Kahoot

Product Description:
This is an online quiz or testing system for teachers. Teachers have the ability to create or use quizzes or tests on the program. Students engage by using a laptop, tablet, or smartphone to submit their answers.

Glitchy Review:
I have used Kahoot in my classroom for YEARS! I love it because I am able to test or quiz my students on anything I have taught them in the classroom in the most engaging way possible. They have made tests and quizzes into a game. When my students know they are going to do a Kahoot they get so excited and engaged that their behavior is perfect, they are excited, and are following the classroom rules and procedures better than any other time. This program takes the stress away of testing and replaces it with excitement and fun.

The program allows the teacher to decide if the students should work individually or with a partner (team). The teacher then displays the Kahoot to the class and it will automatically generate an access code for the students to use to log in. Once in the students can choose a nickname for themselves; sometimes I have the students use their name when I know this will be part of their grade the rest of the time they can choose nicknames. "But what if a student chooses a name that is not appropriate for school?" Teachers have the ability to kick a participant out before the game starts and the student can re-log in with a proper name. Once the game has started the students are given 5 seconds to read the question before the timer starts. When the timer starts the students are given multiple answers to choose from and on their device (laptop, tablet, phone, etc) must choose the corresponding color or shape with their chosen answer. When time is up for the question students are shown the answer and where they are in the standings. Please note students get points for clicking the correct answer and how quickly they click that answer in. After the Kahoot is done with all questions you and the class will see "the final results" (the top 5 students in the class.) As the teacher you will have the option to download ALL student answers with a breakdown of correct and wrong answers (I will attach a result to the bottom of this blog) for you to download. The students will also get the chance to rate the Kahoot! I always have my students do this because someone (or you) did spend time on it and would like to see how other students are enjoying it.

I would absolutely recommend this program to every teacher. The best part....it is 100% FREE! That's right you heard me FREE!

Glitchy Rating:
I give this a 5 because you can use it with any grade 1-12th. Student engagement is astronomically high and really shows students how using technology can be a great learning tool!

User Rating:
I give this a level 1 user rating. This program is super easy to sign up and start your first Kahoot. Creating, downloading, and all the perks of this program are user friendly and easy to figure out.

Newsela

Product Description:

Newsela is a website which houses numerous different non-fiction articles for different grade levels. Teachers can either assign articles, quizzes, or writing based on these articles.

Glitchy Review:

Newsela is a decent program. I use the free version with my class and can still do many different things. While with all programs the paid version does give you more information there is still much to do with the free version. When you sign up you get a month of the paid program to check it out. The only flaw with this would be if you like the program you HAVE to be a school or district to get the paid program. There is not option on the site to order for the individual teacher. I am currently looking to find out if you can get Newsela for individual teachers. I will update when an answer is received.

For this review it will be a compare and contrast the free version to the paid.

First, with the free version you have access to all the articles available on Newsela as well as the quizzes and writing assignments. The only difference between the paid and free version is you can assign these to the students online while the free version you do not have that option. For me I just read the questions on type them up for my students. (Paper and pencil is still good!) The only thing you can do with the questions on the paid version and not on the free is customize the prompts.

Second, with the free and paid version you have the ability to change the Lexile level of the article to allow all students to read the same article at their level! (Hello access to the information!) Now students and teachers do not have to worry about students not being able to follow along or not have access to the information! (This is my FAVORITE feature! Yes, even more than the quizzes.)

Third, with the paid version you have access to all articles in SPANISH. Yes, you read that correctly, SPANISH. All quizzes, writing, and articles will be in Spanish as well. No other languages are available, but I am sure they are in the works.

Fourth, is a couple of things. With the paid version you will also have access to a report for each student with a breakdown of the concepts. This breakdown also allows you to see the class average, annotations made by students, organize the questions by CC Strand, view student progress, and compare your students to other students on Newsela. This works great for any teacher’s, schools, or districts looking for RTI information or small group information.

Glitchy Rating: I give this website a 4 simply because you have so much you can do as teacher on the free version. I really wish they would have a way for us to buy the program as the individual teacher and more language options available.

User Rating: This website is a level 1. You can go in there and begin working right away. It will take some “playing around” to figure out where everything is, but still highly user friendly for any of the user.

Here is the website for you: https://newsela.com/

Bloomz

Product Description;
Bloomz is a type of social media for teachers to use for their classrooms. It allows parents to join the classroom and the teacher the control of what happens.
https://www.bloomz.net/

Glitchy Review:
I love Bloomz! This app/website allows me to communicate with my parents quickly and effectively. I am able to create a type of "Facebook" page for my classroom where I can create posts, announcements, alerts, or events. This allows my parents to be informed of what is going on in the classroom whether it is for homework, project, awards, etc. I can even schedule conferences, that's right CONFERENCES! I just post when conferences are, time slot duration and Bloomz does the rest! I can send out reminders to parents of their conference time! In addition you can post for Volunteer Help. This is where you can have parents sign up for items or times to come in and help! Just like conferences you can send reminders to parents!

