trello is a collaborative work tool that allows teams to visually plan and manage tasks. Utilizing a novel board system, lists and cards are used to organize and prioritize projects in a fun and flexible way. Trello integrates very easily with other major teamwork applications like Google Drive, Dropbox and Slack. What is especially helpful with Trello is that it provides the user with a large library of pre-made templates that are applicable to almost any situation. These built in models give students the opportunity to stay organized and improve their digital literacy skills.

Almost, synonymous with online learning and working at this point – Google Drive still remains a powerful tool for individuals and larger corporations. If you are someone new to e-learning Google Drive is a great tool to help get your feet wet by utilizing it’s synchronization and file sharing features. For advanced users, consider starting to integrate third-party apps from other organizations into your drive to help drive customized work. For example, the popular graphic design tool Pixlr now has an integration with Google Drive which allows creative teams to work collaboratively.

Educreations is an app that appeals to the content creator who wants to create engaging learning experiences. This tool, allows you to create whiteboard style slide animations and add images to customize learning experiences. Additionally there is an option to add audio to the slides you create in real-time; similar to the style of Khan Academy Videos. If you are a classroom teacher who has access to iPads this is a great tool which allows students to work collaboratively and creatively to make their presentations.

Google Classroom is a cloud based delivery system for educational materials. Teachers typically use it to organize course materials,quizzes and relay new information about class. What is especially interesting about Google Classroom is it’s elearning functionality like automatic quiz marking, Google Drive synching and communication channels for personalized feedback. Collaboration tool for teachers and students that allows educators to create assignments, receive feedback and track other information in a centralized location.

Remind is a free, safe messaging app that helps families up to date with what’s happening in the classroom from their student’s teachers. Teachers send messages to the parents/guardians of their students to remind them of homework or to pass off comments. It can also be used by coaches and club leaders to remind parents of upcoming obligations. Teachers have the option of allowing communication back from parents as well. Recently, the application gained access to google drive so you can send files such as permission slips home to parents.

Almost commonplace in schools now, Kahoot allows you to turn any lesson into game-based learning by offering students instant polls, quizzes and a response based assessment system. Every time, you are asked to join a game you are asked to assign a custom nickname for you within the game. As with any online activity you may want to discuss etiquette and digital citizenship and establish class rules before starting. You can use Kahoot to test student knowledge and make content expectations explicit to students.

Socrative is a web-based student-response system that allows teachers to create quizzes and student response systems for learning.. Students access questions via a Room Code, that teachers have control and access too. It gives teachers an incredible amount of variety in its ability to create quizzes, ask quick questions, and assign exit tickets. In addition to those basic assessment strategies, students can team up to play games which foster creativity while allowing teachers to access real-time results of these activities. At the end, teachers can see quiz data and download it through an Excel sheet or email it for further planning.

Mentimeter is a free-to-use, interactive presentation platform that allows real-time interaction between teachers and students. It’s interactive features make classroom more enjoyable, engaging, and inclusive.

Padlet is an online virtual “bulletin” board, where students and teachers can collaborate, reflect, share links and pictures, in a secure location.Padlet allows users to create a hidden wall with a custom URL. Padlet creators can also moderate posts, remove posts, and manage their board 24/7.