Technology in the Classroom Archives

27 04, 2020

Engaging First Grade Google Classroom Digital Activities for ELA Centers

By Jolene|2020-04-28T09:31:07-04:00April 27th, 2020|Google Classroom Use, Grammar, Technology in the Classroom|0 Comments

Grammar plays a role with reading comprehension and writing development, so its important students are getting a firm foundation with grammar early on in elementary. It can be tough to find engaging first grade grammar activities to use in one’s ELA centers. That is why I came up with some digital activities that can be used in Google Classroom. I wanted to make sure students could easily decode the sentences as they practiced these grammar concepts from the standards and worked towards improving their writing. I wanted to make sure they were as hands-on as much as possible, so I added fun twists like sliding magnifying glasses and punctuation marks. Also, I made sure to include activities that used higher-order thinking, so I made sure to have things like fix-it sentences to get them analyzing and fixing the errors.

At the beginning of each digital grammar activity, I include a video that plays at the beginning of each of them that teaches the grammar concept. Now these videos are not meant to replace great teaching instruction, but they are great for review before completing the activity. However, you can also certainly use these activities in your classroom with an interactive whiteboard to teach a mini-lesson and do some guided practice with them.

I also made sure to include kid friendly instructions with each resource if your students will be using these independently as a center activity.

If you have ever looked at the Common Core standards for grammar, you know how much ground there is to cover and how some of the things they want mastered seem to be a bit much for first grade. I worked diligently to make sure to cover these standards while putting a lot of thought into making them developmentally appropriate. At the beginning of the year, you may have students that are still grasping basic reading skills. However, its important to start covering grammar out the gate to make sure to cover everything that year. That is why I made sure to include some grammar activities for first grade that did not involve the need for decoding sentences, but students could still work in developing an understanding for things like adding an -s to make the word plural.

Understanding proper nouns and the use of capital letters was another grammar standard I felt students could start to learn early on in first grade too.

Building up student’s oral language with using things like demonstratives is also a concept that is good for the early part of first grade. Just like the sentences above, these grammar activities do not involve sentence decoding either, yet students are learning proper usage of words like these and those.

When you are ready to combine sentence decoding and grammar to get students to apply these concepts in their writing, its important to start off with some familiar concepts like action verbs. With this activity students decode the simple sentence and mark the action word with a star.

As students begin to gain a firm foundation in recognizing and understanding verbs and plural nouns, they can then move on to subject-verb agreement. These activities can also flow over into their writing activities. You could easily put a focus that week in writing workshop to get students paying attention to their use of nouns and verbs in a sentence to make sure they agree. Application is always important, but sometimes there is definitely a gap between grammar and writing when they do not have some focused, engaging activities to make these concepts more concrete. It is hard for young students to apply grammar when the concept has never been made concrete to them. These activities play a huge part with grammar use in writing because it provides visuals in their minds to help them recall as they write and gives them some hands-on practice. That makes the concepts more concrete to them. The more concrete, the more they will be able to apply the use of subjects and verbs agreeing in their writing.

Another aspect of verbs to cover in first grade that is important is verb tenses. This is important because often they will come across many past tense verbs as they read. This aids in them being able to decode these words more easily by recognizing that -ed on the end is a change to the tense of the verb. Additionally, the understanding of future tense verb use will also help with reading comprehension as they begin to understand writing that is taking place either in the past, present, or future. This also flows over into their writing as they learn to write narrative pieces.

Conventions are another important area that needs a lot of additional practice for students. Drag and drop activities add a fun and engaging twist to help make this concept more concrete.

Here are some comma activities where students work on adding commas to dates and items in a series.

Teaching about simple and compound sentences is another important area to cover in first grade. To set a firm foundation with simple sentences, students can complete the sentence by adding the predicate or telling part to the sentence. This particular set also includes some sentences where they have to add the subject instead.

Once students are ready to write more complex sentences, you can show them how they can combine two sentences into one with a conjunction. Since the books students read are becoming more divergent with the sentence structures, it is important they learn to understand how compound sentences are two complete thoughts. Recognizing various sentence structures as we read is all part of improving reading comprehension.

Students can become more familiar with conjunctions with this fun red light activity.

Having students find errors in sentences and fix them involves higher-order thinking, so it is a good way to get them thinking about things like the use of capital letters, punctuation, verb agreements, and more.

Other grammar concepts to teach in first grade include different types of pronouns, adjectives, and more. Here are two adjective activities. The first gets students use to the idea of how some adjectives can describe one of the five senses. The other one has students describing a noun with any adjective they choose.

This pronoun activity has students fish for the pronouns. Then they move onto the other slides and swap out the noun or nouns with a pronoun.

