Edmodo - Where learning happens. » Communities http://blog.edmodo.com The free and safe social learning platform for education Tue, 18 Jun 2013 22:08:09 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.2 Enter the National STEM Video Game Challenge http://blog.edmodo.com/2013/02/11/enter-the-national-stem-video-game-challenge/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2013/02/11/enter-the-national-stem-video-game-challenge/#comments Mon, 11 Feb 2013 20:50:14 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=9977 The National STEM Video Game Challenge, launched in 2010, aims to motivate interest in STEM learning among America’s youth by tapping into students’ natural passion for playing and making video games.

Organizers have set up a special Edmodo Community for educators to join and to help you get your students involved. Join the community and connect with the event’s organizers as well as other teachers who are mentoring students in the competition.

Check out 2012 winners & games

The Challenge

Middle and high school students across the country are challenged to create original video games, individually or as teams, and to submit their games for the opportunity to win important recognition for themselves and their communities. This is a great way to get students involved in STEM, in a non-traditional way. Visit stemchallenge.org to register.

Credits

The National STEM Video Game Challenge is presented by the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and E-Line Media. The Challenge is sponsored by Microsoft’s Xbox 360, Entertainment Software Association and AMD Foundation, with community sponsorship from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and Hive NYC Learning Network, and national outreach partnerships with Edmodo, Learning Games Network, BrainPOP and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

 

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2013/02/11/enter-the-national-stem-video-game-challenge/feed/ 1 Top 20 Shared Resources and Tools of 2012 http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/12/28/top-20-shared-resources-and-tools-of-2012/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/12/28/top-20-shared-resources-and-tools-of-2012/#comments Fri, 28 Dec 2012 15:14:08 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=9416 Edmodo Communities are a great place to connect with other educators to share resources and best practices. Leveraging your network on Edmodo enables you to surface the best resources to meet the needs of your classroom.

With the year coming to an end, we took at look at the top 20 tools and resources that were shared in 2012. Check out the list below and join an Edmodo Community to share your favorite tools with other educators!

Top 20 Shared Resources and Tools:

  1. KhanAcademy.org - Access a library of videos covering K-12 math and science topics. (Tip: Videos are also available within the Khan Community on Edmodo)
  2. Wordle.net - Generate word clouds from text you provide.
  3. Youtube.com - Watch and share videos.
  4. Prezi.com - A presentation tool to help you organize and share your ideas.
  5. Quizlet.com - Provides learning tools to help students study.
  6. MLA Formatting and Style Guidelines from Purdue.edu
  7. Glogster EDU - Make interactive posters and share them with your Edmodo group.
  8. Dance Mat Typing from BBC helps students learn to type.
  9. The Scale of the Universe 2 - Offers a neat way to visualize the universe.
  10. CoolMath.com - A popular destination for learning math in a fun way.
  11. Brainpop.com - Access hundreds of standards-aligned animated movies, quizzes, games, and activities that span all subject areas.
  12. Spellingcity.com - Game-based study of literacy skills using any word list.
  13. Easybib.com - A site for citation, note taking, and research tools.
  14. Studyisland.com - Provides standards-based instructional, practice, assessment, and productivity tools.
  15. Subtext.com - Enables classroom groups to interact in the pages of ebooks and digital documents. (Tip: Also available as an app in the Edmodo Store!)
  16. Bubbl.us - Create colorful mindmaps to print or share with others.
  17. Drawastickman.com - Draw a custom stickman and watch him come to life in an interactive adventure.
  18. Create a graph with this site from The National Center for Education Statistics
  19. Grammar Ninja - Sentence creator from Kwarp.com
  20. Tagxedo.com - Create visually appealing word clouds.

Note: Many of these sites offer sharing options, making it simple to embed the content in your Edmodo groups!

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/12/28/top-20-shared-resources-and-tools-of-2012/feed/ 8 Share Your Thanksgiving Activities and Resources http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/16/share-your-thanksgiving-activities-and-resources/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/16/share-your-thanksgiving-activities-and-resources/#comments Fri, 16 Nov 2012 17:45:50 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8847

Next week is Thanksgiving in the U.S. and many educators are looking for resources and activities to engage students.

We wanted to share a few great Thanksgiving activities and resources we found in the Edmodo Communities:

  • Lisa Siegfried, 7th & 8th Grade Language Arts teacher, shared the following activity:

“We do a Thanksgiving project where students write down three negative things in their lives that they are thankful for, and then turn them into positives. (I am thankful for a messy house. Because that means I have a family at home.) They then write each sentence on a smallish poster, and then drop them on the floor one by one. (They will each have 6 to drop.) We do this with the entire 8th grade, and the last day before break, I play a playlist of appropriate music while they walk across the gym to the middle to drop their posters on the floor. I do mine first. When the last student is finished, I take a mic and tell the audience that the papers on the floor represent all the many burdens that we think we have that are actually blessings. It is a really neat program.”

If you have any you’d like to share, visit one of the Edmodo Communities and post yours!

