Tech Tuesdays: Class Q to Support Students Asking for Help

It’s not too late to register for the NJCTE 2018 Fall Conference: Approaches to Writing, K-12! Featuring keynote speaker NCTE President Jocelyn Chadwick, the conference will take place September 29 at Kenneth R. Olson Middle School in Tabernacle, NJ. Register today!

Share what you’re looking forward to at the Fall Conference all this week on Twitter, using  #NJCTE18 to join our pre-conference slow chat!

---

by Kathryn Nieves (who will be presenting on Saturday as well!)

Struggling to assist all of your students at once? Can’t figure out whose hand was up first? Feeling guilty because you can see other students with their hands in the air while you’re working with another? With Class Q, that isn’t a problem anymore.

Class Q is a website that allows you to keep track of students that need your help during a lesson. While there are premium and school packages that require a fee, most of the features can be applied to the free  version.

Once you have registered for a basic (free) membership, you are ready to get started using it in your classroom. While you are logged in and waiting on the homepage, select “Teachers” from the page options.

Select the blue “start” button from the next screen to get started using the tool. The website will generate a class code that students can use to join the Class Q session.

From the student end, they would go to the Class Q website and select “Students” from the page options on the homepage. Students do not need an account to use the website. Instead, they will simply add their name and the code from the board when they are ready to ask a question. The free version limits you to 5 students waiting in the queue at a time.

Students can select the large red button that says “Assistance Needed” when they need help on an assignment.

On the teacher end, you can see the names of the students who are waiting for assistance. It comes up in the order in which the students asked for help, so you will know who to assist first. When you’re finished working with that student, you can click on their name to remove it from the list. Students will see their number decrease as they are waiting, too.

Students can also cancel their request for help if they figure out their question while they are waiting. Using the comment feature, students can post the specific part of the assignment where they need help. Then you can prepare to help them accordingly. Clicking on the purple speech bubble will remove the comment from the screen, just in case you are projecting Class Q on the board.

When you’re finished with the class or done with the independent work activity, just select “end session.” For premium users, a log can be saved with all of the names of the students who needed help during the class period, which can be useful in future planning.

Class Q is an easy way for teachers to track the students who need assistance during class and keep track of their individual needs and questions. Its simplicity on the student’s end makes it a great tool to try out in your classroom.

New Jersey Council of Teachers of English, the New Jersey state affiliate of NCTE, the National Council of Teachers of English

Tech Tuesdays: Talk and Comment

EVENT ANNOUNCEMENT: Coffee Klatch at Panera Bread, West Orange, NJ, on Thursday 9/20/2019, 4:30 p.m. to 5:45 p.m., to launch the 2019 School Writing Contests. All are invited.

Illusion and Reality:   How have these shaped your life for good or for bad?   – This will be our theme.  The prompt based on this theme will be posted shortly.  Start thinking….

—————————————————————————————————————————————–

by Kathryn Nieves

The beginning of a new school year always brings the challenge of finding new tools to support the needs of each student. For me, that means there is always one or two students that have a need that my list of extensions, websites, and tools, do not support. This year, as I was planning to introduce text annotation to my sixth graders, I thought about my students who struggle to type their words or need speech-to-text tools. How could I get them to annotate on a webpage? Then I found Talk and Comment.

Talk and Comment is an extension for Chrome browsers that allows students to make voice comments on any webpage. Typically, my students use Diigo to highlight and make comments on their reading, but for my students who need the voice typing support, this provides another alternative.

Once added from the Web Store, Talk and Comment requires approval to use the device’s microphone. After approval, the tool is immediately ready to use.

The logo on the toolbar at the top of the browser allows you to toggle the extension on and off based on usage and preferences. When the extension is activated, the logo will appear in a circle in the middle of the browser scrollbar. Clicking on it allows you to begin recording immediately.

Clicking the X will stop the recording from saving. Selecting the check mark will cause a popup window to appear with the URL to the recording that can be copied and then pasted to a variety of places.