The app allows you to customize your Bloomz account to either allow or deny inter-parent communication, parents can choose a preferred language from 75 (goodbye to language barrier issues!), even how you want messages between you and parents will be stored!

Hands down the best part of this app is the set-up. This is almost identical to Facebook so user issues are almost non-existent. Parents can download the app on any SMART device and have immediate and up-to-date information about their student, activities, announcements, events and not have to worry about papers coming home from their students. I could go on and on about the awesomeness that is this app/website; but please go check it out for yourself!

Glitchy Rating
I give Bloomz a 5 because it is easy to use and incredibly valuable to teacher/parent communication.

User Rating
This is a level 1 app/website. If you can work Facebook, you can work this app.

Nearpod

Product Description:
This product is to allow teachers to create interactive lessons for their classroom. Teachers can create or use previously made lessons in their classroom. The product has a free account (which I always suggest); however, there are multiple different accounts available. (Refer to picture below) For this review, I will be using the free account or Silver account.

Glitchy Review:
When I found this website I thought it was just a different version of Spiral. After playing around with it I noticed it was not. I am happy I was wrong! This website allows teachers to create interactive slide shows or "lessons" for their class. You can either create your own or user created one. This allows teachers to check for understanding throughout their lesson. (As a teacher a different way of CFU is great!) There are multiple things I like about this website and a few I am not too keen on. Like always I will start with the good things.

The best part of Nearpod is the ease of use. This is SUPER easy for everyone to use (teachers and students alike). The dashboard, creating lessons, adding slides, adding activities, or adding web content is simple. Using the website is great for every level of technology user. Second, this website allows teachers to check for understanding in different and more engaging ways. Being able to check student knowledge in a way they are familiar with and more engaging overall increases student learning. The learning process has now become a game for students. Third goes along with checking for understanding; aside from being able to engage with technology are the different types offered by the website. Nearpod has 6 different ways (open-ended questions, poll, quiz, fill in the blank, draw it, and memory test) which students can answer in real time. These different types of activities allow the teacher to gain access to multiple learning styles within one lesson! Fourth, students are able to use their own devices! Any of those schools with BYOD policies, rejoice! Your students are able to learn how

• students can use their own device to respond (BYOD)
• SUPER easy for students and teachers to use
• add multiple slides with ease

One great benefit to signing up for Nearpod is you are able to access many interactive lessons created by other teachers. You have the option to create your own or use other ones. Either one you choose is going to be easy for you to use. The only catch is if you have the free account you have a limited presentation size but is still workable. In the end, the benefits to teachers and students are immeasurable (granted you can measure results, but you get what I mean.). The ability to create even more interactive lessons, beyond what we already do, is amazing! I can't wait to have classes start to get going on this program! I will have to see how this works in my classroom before I will decide to buy the Gold level. However, I am optimistic and should this do what I hope, I will buy it ASAP.

Glitchy Rating: I give this website a 5 because of the ease of use, student access abilities, and the multitude of lessons available to the teachers.

User Rating: I give this a level 1 rating; the ease of use on both teacher and student ends is outstanding. You don't need any videos to know how to use this, however, you can watch videos to get ideas of different ways to use Nearpod in your classroom.

If you would like more information on Nearpod please click the following link from the Nearpod blog. Enjoy!
https://blog.nearpod.com/improvement-to-the-live-session-experience/

Frontrow

Product Review:
Frontrow is an online product to review/teach students skills in both Math and Language Arts. The program is accessible from both computers, tablets, and SMART phones. There is a free version as well as a paid version; however, the paid version is only for schools/districts.

Glitchy Review:
This product is amazing. If you haven't started using this, you need to! I use the free version for my classroom and I am still able to do multiple different things for my students. Let's begin with the teacher dashboard. This is very user friendly. It is simple for teachers to find the information they are looking for. There are videos available to you to help you learn what each part does. The teacher has access to any things about each student. I could list them all but that would take a long time; here are a few highlights I find the most beneficial.