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/16/share-your-thanksgiving-activities-and-resources/feed/ 13 Students Cast Their Vote for President http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/05/students-cast-their-vote-for-president/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/05/students-cast-their-vote-for-president/#comments Mon, 05 Nov 2012 23:00:40 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8327 Last week, we launched Edmodo Votes as a way for your students to participate in this year’s election. We asked Edmodo educators to poll their students, in advance of election day, on who they think should be our next president.

Today, the results are in! Votes have been tallied and the following shows the breakdown of how students would vote in this year’s election*:

Will students’ opinions match the results of the election? We’ll have to wait and see tomorrow.

If you’re curious about how swing states voted on Edmodo, here are the results by state:

In addition to the Edmodo Votes initiative we also took a look at how students were talking about key election issues.  The following is a breakdown of what issues were being talked about most on Edmodo by both teachers and students.

Big thanks to everyone who participated in Edmodo Votes! We were overwhelmed by the number of responses and excited to see so many educators engaging their students around the democratic process, civic responsibility, and what it means to be a well-informed citizen.

View our previous post The Election and the Student Perspective, for a look a breakdown of how students were talking about each candidate on Edmodo.

*Polls were administered on Edmodo by teachers. The outcome represents a portion of students and is not reflective of the entire Edmodo student population.

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/11/05/students-cast-their-vote-for-president/feed/ 40 The Election and the Student Perspective http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/31/the-election-and-the-student-perspective/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/31/the-election-and-the-student-perspective/#comments Wed, 31 Oct 2012 19:01:51 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8257 Last month we launched our Election Insight’s Community and during the past eight weeks educators have been using the community as a resource to help teach their students about the democratic process, civic responsibility and what it means to be a well-informed citizen.

Through the community we’ve learned about the interesting ways educators are talking about the elections in their classrooms (such as back channeling during the debates), as well as the top issues that were of importance to students. The following infographic gives a snapshot of how students on Edmodo are talking about the elections. It outlines the percentage of mentions per candidate, the top issues being discussed and the top states (on Edmodo) talking about the elections.

If you’d like a copy of the infographic to share with your students, you can access it in the Election Insights Community.

Note: Next week we’ll be posting the results of Edmodo Votes 2012. Learn how you can participate!

 

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/31/the-election-and-the-student-perspective/feed/ 1 Edmodo Votes 2012 http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/25/edmodo-votes-2012/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/25/edmodo-votes-2012/#comments Thu, 25 Oct 2012 17:45:11 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8230 As this election season comes to a close we’ve been hearing how you’ve been using Edmodo to bring the debates and politics alive in the classroom – from Language Arts to Social Studies, getting students to participate can offer great learning opportunities and encourage them to be active citizens in the future!

Some of you have shared your classes’ view on the debates of this election through hashtagged polls and participation in our Election Insights Community. It’s great to bring the student voice to life. Today we’re launching a great way for your students to get their vote counted and participate in this year’s election – Edmodo Votes 2012.

To be a part of Edmodo Votes 2012 all you need to do is post a poll in your Edmodo groups, enabling students to place their vote for who they believe should be the next president. We’ll tally the results and share with the world just how students would vote.

To participate:

  1. Login to Edmodo
  2. Create a poll asking students to cast their vote. Be sure to use the hashtag #edmodovotes2012 (Learn how to create a poll)
    • Example: Which candidate would you vote for as our next President? #edmodovotes2012
  3. Run the poll with your class by Friday, November 2, 2012. We’ll compile the results and share them with you in advance of election day.
  4. Spread the word about Edmodo Votes 2012 on Twitter!

As always all data will be anonymized and aggregated so that your classroom and student data is protected.

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/25/edmodo-votes-2012/feed/ 26 Share Your Digital Citizenship Story, Get a Free Poster! http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/22/share-your-digital-citizenship-story-get-a-free-poster/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/22/share-your-digital-citizenship-story-get-a-free-poster/#comments Mon, 22 Oct 2012 16:07:45 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8146

UPDATE: This promotion ended on 12/4/12. Posters are no longer available.

Last month, in partnership with Common Sense Media, we announced a new resource for educators, the “Digital Citizenship Starter Kit.” The kit included a series of activities and lessons designed to introduce digital citizenship concepts right in Edmodo and are based on Common Sense Media’s free K-12 Digital Literacy and Citizenship curriculum. We made the kit available in the Digital Citizenship Community where it’s been downloaded by more than 12,000 educators.

This month we’re giving out a free digital citizenship poster for your classroom!

Complete this form, and we’ll mail you a 24 x 36″ printed copy of the “We the Digital Citizens Pledge” poster for your classroom. The poster can be used as part of the Digital Citizenship Pledge lesson available in the Starter Kit.  The lesson is designed to help students establish expectations and norms for online behavior.

*Please note that limited quantities of the poster are available and we can only ship to U.S. schools.

Tweet about the free Digital Citizenship Poster!