The notes can be copied and pasted onto social media websites, like Twitter or Facebook, and they will immediately turn into a recording file that can be played.

In addition, the comments can be pasted into Google Docs, providing similar results. Students can keep all of their recordings in one Doc as notes and then share the notes with a teacher or peer for them to listen. Pressing the play button allows you to listen immediately within the Doc.

If the transition from URL to recording file does not occur right away, highlight the URL and press Ctrl + K to move the process along.

For students who do not have access to Chromebooks or laptops with a Chrome browser, this tool is also available on Android phone devices from the Google Play Store. It functions in a similar method as the extension but appears in the corner of your device’s screen as opposed to on the scrollbar, which allows for recordings across apps.

Talk and Comment is an easy-to-use tool that doesn’t have a lot of overwhelming features, which makes it perfect for struggling students in an ELA classroom. Students can use it to record their ideas, comments, or even feedback in peer review, and then share it with others through the URL. The fact that the other user does not even need the app or extension to listen to the recordings makes it ideal for classroom use.

---

Don’t forget to register for the NJCTE 2018 Fall Conference: Approaches to Writing, K-12! Featuring keynote speaker NCTE President Jocelyn Chadwick, the conference will take place September 29 at Kenneth R. Olson Middle School in Tabernacle, NJ. Register today!

Early Registration for Fall Conference Ends Sept. 19

Tech Tuesdays: Bookopolis — One Way to Track and Engage Students in Independent Reading

When I started off this school year, I was searching for a new way for my sixth graders to engage in independent reading. Aside from traditional book talks, discussions, and journal entries, I wanted more opportunities for collaboration. I previously used a Google Slides template with shelves to add the covers of books they had currently read, but I wanted something more. I looked into using GoodReads, a great solution for older students, but needed something to fit within my students’ ages. Then I found Bookopolis, a website that markets itself as a “community of young readers” where students can safely post comments, reviews, and share books in a confined space.

Bookopolis requires a teacher to sign up and create a class in order to activate the account. Teachers are required to provide their school name and their own information. An avatar can be chosen, but there are no real photographs allowed; instead stock-image options of animals, cartoon people, and other icons are provided.

When you are transported to the dashboard, you have the option to add classes. The only requirements are a class name, grade, and school year. You can also choose a range of grades if you teach multiple.

One of the nice features of Bookopolis is that students can sign up using a Google account instead of having the teacher manually add each student’s username and password. When a teacher creates their account, it automatically links any Google Classrooms associated with that email.

Clicking on “My World” shows the homepage as a reader. It provides a place for students to add books, a list of their classmates, and badges. When you click on “My Books,” it brings you to three book lists that students can use: “Reading it Now,” “I Read It,” “I Want to Read It.” Students can add books they are currently reading, they have read in the past year, or that interest them. On the left-hand side are Quick Actions, where you can add books to the list or search through books.

By clicking “Add to My Books,” you will be prompted to search for a book or search by genre. When you find the book you are looking for, you can select one of the three buttons under the title to add the book to one of the three lists.

Selecting the book opens a lot of information for the student. There is a grade level indicated, as well as a potential range of grades who would be interested in the book. A guided reading level is also offered for teachers looking to pair students in similar groups. The students can also read reviews from other users. If the user who reviewed the book is one of their classmates, the student’s username will appear. However, if the review comes from another student in a different class or school, Bookopolis protects anonymity by referring to the user simply as “Bookopolis Reader.”

The “Reviews” section is also the place where students can compose and post their own reviews. They give it a rating out of five stars and compose the review of the text. Students can also check off grade levels that might be interested in the book and recommendations for students who like different genres.

Other tabs on top of the recommendation page include “Book Buzz,” which allows the student to write short summaries of the book and their favorite moments, “Report,” which provides the student with three questions and three choices per question in which they can respond about the book. The final tab is “Recommend,” where students can actually send books directly to their classmates if they think the person might be interested in the book.

As students use Bookopolis, they become part of the gamification process. They receive badges for various tasks, including writing reviews and making recommendations.

