updates

Welcome to the 2023-2024 school year! Below are some important updates, a quick AI overview, and update on programs that we do, or do not, have access to, and some more tidbits of information you might find helpful as we start up the school year. We will link some of our blog articles in the monthly Tech This Out newsletter, but if you want an immediate notification, subscribe to our blog! Tech Coaches Your Instructional Technology Coaches will be working in your buildings more frequently this year so if you see one of us, be sure to grab us and...

We have been working hard pushing out content that is accessible, quick, and meaningful. We hope you enjoy the various methods we are using to get information out to you as we know Time is sacred! ✨New✨ Podcast Don’t have time to watch something? Need something quick? Want to listen to EdTech tips and hacks while you set your room up for the morning? Listen to our Podcast 👇🎙️ Our latest episode is on our favorite IXL features and is only 7 minutes! We will be pushing new episodes out every other Friday. Be sure to subscribe and give us...

Canvas has regular updates and from time to time, we’ll write about those here on the blog so you’re aware of some of the more important changes. This month, there are three small, but helpful, updates we wanted to make you aware of. Gradebook labels As you know, Canvas adds labels to the gradebook automatically. Starting this month, the “Missing” label will automatically be removed when you add a score. This is nice because before, you had to manually change the label. Saved mouse clicks for the win! Splitting First and Last Names There is a new setting available in...

Each month, the Technology Ambassadors work hard to create resources, materials, and other tools to help you with planning, brainstorming, or getting quick tips. To make them easy to find, we’ll publish the collection here on the blog as well as send an email digest. To get these updates in real time, subscribe to email notifications in the box on the right. Blog Posts Digital Interactive NotebooksDigital interactive notebooks are a fun, new way to help keep students engaged and organized digitally. Sketchnoting in the ClassroomSketchnoting is the strategy of mashing together the use of visuals along with words to...

Okay, so it’s not quite a bracket but you have to admit the title is catchy. This spring our PD website is overflowing with options for Elkhart teachers! The Ambassadors have been working on several options to carry on the energy from the secondary institute on February 6th and to prepare for our next eLearning Day on April 1st, which will be the first eLearning day for the elementaries. (Seriously, it’s on April 1st, this is not an early joke.) We’re going to try a few new methods for offering PD that makes it easier on you to attend and...

It’s cold outside, but Canvas has some ?? updates this month that we wanted to briefly outline. The updates this month provide two new tools that you can try out in our courses started today. Direct Share Sharing materials between courses is tricky. You can either set up a shared, empty course that holds materials. Any teacher in that course can then import those materials into their own class. The downside is that you now have another course to manage in Canvas. Starting today, there is an option called Direct Share. This option allows you to either copy materials between...

The Canvas SpeedGrader works well in general, but it can take a lot of clicks to get a score into the books. We’ve added some customizations to the SpeedGrader that will make scoring assignments on your computer faster. Essay Scoring If you give a quiz in Canvas, you need to manually score File Upload and Essay questions. Plus, you had to score each individual question. We’ve added a tool that automatically scores blank questions with a zero (no credit) by default. Essays with something typed in will remain unscored and require you to manually update the points either by clicking...

We spent last Thursday and Friday in Noblesville at the Indiana Connected Educators Conference. Nearly 500 teachers from around the state got together to talk about technology uses in education across curriculum and grade levels. Our team presented two workshops: one on using Book Creator to teach and assess literacy in all content areas and a second on designing your own Breakout kits to use in class. Wes led an intense workshop with teachers designing Breakout kits using a design thinking process. Boxes were designed to teach students about the wildfire crisis in California and about recovery efforts in Puerto...