Accessibility

The language domains, listening, speaking, reading, and writing, are the 4 ways that people can interact with language. Two of these skills, speaking and writing, are described as productive skills as we create language with each of these. The other two skills, listening and reading, are receptive skills because we use these skills to receive information from an outside source.   In this post, we will focus on practicing the language domain of speaking and how Seesaw can help you meet this need.   But my students talk all day long… If I told a kindergarten teacher that we need students to...

Earlier this week I stumbled upon a podcast called Equipping ELL’s with Beth Vaucher. One episode that really caught my attention was “4 Ways to Easily Cover All 4 Domains Through a Read Aloud”. Beth walks through how to actively engage your students in all four of the language domains using just one read aloud. This post is based on the ideas that she shared in her podcast. Check out this episode, below! Why Use Read Alouds There are many evidence-based benefits of reading aloud to students. Reading aloud creates a classroom community by establishing a text known by the entire...

Ensuring all students are successful at learning content in your classroom starts with lesson preparation. The SIOP component of Lesson Preparation sets the tone for the entire SIOP framework. In this blog post, we will highlight two features of lesson preparation: choosing appropriate content concepts for both age and educational backgrounds and adapting content to all levels of student proficiency, and look at how these two features work hand in hand and when planned for effectively, can change the trajectory of your classroom. In specific, we will focus on different methods you can use to adapt texts so that you...

What I truly love about Apple and the iPad is their dedication to accessibility. (You can learn more, here). Below I present to you my top 5 iPad accessibility tips for the iPad! Tip #1: Enable dictation (it isn’t cheating) Dictation allows students to use the microphone to use their voice to type. This is POWERFUL for many students, and while it may feel a bit like cheating, I promise you that it isn’t. To turn on dictation, Settings > Keyboards > Enable dictation towards the bottom. Tip #2: Speak Screen and Speak Selection (this also isn’t cheating) Speak Selection...

Homepage You should be meeting the following requirements to ensure your homepage is accessible. Translated Text Fonts that are readable (avoid cursive or anything that looks cursive) Visual icons Below are two customizable homepages you can use and edit for your own class. There is a horizontal calendar option and a vertical calendar option. Click on the links for the canvas course to copy it in your course. Canvas Horizontal Calendar Homepage Canvas Vertical Calendar Homepage Common Icons I recommend starting the year with an intro and a key of common icons you use in your classroom, see example above....

Seesaw has updated their messaging! You can now add more than one person to a message, including students, other teachers in your building, and parents. Read on to learn more!

Dear struggling teacher, below you will find our 4 big suggestions when approaching this issue with best technology and SIOP practices, Smekens strategies, and utilizing our ELA curriculum resources.  Tip #1: Use accessibility features on the iPad, including those within Seesaw and Canvas. First and foremost, ensure your content is accessible to your students. Have you taught your students the basic accessibility features within the iPad? Be sure to take time to teach these features and then remind students to use them! This will allow your students to be more independent while working through work that the rest of the class has...

Dear frustrated teacher, below you will find our 3 big suggestions when approaching this issue with de-escalation, Trauma-Informed Care, and SIOP in mind.  Tip #1: Don’t take student behavior personally.  Before you can help students control their outbursts and time on task, you need to ensure your own emotions are regulated. This starts with rational detachment. In a nutshell, rational detachment is the ability to control our own behavior/emotions and not take student hostility personally. Sounding easier than it is, you may need to practice regulating your own emotions and reactions to student behavior.  Take a step back and take...

If you have yet to open flipgrid, here is your friendly reminder and gentle nudge to give it a try this school year. While there is no substitute for students speaking directly to a teacher or peer, flipgrid can be an amazing way to encourage students’ communication and dialogue. This is especially true for our English Language Learners who may benefit from extra time and practice before speaking.   Wait, what is Flipgrid? Flipgrid is a video discussion platform that allows all student voices to be heard. Students respond to prompts posted by their teacher by recording a video response....

The majority of my students in my 4th grade classroom are able to use writing to explain their thinking and answer any given problem. They may need sentence starters or a bit of extra support, but they will be able to find success and mastery just by writing. However, there is always a student or two that need a little more than extra support, and would benefit from being able to respond to problems in different ways. Explaining answers aloud is a common IEP accommodation and strategy for our EL students, but can often be mentally draining to put into...

In my classroom, I want all students to learn. Don’t we all? But I also want my nights and weekends to myself and not to be spent lesson planning. So how does one find the time to plan for all SIOP components within every lesson you teach and still work within contract hours? Well, the truth is… you don’t. At least not yet.  If you are just getting started on the journey to ensuring your lessons are accessible to all, let me be the first to welcome you to our quest. Below I broke down the SIOP components into two...

For some teachers, bringing technology into an elementary classroom can be overwhelming. What tools should you use? How much is too much? Or enough? What if the kids break their iPad? While these are all valid concerns, you’d be amazed at how seamless the experience of integrating edtech into your class can be. First of all, the kids are already used to using technology in their daily lives, so you don’t have to worry about going through that awkward learning curve (unless it’s for you!). Secondly, rather than turning kids into zoned-out zombies, when used correctly, technology will actually stimulate...

Why Should I add Audio? We need to continue to make material that is easily accessible to all of our students. Whether you are presenting a lesson, engaging students in a self paced activity, or sharing an agenda it is easy to add audio to google slides. Right now there are three different ways you can add audio to your google slides.  Using the Pear Deck Add on Since we have the paid version of pear deck we can add audio to a slide. This audio only works when you are sharing the pear deck with your students. Follow the...