Teachers can monitor student work through the “Monitor Classwork” sidebar to see student book reviews, popular books, or book buzzes and reports.

The last section, the Reading Log allows students to log their amount of time reading. Based on the discussion of the relevance of reading logs, it is up to the teacher to decide whether or not to utilize this feature.

Bookopolis provides a safe space for students to share recommendations and reviews and interact with their classmates. It is an engaging option to add to independent reading experiences, especially at the elementary and middle school level.

---

Don’t forget to register for the NJCTE 2018 Fall Conference: Approaches to Writing, K-12! Featuring keynote speaker NCTE President Jocelyn Chadwick, the conference will take place September 29 at Kenneth R. Olson Middle School in Tabernacle, NJ. Register today!

Book Review: Using Grammar to Improve Writing by Sarah Tantillo

by Susan Chenelle

First off, the journalist in me requires that I state that this is not an unbiased review. I have had the benefit of Sarah Tantillo’s wisdom and guidance since the beginning of my teaching career, nearly ten years ago. That said, I would not have taken time out of the precious last days of my summer to write this review if I were not so genuinely excited about Sarah’s recently published third book, Using Grammar to Improve Writing: Recipes for Action.

Tantillo’s approach forefronts the critical why of grammar instruction, i.e., learning to write and express ideas well. As she emphasizes in her introduction, “How we frame grammar instruction matters. If you view it as ‘fixing incorrect sentences,’ you teach it that way. If you view it as ‘building strong, compelling sentences,’ you take a different approach.”

Tantillo’s first chapter, “What should we STOP doing?” goes after four dysfunctional yet common elements of grammar instruction, including having students copy down grammar definitions or rules, having students correct error-laden sentences, and over-editing students’ work. After clearing the decks, so to speak, Tantillo presents principles that will help teachers design lessons that engage students in developing their skills in noticing and wrestling with syntax and language choices and their effects, rather than memorizing rules by rote and trying to remember when and how to apply them. Instead Tantillo encourages teachers to use model sentences from the texts students are already reading to give students opportunities to imitate and/or expand upon them after acting as detectives to identify the grammatical moves each set of model sentences exemplifies and infer the writer’s intention in crafting them that way.

Tantillo grounds her clear, practical directives in research about grammar instruction and teaching best practices, synthesizing the ideas of educators like Constance Weaver (Teaching Grammar in Context), Doug Lemov (Teach Like a Champion), and Jeff Anderson (Mechanically Inclined). These references to such well-respected and well-known teaching texts make clear how Tantillo’s approach sits within the field. Her work, moreover, and her insights about opportunities to capitalize on, pitfalls to avoid, and ways to fit everything in also draw on Tantillo’s extensive experience in the classroom.

The book is structured in a straightforward, easy-to-use format; readers can absorb the fundamentals of Tantillo’s approach in part one and then dive into the specific section of part two relevant to the grade level(s) they teach. Tantillo also emphasizes the importance of teachers knowing the standards above and below the grade(s) we might teach so that we can meet our students’ diverse needs; this volume makes it easy to see the underlying skills or understandings to target when students are struggling with tasks specified for their grade level in the CCSS. Along with her breakdown of the standards for each grade, she gives concrete advice for how to teach each standard, complete with sample pitches for conveying the importance of each skill to students and “genre alerts” that highlight particularly effective opportunities to teach certain aspects of grammar with specific genres of writing (i.e., teaching interjections and verb tenses with narrative writing). The appendix offers a handy CCSS tracker and sample overviews of weekly grammar, reading, writing, and vocabulary routines based on the particular genre(s) being taught.

While I have already recommended this book to the English department at my school, I will be sharing two bits of Using Grammar with all of my teachers in September: 1) her reminder that “telling is not teaching” in chapter one, and 2) the strategies she shares at the end of chapter four for combatting learned helplessness in our students. As anyone who has attempted to teach grammar knows, persistence and effort are at the heart of revision in writing, but they are also at the heart of learning in general. Tantillo urges teachers to wage this battle by “encourag[ing] engagement and accountability,” “provid[ing] models for clarity, and “encourag[ing] risk-taking.”