With this activity, students spot the indefinite pronoun in a sentence.

Possessive nouns is another area to cover in first grade. This simple activity has students distinguishing which ones are possessive. The other nouns that are not possessive either are plural or normally end with the letter s. The apostrophe is drag and drop too.

Later on after students understand both pronouns and possessive nouns, they can learn about possessive pronouns with this drag and drop activity.

The proper use of articles is another area that is commonly taught in first grade. These sentences are easy to decode and students decide which article to place in the sentence.

Spelling is another area of grammar, so I created some different spelling activities. This one has students focusing on spelling patterns.

This other activity has students using inventive spelling. The final one is a sight word activity that focuses on the spelling of commonly used sight words. You might not always think grammar activity when you first see the sight word activity, but the Common Core standards actually mention students use conventional spelling with frequently irregular words. The standards also mention that students use phonemic awareness and spelling patterns to spell untaught words too.

With these digital grammar activities for first grade, your students will be engaged as they develop their writing and even reading skills. You can find these all individually or sold as a bundle at a 50% discount in The Candy Class store on Teachers Pay Teachers.

Find the first grade digital grammar activities bundle by clicking here.

Looking for individual resources instead of the bundle? Find the first grade individual grammar resources here. Looking for kindergarten digital grammar activities? Click here. You can also find second grade digital grammar activities here.

Thanks for visiting The Candy Class!

Jolene Mathew

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30 03, 2020

How to Download and Use Your Google Classroom Resources in Three Easy Steps

By Jolene|2020-03-30T21:20:37-04:00March 30th, 2020|Classroom Organization & Management, Google Classroom Use, Technology in the Classroom|0 Comments

Hi everyone! Today, I want to share some video tutorials for using digital resources in Google Classroom in three easy steps.

This past week, I know many of you have been thrown into uncharted waters. I get that it is very overwhelming. After spending all my spare time last week trying to answer questions, I have decided maybe videos might help more. If you have purchased one of my digital resources for Google Classroom use, then those also come with step-by-step instructions in the main pdf that you download with your purchase. If you prefer to read directions over watching a video, I recommend referring to those instead.

#1: Make Your Own Copy of the File

The first video goes over making a copy of my resource, so you have your own copy to assign to your students. One thing, I want to emphasize here is make sure to be logged out of all your Google accounts including any Gmail in your default internet browser before making a copy. Then log into your Google for Education or Google Classroom account, so it is ready to have the files added to its drive.

#2 Assign a Copy of Your File in Google Classroom

This second video covers how to give the assignment in Google Classroom. For primary students, I recommend assigning from your Drive instead of sharing a link of your copy. Please do not assign my link to your students. That will not work properly.

#3 Use it Interactively in Edit Mode

In order for the features to be interactive and for your students’ work to be saved, they will use the files in edit mode. This is when they are exited out of presentation mode.

Troubleshooting:

1. It’s not dragging and dropping.

Make sure to not enter presentation mode. It is meant to be used in edit mode. Also, if you are using a tablet or iPad, download the Google Slides app to use it instead of using it in an internet browser.

2. It says I don’t have access, so please give me access.

Please review over the video from step number one. You will need to first make a copy of your own file and assign your copy of the file to your students. The first two videos will walk you through that.

Would you like to try out a free sample? Check out my free digital guided reading resource here.

I hope that helps make things clear.

Thanks and be blessed!

Jolene Mathew from The Candy Class

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28 05, 2019

Engaging Digital Word Work Activities for Literacy Centers

By Jolene|2019-05-28T20:38:01-04:00May 28th, 2019|Reading|0 Comments

Today, I want to share some ideas for digital word work activities that you can use in your classroom. Digital activities are great for teachers because they save time and paper, but they still help our students learn all the important skills they need to know. The digital activities in this post will help you teach your students phonics, spelling, and sight words. Many of the activities can be used for either small groups or centers. Some can even be changed to use for whole group instruction.

Digital Word Work Activity #1

As a center, your students can build words with digital magnetic letters. Each student can build words at their appropriate learning level, even when working on the same phonics concept. For example, when working on the L blend, emerging students can choose from options like fl, bl, or gl to complete the word “flower.” Intermediate students can choose from a jumbled assortment of letters like h, k, l, t, and f to create the same word. When students are ready for more of a challenge, they can type a sentence for each new L blend word that they created.

Digital Word Work Activity #2

You can also use digital magnetic letter activities for small group instruction. You can have all the students work on the same blend, but each student can build a different word from that blend. For example, one might be working on the word “crab” while another works on “crow.” As the students create new words for the “cr” blend, you can make a running list on an anchor chart of these words. You can write “cr” in a different color if you’d like to make the blend stick out more for the students. At the end of your small group instruction time, you can have students practice reading the words on the chart aloud.

