Student Virtual Room Tutorial à la Bitmoji Classroom

Student Virtual Room Tutorial à la Bitmoji Classroom

I’m finally getting to this post after months of enjoying the summer with my family after COVID-19 quarantine and learning/teaching from home. I wanted to share the Student Virtual Room project that my grade 4-6 classes did during remote “emergency learning” in June. We had done some amazing work in Media Literacy classes where students […]

Green Screen Tips to Get You Started

Green Screen Tips to Get You Started

I love the creative possibilities that green screening brings to my students. If you’re thinking about getting started and aren’t sure where to begin, see below for some ideas. Below is a sketchnote I drew with ideas from Todd Burleson that was also published in his book The Green Screen Makerspace Project Book. Note that the […]

iOS Green Screen Without Third-Party Apps

iOS Green Screen Without Third-Party Apps

Greetings…or should I say “Green-tings” 😉 Ever wanted to do some creative green screening with your students but don’t want to pay for a third-party app? You can, it’s easy! I wanted to share some step-by-step guides I created for using the Instant Alpha feature in Keynote/Pages and the new iMovie green screen feature. Please […]

21st-Century Global Competencies

21st-Century Global Competencies

For the past little while, one of the biggest education buzzwords has been “21st-Century” or “Global Competencies”. There are several interpretations and different ways to organize the idea of these competencies, but essentially the same idea comes through in all cases. It’s all about preparing students for this ever-changing world and fostering an education that […]

Digital Word Wall or Class Dictionary

Digital Word Wall or Class Dictionary

Last year I decided to move my word wall online using Google Slides. Having a digital word wall or class dictionary online made it easy to manage and not to mention there was less cutting and pasting and words were instantly on our shared word wall–not just by myself but by students as well! See […]

Google Drawings Templates

Google Drawings Templates

Google Drawings is one of my favourite G Suite tools for getting creative with students. I love using it to create easy to use templates for my classes, especially at the beginning of the year or in the early years when they need some motivation to get their work started. Google Drawings Templates are easy […]

Free & Easy Green Screen Editing – How to Make Transparent Backgrounds

Free & Easy Green Screen Editing – How to Make Transparent Backgrounds

Your Green Screen Editing Just Got Easier! Ever wanted to remove the background from an image for free without a tablet or a paid App? You can! I’m going to share two ways you can easily do green screen editing regardless of the device you have! This post will cover 2 different ways to make […]

Flippity Add-on for Google Sheets

**EDIT: March 2020 Please note that the Flippity add-on for Google Sheets is no longer available. More info on that here. That being said you can still use the templates…PHEW…I know, right?! Here’s a quick step-by-step to walk you through the new process to using Flippity: 1) Visit https://flippity.net/ 2) Choose your template and click […]

BreakoutEDU Digital – Online Escape Games for Students

BreakoutEDU Digital – Online Escape Games for Students

Want a fun activity for your class that promotes communication, collaboration, critical thinking, problem-solving and creativity? Check out BreakoutEDU Digital* Online Escape Games! What is it exactly? An online digital escape game co-founded by Justin Birckbichler and Mari Venturino Based on the BreakoutEDU kit educational games from James Sanders & Mark Hammons All is organized and played on one website […]

Pic Forward Global Green Screen Challenge

What is Pic Forward? Pic Forward is a global green screen challenge for students, teachers and schools. The idea is to have people all around the world edit our monthly green screen photos, then to “Pic Forward” or “pass it on” via social media to other classes so they can participate too. My grade 4 & […]

Là où je dors – An Interactive Website and Videos for FSL Classrooms

With the updates to the FSL curriculum in Ontario, we now have Listening and Speaking as two separate strands instead of the previous stand-alone “Oral” strand. For the Listening portion of the curriculum, I’ve found TFO’s Idéllo platform to be a great place for students to watch controlled content videos and for teachers to find ample […]

Google Drawings 101

Google Drawings is one of my favourite G Suite tools, it truly is the ultimate blank canvas. Not to mention, everything I show in these tutorials about images, cropping, WordArt, etc. can also be used in Google Slides! What is Google Drawings? Don’t let the name fool you, you don’t need to be an artist […]

Introducing Sketchollage – Sketchnoting & Photo Collages Come Together!

Sketchollage – a new creative way to express ideas, notes and experiences in your sktechnotes. Recently my friends Marie-Andrée Ouimet and Sylvia Duckworth inspired me to start sketchnoting. It’s basically like taking creative digital notes with drawings, logos, sketches and shapes mixed with handwriting. I’ve made a few now, they can be found here. Sketchnoting […]

Coding in French – Free Printable Coding Blocks

It’s a pleasure to have a guest blog post today by Ashley Soltesz, a fellow French teacher who like me is on a mission to share French resources with others so we don’t have to keep recreating the wheel! She’s made some amazing free French printable coding blocks you can use in your classrooms, enjoy!  A […]

“Oh snap, no tap!” Paying with an Apple Watch – My Experiment at Toronto Retailers

Anyone who knows me won’t be surprised that I dove in and bought the latest Apple Watch, yet another gadget to add to my ever growing tech collection! Luckily I was able to score a deal on Kijiji, those who know me also know I hate paying full price for things if I don’t have to! […]