These nuggets of wisdom exemplify the thorough, thoughtful support Tantillo offers teachers in this book. Teachers starting a new school year will find it a valuable resource that will help them begin with clarity and purpose.

---

Don’t forget to register for the NJCTE 2018 Fall Conference: Approaches to Writing, K-12! Featuring keynote speaker NCTE President Jocelyn Chadwick, the conference will take place September 29 at Kenneth R. Olson Middle School in Tabernacle, NJ. Register today!

Tech Tuesdays: Owl Eyes — Read, Annotate, and Collaborate

Making literature accessible to all students can be a difficult task. It’s hard to have enough time in class to fully read texts and dive into analysis, which results in a lot of the material being read at home. Owl Eyes can assist with that process for teachers by saving them time while still supporting students while they read outside of the classroom. Owl Eyes offers different annotated e-books that can be shared with students while still allowing teachers to track their progress.

Once you create an account, you will be brought to the main homepage, which allows you to select between browsing books or creating a class. You’re also able to see what books you are currently reading and a list of suggested books is offered. If you click “Browse Library” a drop-down menu appears with different options to choose based on your classroom needs.

If you select “Annotated Books,” you are brought to a list of all of Owl Eye’s already annotated novels and texts.

When you have found the text you want to view, you will select it and the main access page will appear. Initially, you will be met with a synopsis of the text. In a blue sidebar, the literary period, publication date, Flesch-Kincaid level, and average reading time will be provided. You will have several red button options, including the opportunity to begin reading, adding the text to “My Books” for later reading, or the chance to download the text as a PDF. A drop-down menu under “Table of Contents” will allow you to jump to a specific point in the text. Analysis resources are provided in that drop-down menu and there are even teaching resources, although some of them require a paid membership.

If you select “Start Reading” you will be met with the first page of the text. The text appears like an e-reader with the different icons for navigation at the top of the screen.

Some of the text will be highlighted in yellow as you read, which is an indication of where Owl Eyes has made annotations to enhance comprehension and understanding. If you select the funnel on the navigation menu, you can filter through different types of annotations based on your interest while reading. The types of annotations vary based on the resource, ranging from persuasion devices, historical context, literary analysis, symbolism, and characterization, among others.

Returning to your homepage, you can create a class for your student and assign them texts. Click on the “My Classes” tab on the homepage and then select the red “Add a Class” button. You will be prompted to name your class and provide information about it. To have students join, you can either send them an invitation through their email or use a class code provided by Owl Eyes to have them join themselves. There is even the option to send the invitation to students through Google Classroom.

When you assign a text to students, you can add your own annotations to help them. Go to the text you want and highlight the necessary words or phrases. Three icons will appear that allow you to highlight and write your own annotation for students to view. Highlight the text you want to stand out and then select the comment icon to add your own annotation. You can give it a tag so students can filter through your annotations easily. Then save your annotation. Students will be able to view the annotation when they are reading the text now.

Students can reply with questions or comments to your annotations as they read, which can lead to in-class discussions and opportunities for teachers to help students at home or promote peer assistance.  

When students are enrolled in your class, you can also monitor their progress through the text and see which page they are currently reading. You can also view any annotations the students are making on the text themselves. This view is through the “My Classes” tab from the homepage. You can see the progress and annotations by selecting the student’s name. You can even reply to their annotations without leaving that page.

Owl Eyes is a collaborative tool that allows for student support as they read outside of class. Teachers can provide resources to help students as they read and can track the progress of their students, determining who may need extra assistance in class. This resource would allow teachers to also determine points of review for the class period based on the progress of the class in the reading assignment. Owl Eyes covers a wide range of literature used in English courses at both the middle and high school level. While some of the tools require a premium membership, the majority of tools are accessible through the free account.

New Jersey Council of Teachers of English, the New Jersey state affiliate of NCTE, the National Council of Teachers of English