Digital Activity #3 with Spelling Words

In centers or small groups, students can refer to a list of spelling words and “graph” the words. This means they will type the words in columns based on their number of letters. Emerging students can type in columns for three, four, five, and six-letter words. Intermediate students can use these columns, plus added columns for words with seven and eight letters. Students that are ready for an even greater challenge can graph words with nine or ten letters!

Digital Activity #4 with Spelling Words

Your students can also practice parts of speech with their spelling words. Emerging students can type their spelling words under either the “noun” or “verb” category, while intermediate students can type the words under “noun,” “verb,” adjective,” or “adverb.”

Digital Activity #5 with Sight Words

With this word work activity, students can mix the word up in the soup bowl and fix it back up. Then they can read the word to a partner and move on to the next word.

Digital Activity #6 with Sight Words

Your students can also practice sight words by using the Kids Doodle app to write sight words on their tablets. Students can draw a word and read it to their classmate. Then their classmate writes the word. They could also type the words instead. You can give your students a sight word list or a digital alphabet chart to help them write the words correctly.

I hope my digital activity ideas will make your job easier by saving you time and paper, and I hope they will also help your students have fun while they do word work! All the digital word work activities I mentioned in this post can be found in my store, The Candy Class. My Digital Word Work Bundle includes 121 phonics activities! You can download it here.

I also have separate resources for the spelling and sight word activities in this post. You can find the spelling resource here and the sight word resource here.

If you are looking for more word work activity ideas that you can do in centers, read my article Word Work Activities: Hands-on Ideas for Literacy Centers. It has plenty of ideas!

Also, if you would like a simple system for setting-up technology use in your classroom next year, make sure to sign-up for my free tech course here. You will also gain access to my free resource library when you sign-up! 🙂

Happy teaching, and thanks for stopping by The Candy Class!

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20 07, 2017

How to Use Google Classroom on an iPad or Tablet When You are Not 1:1

By The Candy Class|2019-03-12T21:05:59-04:00July 20th, 2017|Google Classroom Use, Technology in the Classroom|1 Comment

Hi everyone! Today, I want to offer show you how to use Google Classroom on an iPad or tablet when you are not 1:1. Some of you may have been 1:1 for a while, but Google Classroom is new to you. Now, some of you might ask, what is 1:1? This is simply when each student has their own tablet or iPad to use in your classroom. Of course, some of you are like, our computers are more like one of those ones from a 1972 sci-fi movie. I can relate. My first year of teaching, I had no printer in my classroom and the text on the only computer was green and ran like a brontosaurus. This was in the 2000s, and it was mainly just my class that had THAT computer. Others had more efficient ones. My classroom was a storage closet with an obvious hidden dinosaur when they gave it to me, haha! Fast forward three years at another district in the county next door where I later went to teach, and they were handing me an interactive whiteboard and telling us to use it without providing very much with content in it or guidance geared for primary teachers. Some of you might not have devices for each student, and that might have some perks of its own, haha! New technology equals more expectations usually.

How do you manage using Google Classroom when students have to share the device? I am going to show you how I would do it. There is another option to have students log in and out, but that takes time each go around. Also, sometimes you have no control over the username and passwords given to your students that can easily be hard for them to remember or too easy to make a typo on due to the long length. ELA center time with the gadget could easily become login practice time instead! Thankfully, the devices leave the students logged in on an iPad and lets you add multiple accounts onto the device. This method will show you how to add multiple accounts, so students can select their account to use.

First off, if you do not have Google Classroom on any device, please see this post first on using Google Classroom on an iPad or tablet in a K-2 classroom by clicking here. Then don’t forget to jump back to this post. I have this post linked in there too.

Tip for Before You Get Started

I recommend having students assigned a device and planning that out before you set this up. Using some labels to number the device or name it will help manage this. (Students will find funny names amusing!) You will also want to consider when you will be using the devices in groups to make sure that two students assigned to use one device are not suppose to be using it at the same time (unless you want them collaborating, of course). Using your groups as a reference when assigning the devices will help to manage this. Sometimes, you might need to tweak it as you change up your groups, but considering groups when assigning devices is a good way to manage this. Once you know what student will be going on what device, you are ready to jump into adding them on it.

Step 1

After you have followed the steps from the previous blogpost, you will basically be repeating some of the steps to set-up the accounts for any students using the device. First, go into Google Classroom.

On the left, select the bars.

You will see the first account you have assigned to the device. Click on the triangle.

Choose manage accounts. Select add account. Add the account information to add the student to the device for Google Classroom.

Step 2

Now, you will need to add the student’s account to the Google Slides app if you will be using resources that have the drag and drop or movable pieces. Go to the Google Slides app.

Click on the three bars in the top left corner.

Click on the arrow. It will look a little different. (Sorry, I forgot to take a picture for that step, and I am having a lazy moment, haha! Please cut me some slack, I work 12 hours a day even in the summer, lol! It is pretty much the same as the one above, only without the choose manage account option). Choose manage accounts once that option appears. Select add account. Add the account information to add the student to the device.

Step 3

Now here is where it gets more complicated because you will have to train your students to do this step. Thankfully, they pick up on things fast! Students will need to know how to select their account in Google Slides to be able to access their file and select their accounts in Google Classroom to turn in their assignment. Students can select their file by going into the Google Slides app, selecting the bars, clicking the arrow, and selecting their account as shown in step 2. They will then have access to their files and can select their assignment. It should be the first choice if it was recently added.

Now thankfully, when you make a copy for a student in Google Classroom, it puts their name on the front part of the file. That way, they can know it is their file. I recommend teaching them to double check by looking for their name on the file too. When students work within their file, it will automatically save into what you are able to access from Google Classroom.

Once students complete an assignment, you will also need teach students how to go into Google Classroom, select their account and turn in the assignment. Once students are in the Google Classroom app, they select the bars, click the arrow, and select their account as shown in step 1.

Then they select the assignment and choose turn in. You are then able to view their assignment to assess how they are doing, so you can intervene with students who are struggling with something.

Yes, this is not a perfect system because there are some situations that can arise out of this to complicate things. 1:1 makes life a bit easier because it takes away worries of students accidentally working in the wrong file or worst yet…working in the wrong file on purpose. However, many still do not have that luxury! This is pretty much working within the technological limits, so you can have multiple students using Google Classroom on the same device.

If you are new to my blog, I have a free set of printable task cards for long and short vowels that I would love to share with you. Simply sign-up for email, and they will be sent to your email. If you are a current email subscriber, but you do not have the cards, you can grab them also by filling out the form too.

You can also view my privacy policy here.

Image of students trying to both use Google Classroom on one device

Thanks for stopping by the Candy Class! I would love to hear about how you are using technology in the classroom in the comments below.

Jolene 🙂

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21 06, 2017

How to Use Google Classroom on an iPad or Tablet in K-2

By The Candy Class|2019-03-12T21:06:00-04:00June 21st, 2017|Google Classroom Use, Technology in the Classroom|5 Comments

Hi everyone! I wanted to share how to use Google Classroom on an iPad or tablet in K-2. First off, it can seem a bit overwhelming at first to consider even how to set this up on an iPad. At least, it did for me. My mind was boggled. I admit it. I was confused. I figured there must be other teachers confused, and I bet you many of us could have let students teach us by simply handing them the device and telling them we needed to use Google Classroom on it, haha! Seriously, young children amaze me at how much they pick up with technology. I am interested to see what they come up with by the time they are all grown up. It probably is going to make all our technology now look like the Middle Ages!

My initial fear was pushed aside once I dove into it instead of trying to figure it out in my head. It was actually pretty simple to set-up once I downloaded the appropriate apps. Most of it was intuative. The only thing that is a bit more confusing is if you are not 1:1 with the device and students need to share it. I have a post about that here. First set-up one, and then head there to set-up additional accounts on the same device.

Step 1

Download the Google Classroom App from the app store onto the device.

Step 2

Have the student log into the account, or you log into the student’s account for them from within the Google Classroom app. They can now access their assignments from within the app. However, if you will be using drag and drop features in Google Slides, you will need to go to the next step because it will not work in Google Classroom.

Step 3

Download the Google Slides app from the app store. This will allow you to use the drag and drop features from within the app. Please note, you will need to log into the student’s account from within this app too. That way, their work can be saved to their drive. They will be able to access their assignment from their drive too. Now, here is where my mind was boggled: I wondered how can an assignment go back into their Google Classroom account? Would students need to know how to send that back? Thankfully, no they do not! Since they are working within their file from within their drive, all their work is automatically saved from within their account! Yay! This leads me to step four.

Step 4

Teach students to go into their drive from within the Google Slides app to access the file.

Then teach them how to go back into Google Classroom to submit the assignment once it is complete.

And that is it! It is actually not so mind boggling after all. It just seemed that way at first! The technology actually makes things super easy for you and does a lot of the work for you. Now the real mind boggler….what assignments to give students to use all this fancy technology with contentless screens! I hope to write some posts with some helpful ideas at some point later down the road once I mow down some of my to do list more. However, I do have resources already created that you can find by clicking here.

If you are new to my blog, make sure to sign-up for email. I have more posts like this planned, and I also have other tips and even some free resources to share along the way.