Design concept, remote learning, a laptop surrounded by education icons

Issue 3

QUICK UPDATE

ELL Brainpop is now available on Clever! A great tool for your ELs to practice their English independently, ELL Brainpop helps students learn the language with short, animated videos along with games and interactive activities that cover all four domains (reading, listening, speaking, and writing). Click HERE for a quick tutorial on how to access it!

USING FLIPGRID AS AN ORAL ASSESSMENT TOOL
It’s hard to find time in our shortened virtual periods to fit in oral presentations or assessments, but Flipgrid can change that! Many teachers are now using the online video assignment platform to have students record creative oral presentations or even just provide quick oral explanations for how they completed a task, such as a math problem, in order to gauge comprehension. Check out this VIDEO to see an example from a real classroom! There are hundreds of youtube videos of how teachers have become creative with their formative assessments using Flipgrid.

HELP FOR EL STUDENTS

Do you often find your ELD 1 students toggling back and forth between Google Translate and an English website? Help them install THIS free translation Chrome extension! With this tool, students can highlight unknown words or phrases on websites (and even some online platforms), and simply right click to access the Simple Translator. The translation will appear on their current screen and will even provide an audio button so that they can hear the translation if they have low literacy! Students also have the option to translate the entire webpage by merely right-clicking on the page and selecting, “Translate this page.”

TECH ROUND TABLE
Join VLL, Valerie Ward, this Tuesday, October 20th at 2:30pm for a Tech Round Table with a focus on remote learning accommodations. During this session, Val will discuss how to use Google Jamboard for Project Read and Wilson-style phonics instruction, as well as how to create interactive worksheets using Google Slides. Please find the meeting info below:

Topic: Tech Round Table with a Focus on Remote Learning Accommodations
Time: Oct 20, 2020 02:30 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)

Join: Access the Zoom link HERE

Have a tech question? Or want to share any tech advice, tips or tricks that may be useful for your colleagues? Post it now on the Virtual Staff Room located on top left of the EPS Virtual Learning website’s home screen. This is a space for all of us to help support each other as we navigate digital education.

GETTING STARTED WITH THE NEWSELA WORKSHOP
NewsELA is a phenomenal platform for the virtual learning block and for assigning meaningful, cross-content reading comprehension assignments to all students. You can adjust the reading level of each text to instantly differentiate.

Interested? NewsELA is hosting two 30-minute kick-off trainings to help you set this up for your classes:
Tuesday, October 20 at 1:45 (middle school teachers)
Wednesday, October 21 at 2:30 (high school teachers)

Please email EL Director Ann Auger if you and/or your team would like to attend.

READING A-Z WORKSHOP: ELL EDITION
Want to learn more about the ELL Edition extension connected to your Reading A-Z/Raz Kids account? Here are some optional sessions with a Reading A-Z expert trainer. Once you register using the links below, you'll receive additional information and a recording afterwards.

Register HERE for the Raz-Plus ELL Edition for Virtual Learning: Grades 2-3 on Oct 20 at 2:45 PM.

Register HERE for the Raz-Plus ELL Edition for Virtual Learning: Grades 4-5 on Oct 21 at 2:45 PM.

Register HERE for the Raz-Plus ELL Edition for Virtual Learning: Grades K-1 on Oct 22 at 2:45 PM.