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/22/share-your-digital-citizenship-story-get-a-free-poster/feed/ 10 Election 2012: 12 Questions to Engage Students in the Debate http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/19/election-2012-12-questions-to-engage-students-in-the-debate/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/19/election-2012-12-questions-to-engage-students-in-the-debate/#comments Fri, 19 Oct 2012 23:17:41 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8198 The final presidential debate takes place on Monday and today we’ve got 12 sample questions you can ask your students before the debate! Choose one or more of the following questions and post them in your Edmodo group for students to respond to. If you have additional ideas to share, or you want to access more election resources, join the Election Insights Community.

Sample Discussion Questions

  1. What was your favorite moment in the presidential debate?
  2. Which candidate seemed the most prepared to answer questions?
  3. Do you think that two minutes is long enough to answer a debate question?
  4. Why would a candidate choose to present his opening statement first, if he won the coin toss?
  5. What would be the advantage in having the last word in a presidential debate?
  6. When one candidate is talking, what types of facial expressions and body language did each candidate use and why?
  7. Which candidate seemed to deliver his answers with more emotion?
  8. Did any candidate tell a story about a person impacted by a particular campaign issue? Was that story meaningful to you?
  9. Did the incumbent (candidate currently in office) seem more or less confident during the debate and why?
  10. Did anything said by either candidate change your mind on a particular issue?
  11. Do you think each candidate was respectful of his opponent, the moderator and the audience? Why or why not?
  12. What would be challenging about airing a presidential debate on live television?
]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/19/election-2012-12-questions-to-engage-students-in-the-debate/feed/ 12 Election 2012: Polling Students via Edmodo http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/10/election-2012-polling-students-via-edmodo/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/10/election-2012-polling-students-via-edmodo/#comments Wed, 10 Oct 2012 18:49:54 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=8105 The next presidential debate is tomorrow evening! This second round of debates will feature Vice President Joe Biden and Congressman Paul Ryan. To help you get your students involved and spark discussion in the classroom, we’ve put together directions on how to poll your students (a great way to engage them before, during and after the debates), as well as sample poll questions to provide students.

For more election related ideas and resources, join our Election Insights Community.

To create an Edmodo Poll:

1. Select “Poll”

2. Type in your poll question, or copy and paste one of the sample poll questions listed at the end of this post.

3. Type in the poll answer options.

4. In the “send to” field, type in the name of the group you want to send it to, then hit send to publish your poll.

Remember that all poll responses are anonymous. Students can select the “reply” option below the poll to add their thoughts and participate in discussion.

Sample poll questions:

Prompt discussion in your classroom by posting one or more of the following poll questions:
Tip: Tag your polls with the hashtag listed. We’ll aggregate responses to see how Edmodo students responded!

  • Overall, who do you feel did a better job in this debate? #debate [Biden/Ryan]
  • Which candidate did you feel used facts and expert opinion best to support his points? #facts [Biden/Ryan]
  • Which candidate spoke best? i.e. clear, organized, pleasant manner #speaker [Biden/Ryan]
  • Which candidate did you feel focused on the most pressing issues? #issues [Biden/Ryan]
  • Did you think the debate moderator was fair to both candidates? #fair [yes/no]

Do you have ideas for poll questions that you want to share? Add them in the comments or share them in the Election Insights Community.

 

 

]]> http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/10/election-2012-polling-students-via-edmodo/feed/ 5 Election 2012: Debate Activities for all Subject Areas http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/02/election-2012-debate-activities-for-all-subject-areas/ http://blog.edmodo.com/2012/10/02/election-2012-debate-activities-for-all-subject-areas/#comments Tue, 02 Oct 2012 06:53:55 +0000 Lucia Giacomantonio http://blog.edmodo.com/?p=7905 The presidential debates start this Wednesday, October 3, and we’ve pulled together activities for each subject area to help you engage students. All activities and resources are listed in our Election Insights Community, with a few samples highlighted below.

Join the community and view the “Collection” area for additional resources. Please share your favorites as well.

Social Studies - Host a backchannel discussion on Edmodo during the debates. Have students login to Edmodo from their home computer, laptop or mobile device. Within your group, post discussion questions and thought starters in real-time and allow students to respond.

Language Arts – Have students use this debate viewing guide to rate each candidate during the debate. Post the reflection questions (listed within the guide) in your Edmodo group for students to discuss.

Have access to Edmodo Apps? Download the free Votes Blasts app from StudySync and use it with the Votes Blasts lesson plan.

Science – Help students understand our Earth’s energy sources and alternative energy sources with The Great Energy Debate lesson plan. Use the small groups feature to host your own in-class debate on Edmodo and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of renewable and nonrenewable sources of energy.

Math – Use this Analyzing Election Data activity to get students thinking about quantitative data and statistics. After Wednesday’s debate, ask students to share a statistic stated by a candidate and have them share their findings in your Edmodo group.

A fun activity for all subject areas – Debate Bingo! Look for the bingo cards in the Collections folder of the Election Insights Community.

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