What is a URL shortener? URL shorteners take long URLs (web addresses) and turn them into smaller/shorter URLs that still direct you to the same site. Why would I need to use one? URL shorteners can be used for a variety of reasons. The reasons I use it the most:
My Favorite URL Shortener goo.gl Goo.gl is Google's URL shortening service. It shortens URLs just like tinyurl.com or bit.ly, but it also has some added perks.
These are a few screen shots of the analytics from a goo.gl that I created today: These analytics are interesting to me, and it doesn't matter to me if someone sees my link's analytics. However, if you do not want the public to have access to the analytics of your "goo.gl"s, I would suggest using a different URL shortener. (tinyurl.com, bit.ly, etc.)
For more information about goo.gl check out this site.
0 Comments
Hopefully, you are still enjoying your summer, but it is nice to start thinking about what you would like to do differently for the 2014-2015 school year.
A great way to motivate students, document growth, communicate with parents, and track students successes is with data notebooks. These are a few links that I found that have really great templates to help with starting your own data notebooks for your class: Montgomery County Public Schools - This sites has oodles of templates for elementary school data notebooks. Third Grade Data Notebooks - This is a blog from a teacher with links to different forms that she uses. Bugg Elementary's Notebooks - This is a magnet school in Raleigh that I observed this year. Their K-2 students have 3 ring binders for data notebooks, but their 3-5 students have digital notebooks. (They have a 1-to-1 iPad program.) This is how they organize their information: Sections Personal Profile: information about the student, their personal goals and objectives, and celebrations Academics: Common Core reading and math goals and objectives, data, artifacts, and reflections that document progress towards reaching goals Arts and Athletics: personal art based goals and objectives, data, artifacts, and reflections Communication: logs that reflect conferences, events/field trips, behavior concerns, and helpful resources I worked with data notebooks for several years at Wells Elementary. My favorite part was when we had "Data Notebook Parent Night". Parents came in to see how their child was doing, but the students led the conversations. Each student picked up their Data Notebook and explained everything to their parents. Using data notebooks helps encourage you as a teacher to document each student's individual progress. Students learn to focus on growth instead of comparing themselves to others. Feel free to email me with any questions about using data notebooks. These sites might be helpful with your listening centers. ![]() Storynory Storynory has published a free audio story every week since November 2005. The stories are read by professional actors. They have books and poems by classic authors, fairytales from around the world, myths and legends and much more! The site includes the text as well as the audio for each story. Storyline Online The Screen Actors Guild Foundation records actors reading books to children. The original video format is through YouTube. (You may have issues with the filter at school. Try it first.) If the YouTube video works, you can choose the closed caption option at the bottom of the player so that students can read along. If YouTube is blocked, at the top of the screen you have the option to "Select Player". SchoolTube should work better with our filter. http://www.uniteforliteracy.com/ This site has ebooks that have the option to be read aloud. Most of these books seem to be for the lower grades. If a child needs help on a page, they can just click the speaker at the bottom and the narrator will read that page for them. Highlights Kids From the creators of the magazine "Highlights". Students can choose whether they want to use the read along option or they can read the story on their own. Children's Storybooks Online This site includes books for young children, older children, and young adults. It does have some books that include the audio. Those are marked with a speaker icon. Just Books Read Aloud Not all of the books include text. Each book is presented as a video that shows the book while it is being narrated. (Since these videos are originally YouTube videos, you may want to try them before you share them with the class. The filter may block them.) http://addisonstales.com/ This site is an interactive site that allows students to read a story called "The Dream". It does not read the passage to students, but it does work on iPads. http://www.literalsystems.org/audiobooks 39 Free audio books! The text is not included on the site, but many of these titles are probably already on your classroom bookshelf. https://librivox.org/ Free Public Domain Audiobooks This site is really neat! The audiobooks are read my volunteers. You can even volunteer to read an audiobook through the site! Unfortunately, they are all audiobooks, so they do not have the text to follow along with. http://www.wegivebooks.org/ This site does not have any audio, but the books are familiar titles and the quality of the images is great. Create Your Own Audio QR Codes QR codes come in handy for lots of different things in the classroom. This site explains how your students (older grades) or you can create a QR code that links to an audio file. You can post the QR code on the title page of the book and if a student needs it to be read aloud to them, they just scan it! |
AuthorI am an Instructional Technology Facilitator for 5 elementary schools in Wilson, North Carolina. This is my second year as an ITF, but I have a total of 10 years of experience in education. Archives
April 2016
Categories
All
|