1. a time stamp on when a student logs in
2. an average grade level for Math and Language Arts based on use and answer of the student
3. breakdown of grade for each domain 
4. current standard of each domain the student is working on
5. suggested domain to have the student work on

As you can see multiple benefits to the teacher. If you are conducting the SST or RTI process on a student you can use the program's Report Card as data as well as a place to have the student work to review topics of other grade levels. This program also allows the students to go home and work on this at home because all they need to log in is their first and last name with the classroom code. Teacher benefits include creating targeted assignments in both subject areas. Please understand most of the good things you can do in math are not accessible in Language Arts. You can assign students activities within Language Arts but will not be able to see the results except for a couple of students.

I have been working with this program for 3 years now and seen benefits of it with multiple students. I had a student failing math in the fall and she committed (to herself, I did not know) to going on FrontRow every day for 20 minutes. By the end of the year, she had an A in math; she started at a 2nd-grade level. I have my RTI students use the program and they refer to videos already linked into the program and I use the suggested lessons when I pull them into small groups. There are so many benefits to the program on the free level I can only imagine what I could do if I had the paid version.

For the paid version I do know you have access to all assessment results, can share and access results from all grade level teachers, use these results to create RTI groups, and grade level teachers will be able to see the results to aid with RTI/SST interventions. You are also able to create assessments online for the whole grade level for your CFAs and the program will automatically grade and group the students for you. Hello to extra time during PLCs!T

Did I mention the layout of the screen and way to answer questions is IDENTICAL to the Smart Assessments we give our students for CCSS? It does and helps ease stress related to that because the student has already been working with this layout and don't have to worry about what to do to answer the question!

Glitchy Rating: Overall, I give this program 2 ratings. For the free version, I give it a 4 because you do not have access to everything. For the paid version, I give it a 5 because of the numerous benefits to both teacher and students.

User Rating: This website is a definite level 2. You will need to watch the videos or hit the Need Help button to really be able to understand all the things you can do.

I hope this post aids you in discovering FrontRow. Below is the website for you to go and get started. Enjoy!

www.frontrowed.com

Spiral Extension/Website

Product Description:
This website is designed to allow teachers real-time information from the students. There are 3 different ways provided to allow teachers access to the information. Students access spiral by downloading the app and entering the code. The product has team up abilities, sharing of anything you or other teachers make, and automatic save of information from the students.

Glitchy Review:
This product has some great parts and not so great parts. I will just start with the good parts. The product can be easy to use. The layout of the website is incredibly user friendly. Students are able to log in using a computer generated code, just like Kahoot and FrontRow, so no confusion there. Students are able to respond easily with little computer experience or from their smartphone or tablet.

Positives-
Quickfires: These are simple to set up. It is perfect for KWL charts. The Quickfire allows teachers to either prepare questions before hand and add questions as you go. Perfect if you want to gain more information from students as you go. This allows teachers to really gain knowledge from the students in a quick efficient manner and saves the answers for teachers to reference through the unit or lesson series. In addition, student answers are posted on the board and done anonymously (as the teacher you will know individual student answers) which allows all students to feel more comfortable sharing their answers.

Discussions: Again these are easy to set up. This is a digital version of classroom discussions; however with students being able to answer without speaking in front of the class allows teachers to hear from those students who are not keen on speaking in front of the class. The discussion is set up as a power point where you can either create one or upload one you have already created. I would suggest making one in Power Point or Google Slides before hand because you will not be able to move the slides around as you are making it. In addition, it has limited things to do. You will not be able to alter text size, font, or color. You are limited to what the program has. However, if you pre-create one using the tools previously mentioned ALL of your customization will upload and remain. (NOTE: animations will not load.) Again, this allows answers from students to be posted anonymously and as the teacher you will know individual student answers.

Negatives:
Team up:This part of the product seems to lacking. While it is great to show students what teams they will be in what they will need to do in their teams, even create specific objectives for each team; it can be difficult to set up. Again, this is basic in it's abilities. There is no real way for the students to digitally turn in their finished product. While it is great to keep up on the board for reference for students; that is really all this can be used for. If you are looking for something to create digital assignments I would use Hapara or Google Classroom. While it does has potential, it does not seem beneficial for teachers beyond a reference for students.

Extension: This product is found in Google Extension, but it really is not like an extension. There is no button added to the omni bar of Google. You still need to go to the website to access the product without a shortcut added. I don't really know if this can be called an extension if there is no shortcut added to Google Chrome. Please click here for direct access to the website.

Glitchy Rating;
I would give this product a 3 out of 5 because of lack of real classroom use for one of the key parts of the product and it not really being an extension of Chrome like it says it is.

User Rating:
This is a level 1 product (when you eliminate the Team Up part) because it is so user friendly for both teacher and students.

Here is a walk through video I made to aid in creating Quickfires and Discussions.:

Below are some videos for you to watch to see if Spiral will work for you.: