On Monday night I received an email from a reader who was looking for a way to have his students blog and share pictures without making the posts completely public. There are two ways that I suggest doing this. In Blogger you can restrict access to a blog by selecting the private option and specifying email addresses that have access to the blog posts. In WordPress-powered blogs including self-hosted blogs, WordPress.com blogs, Edublogs, and Kidblog you can set a password for individual blog posts. Watch the following video to learn how to password protect blog posts. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesHow to Save Space and Time When Using Images in Your BlogThe Three Most Common Searches on Free Technology for TeachersHow to Create Featured Posts in Blogger and WordPress 

Science in the Classroom is a free resource for teachers from Science Magazine. On Science in the Classroom you will find research papers containing interactive annotations to help students understand the content of the papers. In the right hand margin of each paper you will find a section called "learning lens." The learning lens offers seven types of interactive annotations that students can enable. Of those seven types of annotations, the glossary annotation is the one that students will probably use most often. The glossary annotations highlight key words and terms in the article. Clicking on a highlighted annotation reveals a definition. Applications for Education In addition to the interactive annotations for students Science in the Classroom provides teachers with discussion and reading comprehension questions. At the bottom of each article on Science in the Classroom teachers will also find a list of suggested learning activities. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesGlobal Forest Change Explorer - Trends in DeforestationHow to Password Protect Blog PostsKiddom - Another Online Classroom Service 

Earlier this week I received an email from a reader who was concerned that Facebook was requiring her to log into an account in order to view the content of the Free Technology for Teachers Facebook page. While the pop-up that Facebook puts over a page until you sign-in is annoying, there is a way to view and search a Facebook page without logging into an account. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how to browse a Facebook page without logging into an account. As I noted in the video above, the Free Technology for Teachers Facebook page only offers some of what is found on the blog. On the blog you can find all of the shared resources including these alternatives to YouTube, more than 100 Google tools tutorials, and guides to video creation tools. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesHow to Password Protect Blog PostsGlobal Forest Change Explorer - Trends in DeforestationThe Month in Review - The Most Popular Posts 

Next Vista for Learning recently wrapped-up a student video contest. One of the winning videos was Demonstrating Onomatopoeia. The video does a fantastic job of explaining what onomatopoeia is while also demonstrating how its proper use can enhance your writing. The video is embedded below. The video can be downloaded on Next Vista for Learning. If this video sparked your interest in having your students make videos, take a look at Next Vista's next student video contest called Creative Spark. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesGet Inspiration for Video Projects and Help a Non-profit at the Same TimeCreative Storm - A Next Vista Video ContestThe Month in Review - The Most Popular Posts 

One of the things that teachers often ask me for is a set of tools to get them started on using technology in their classrooms. This is a common request because it can be overwhelming to look at a website or a read a stream of emails with tips and try to figure out where to start. For that reason, I have started to put together short PDFs that contain a few options for a three or four common activities in a subject area. These are not meant to be comprehensive guides, they're meant to be starter kits. The first starter kit is for social studies teachers. In the handout embedded below you will find my recommendations for tools to create timelines, tools to create videos, tools to create digital maps, and tools to help students conduct better web research. You can download the document from Box or grab the Google Docs copy. Learn more about how to use these tools in my online course Teaching History With Technology.  This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesA Great Video Explanation of OnomatopoeiaHow to Browse a Facebook Page Without Logging Into an AccountFree Annotated Science Research Papers Accompanied by Teaching Resources 

Classroom Heroes is a new service that seems similar in concept to ClassDojo. Classroom Heroes lets you make a record of your students' behaviors in your classroom. The service also gives you a place to record homework assignments. You can share those records with your students and their parents through SMS and email. Like ClassDojo, Classroom Heroes offers avatars that can be used to represent your students in your classroom. Classroom Heroes isn't open to the public yet, but it is accepting registrations for early users. If you're interested in being an early adopter, you can register on the site. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related Stories15 Tools for Teaching History With Technology - A HandoutA Great Video Explanation of OnomatopoeiaHow to Browse a Facebook Page Without Logging Into an Account 

Earlier this week a participant in one of my online courses asked a good question about using Google Forms as an assessment tool. Here's the paraphrased question: I have created a great rubric for some year end projects. Rather than going straight to the spreadsheet, I complete the form as students present. However, i cannot for the life of me figure out the easiest way for me to take the responses and return them to students. It seems that when I open Flubaroo- things get super confusing. This is one of the times when a Google Form might not be necessary. In fact, my suggestion was to skip the Form and just enter grades and comments into a Google Spreadsheet that has the Online Rubric Add-on enabled. Online Rubric helps you create a rubric within a Google Spreadsheet. The template will let you include email addresses so that you can quickly send to your students their grades and your comments. The video embedded below demonstrates how to use the Online Rubric Add-on for Google Sheets. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesThe Month in Review - The Most Popular PostsHow to Distribute Add-ons to an Entire Google Apps DomainFlubaroo Offers a New Extra Credit Grading Option 

Yesterday morning I woke up to an email from a reader who told me that it was "ridonkulous" that I don't write about OneNote. (Side note, I need to get back in the habit of not checking email first thing in the morning so that I'm not starting my day with a nasty tone). The reason that I don't write about OneNote is that I don't use it with any degree of regularity. It's a fine product and many people like it, but I've been a Google Apps guy for a long time and people kind of know me for that so I tend to write about Google Apps more than I do other cloud-based productivity services. All that said, I am happy to refer people to my friend Jeff Bradbury's website where he has many OneNote tutorials because he is regular user of that service. One of Jeff's videos about OneNote templates is embedded below. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesWhen a Spreadsheet is Better Than a FormHow to Browse a Facebook Page Without Logging Into an AccountHow to Password Protect Blog Posts 

The Library of Congress has quite a number of great resources for teachers and students. The Student Discovery Sets are favorite amongst my favorite resources that I've featured in the past. That collection of resources was recently updated by the LOC. The recent additions to the Student Discovery Sets include iBooks about the New Deal, scientific discovery, and weather forecasting through years. Another great resource from the Library of Congress that history teachers should bookmark is The Teaching With Primary Sources Journal. The free online journal features activities for using primary source documents in primary and secondary classrooms. In addition to the teaching activities in the journal each issue includes a feature article about that issue's theme. The theme of the current issue is "historical and geographic thinking." After the feature article teachers will find links to related articles and related resources from the LOC and from around the Internet. The Teaching With Primary Sources Journal is published on a quarterly basis. The archives of the journal are available to browse and read online. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesLOC Student Discovery Sets Put Primary Sources on Students' iPadsThe Origin and Meaning of Memorial Day10 Educational Resources About the American Revolution 

Open source software powers many of things that we see and do on the Internet and on our computers every day. In fact, if you're reading this on an Android device right now, you can thank the people who have contributed to the open source code making that happen. What is open source software? How is it supported? Why would someone open source a project? Those questions and more are answered in the latest video from Common Craft that I have embedded below. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesA Great Video Explanation of OnomatopoeiaA Good Place to Find OneNote TutorialsWhen a Spreadsheet is Better Than a Form 

This morning I gave the opening keynote for the Collaborate2Create conference in Glendale, Arizona. The title of my talk was Preparing Students to Work Independently. The slides from that talk are embedded below. If you would like to have me speak at your school or conference, please send me an email at richardbyrne (at) freetech4teachers.com or check out my work with me page. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesA Great Video Explanation of OnomatopoeiaHow to Browse a Facebook Page Without Logging Into an AccountHow to Customize Background Scenes in Storyboard That Frames 

Good evening from Sky Harbor airport in Phoenix, Arizona. Today, I had the privilege to speak at the Collaborat2Create conference hosted by the Arizona Technology in Education Association and Glendale Elementary Schools. It was great to see so many teachers come out on a Saturday to connect and learn with each other. Next week I'll be speaking in Amarillo and Abilene, Texas as well as Topeka, KS and Flagstaff, AZ. If you're going to be at any of those events, please say hello. Visit my work with me page to learn how to bring me to your school or conference. Here are this week's most popular posts: 1. A Fun Tool for Making Word Clouds in Fun Shapes 2. 15 Tools for Teaching History With Technology - A Handout 3. A Great Video Explanation of Onomatopoeia 4. 5 Ways to Create Mapped Stories 5. What Connects These Things? - A Search Lesson 6. Global Forest Change Explorer - Trends in Deforestation 7. 10 Sites and Apps for Vocabulary and Spelling Practice Summer PD Opportunities With MeTake a look at the online workshops I'm hosting throughout the spring and summer. The Practical Ed Tech Chromebook and BYOD Camps are sold out! Email me to get on the waiting list. Bring Me To Your School or ConferenceClick here to learn about my professional development services.  Please visit the official advertisers that help keep this blog going.Practical Ed Tech is the brand through which I offer PD webinars.BoomWriter provides a fantastic tool for creating writing lessons. Storyboard That is my go-to tool for creating storyboards and cartoon stories.Discovery Education & Wilkes University offer online courses for earning Master's degrees in Instructional Media.PrepFactory offers a great place for students to prepare for SAT and ACT tests.FrontRow offers adaptive online ELA and Math practice activities.  Teach n Go is a comprehensive platform for teaching online courses.The University of Maryland Baltimore County offers graduate programs for teachers.Boise State University offers a 100% online program in educational technology.EdTechTeacher is hosting host workshops in six cities in the U.S. in the summer.Buncee offers a great tool for creating visual stories.  This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesThe Week in Review - The Lilacs Have ArrivedHow to Browse a Facebook Page Without Logging Into an AccountThe Month in Review - The Most Popular Posts 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Around this time last year I shared a neat Google Spreadsheets script called Flippity. Flippity was originally designed to help you create flashcards through Google Spreadsheets. This morning Steve Fortna informed me that you can now use Flippity to create Jeopardy-style gameboards through Google Spreadsheets. In the video embedded I demonstrate how to use Flippity to create a Jeopardy-style gameboard. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesWhen a Spreadsheet is Better Than a FormThe Month in Review - The Most Popular PostsThe Week in Review - Collaborate2Connect 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. As we head into the new school year and think about all of the new apps and sites we want to use with students, it's a good time to think about teaching digital citizenship. Whether our students are in Kindergarten or high school before we send them out on the web we should be teaching them digital citizenship. The PDF embedded below, click here if you cannot see it, features my favorite digital citizenship resources for elementary, middle, and high school students. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesThe Week in Review - Collaborate2Connect5 Things We Can Do to Help Students Learn & Work IndependentlyHow to Create a Jeopardy Game in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School Year 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Last winter I was contacted by a high school student who had developed a neat tool for generating vocabulary lists and study sheets from a document. That tool is called Vocabulist. Vocabulist enables students to upload a document and have it extract words and definitions from it. Each word in the document is matched to a definition. If the definition rendered isn't exactly right, students can modify it within Vocabulist. Once the list of words and definitions is set students can download the list as a PDF or export the list to Quizlet where it will then be turned into a set of digital flashcards. (Students must have a Quizlet account). In the video embedded below I demonstrate how easy it is to create a vocabulary study sheet through Vocabulist. Applications for Education Vocabulist could be a nice aid to students when they need to learn a set of definitions. The Quizlet integration is a nice feature as it will allow students who use Vocabulist to put their flashcards on their mobile devices. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesHow to Create a Jeopardy Game in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School YearThe Week in Review - Collaborate2ConnectA Good Place to Find OneNote Tutorials 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Flippity provides a handful of great Google Sheets templates. I've featured their Random Name Picker, Flashcard, and Jeopardy templates in the past. The latest Flippity template that I've tried is their Progress Indicator template. With that template you can create a progress chart that will update whenever you update the data in the chart. In the video embedded below I provide an overview of how to use Flippity's Progress Indicator template. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesHow to Create a Jeopardy Game in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School YearWhen a Spreadsheet is Better Than a FormThe Month in Review - The Most Popular Posts 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Last week I presented three webinars about Google Apps for Education. The third of those webinars was all about Google Drive Add-ons and Chrome extensions for teachers. If you couldn't attend the live webinar, you can still grab the handout here or view it as embedded below. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesHow to Create a Progress Chart in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School YearHow to Create a Jeopardy Game in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School YearWhen a Spreadsheet is Better Than a Form 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Zing is a new service offering thousands of free fiction and non-fiction ebooks to teachers and students. On Zing you can browse for books by topic, language, or reading level. You can read the books in your web browser on a laptop or tablet. Zing is more than just a repository of free ebooks. In the Zing reader students will find a built-in dictionary and tools for taking notes while they read. Applications for Education If you create an accounts on Zing you will be able to create Zing classrooms. In those classrooms you can create and manage accounts for students. Through your Zing classroom portal you can check your students' reading logs. I like the potential that Zing is showing. I did find the registration process and initial set-up of a classroom to be a bit time intensive. To really unlock the full potential of Zing you would need to spend some time exploring all of the nuances of the service. It is important to note that Zing appears to be available only to readers in the United States. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related Stories12 Resources for Teaching Digital Citizenship - Best of 2015-16 School YearThe Week in Review - Collaborate2Connect5 Things We Can Do to Help Students Learn & Work Independently 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. From the same people that brought us Photos for Class and StoryBoard That comes another great tool called Quick Rubric. Quick Rubric is a free tool for writing, editing, and printing rubrics. On Quick Rubric you can create a rubric that is tailored to your points/ scoring system, the quantity of descriptors that you need, and utilizes the exact language that you specify. You can save as many rubrics as you like in your free Quick Rubric account. You can copy and modify rubrics your account so that you don't always have to start from scratch when creating a new assignment rubric. Applications for Education Quick Rubric won't make choosing the language that goes into your rubrics any easier, but it will make it easier to save, edit, and print your rubrics once they are complete. There is a rubric writing tips section in Quick Rubric as well as a formatting tips section that some teachers should find helpful. Disclosure: Quick Rubric is owned by the same people who own Storyboard That and advertise on FreeTech4Teachers.com. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesZing eBooks - Best of 2015-16 School Year12 Resources for Teaching Digital Citizenship - Best of 2015-16 School YearThe Week in Review - Collaborate2Connect 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. One of the most frustrating experiences you can have in a classroom is trying to get twenty-seven kids to land on the same webpage at the same time. Nothing can kill the momentum of a lesson like having to spend five minutes saying, "click here" or "you mistyped the address" to a bunch of students while the rest of the class is ready to move forward. Over the years I've put shortened URLs on my whiteboard for kids to copy, posted links on my blog and told students to go there to click a link, and I've used QR codes to direct students to webpages. While all three methods have been helpful, none has been perfect. Now there is a new method that I'm excited to try. Share to Classroom is a new Google Chrome extension designed to make easy for teachers to direct students to specific webpages. With the Share to Classroom extension installed you will be able to push webpages to your students' devices by simply opening the extension and specifying which of your Google Classroom classes you want to receive the page. Students do not need to do anything because the page will automatically load in their web browsers. You can also have students push pages to you.  For Share to Classroom to work both the teacher and students need to have the extension installed. And, of course, both teachers and students will have be signed into their Google Accounts associated with Google Classroom. GAFE domain administrators can install the extension for all users in their domains by following the directions outlined here. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesGreat Google Drive Add-ons & Chrome Extensions for Teachers - Best of 2015-16 School YearHow to Create a Progress Chart in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School YearHow to Create a Jeopardy Game in Google Sheets - Best of 2015-16 School Year 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Math is Fun is a free website that offers math games, puzzles, and tutorials. One of the tutorial resources that they offer is an illustrated mathematics dictionary. The Math is Fun dictionary offers more than 700 definitions of mathematics terms. All of the definitions include an illustration. Nearly 200 of the definitions include an animation. Some of the animations are interactive tutorials. Applications for Education For some students one of the obstacles to understanding how to solve a mathematics problem is understanding the vocabulary used in the problem. Once they understand the meaning of terms they have an easier time understanding and solving the problems. Having a glossary of terms often helps students get to the heart of a mathematics problem. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesFront Row - Adaptive Math & ELA Practice for K-8 StudentsWhy Are Airplane Engines so Big? - How Jet Engines Work #STEMRiddle Me This - 7 TED-Ed Lessons Based on Riddles 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. I'm looking forward to next week's LOC virtual conference on teaching with primary sources. Thinking about the conference prompted me to put together the following collection of resources related to teaching history with primary sources. Before students can work with primary sources they need to understand the differences between primary and secondary sources. Common Craft offers a video in which the differences and relationships between primary and secondary sources are explained in a two minute story. The video is embedded below. You can also click here to view it on the Common Craft website. Zoom In provides units of lesson plans built around primary source documents. The collection of lesson units is organized into six eras of US History. Zoom In is more than just a collection of lesson plans and documents. Zoom In provides an online classroom environment. As a teacher you can manage multiple classrooms within your Zoom In account. Students join your class by using a class code (email addresses not required). Once students have joined your class, you can begin distributing assignments to them from the lesson plan database. You can track which students have started the assignments, read their responses to questions within the assignments, and give students feedback on the assignments all within your Zoom In classroom. Historical Scene Investigation offers a fun way for students to investigate history through primary documents and images. Historical Scene Investigation presents students with historical cases to "crack." Each of these thirteen cases present students with clues to analyze in order to form a conclusion to each investigation. The clues for each investigation come in the forms of primary documents and images as well as secondary sources. HSI provides students with "case files" on which they record the evidence they find in the documents and images. At the conclusion of their investigation students need to answer questions and decide if the case should be closed or if more investigation is necessary. The World Digital Library hosts more than 10,000 primary documents and images from collections around the world. Sponsored by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, the mission of the World Digital Library is to promote the study and understanding of cultures. The WDL can be searched by date, era, country, continent, topic, and type of resource. In my search of the WDL I noticed that roughly half of the resources are historical maps and images. The WDL aims to be accessible to as many people as possible by providing search tools and content descriptions in seven languages. The WDL can also be searched by clicking through the map on the homepage. Who Am I? A History Mystery is a fun and challenging activity from the Smithsonian's The Price of Freedom online exhibit. Who Am I? presents players with six historical characters that they have to identify using the text and image clues provided. To solve the mystery players have to match the visual artifacts to each character. The Price of Freedom offers a series of detailed lesson plans and videos for six major events and eras in US History. Those events and eras are War of Independence, Wars of Expansion, The Civil War, World War II, Cold War/ Vietnam, and September 11. Student Discovery Sets from the Library of Congress offer primary collections of primary sources in free iBooks. There are twelve Student Discovery Sets available as iBooks. Each set is arranged thematically. The sets contain a mix of images, documents, audio recordings, and video clips. Each artifact in each set is accompanied by guiding questions designed to help students analyze what they are seeing, reading, or hearing. Images and texts in the Student Discovery Sets can be annotated with drawing tools built into each iBook. A central part of the Teacher's Page on the Library of Congress website is the primary source center. The primary source center walks teachers through the process of locating documents on the Library of Congress' site. The primary source center also provides guides for using various types of primary sources including political cartoons, photographs, and oral histories. The National Archives Experience Digital Vaults is one of the resources that I almost always share in my workshop on teaching history with technology primary sources. The Digital Vaults offers good tools that students and teachers can use to create content using images and documents from the National Archives. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how students can create digital posters and movies in the National Archives Experience Digital Vaults. The National Archives Experience's Docs Teach interactive tools center offers seven free tools that teachers can use to create interactive learning activities based on primary source documents and images. The seven tools are Finding a Sequence, Focusing on Details, Making Connections, Mapping History, Seeing the Big Picture, Weighing the Evidence, and Interpreting Data. To get a sense of how each of these activities works you can view existing activities made and shared here by other teachers. In fact, you may want to browse through the Find & Use section before creating an activity from scratch as you may find that someone else has shared an activity that meets your instructional goals too. The Find & Use activities are arranged by historical era and are labeled with a thinking skill and a level of Bloom's revised taxonomy. TeachingHistory.org's historical thinking posters are interactive displays that guide students through the process of examining and thinking about history. There are two interactive posters available. The poster for elementary school is called Doing History is Like Solving a Mystery. The poster for high school students is called History is an Argument About the Past. Both posters include images of primary sources. Clicking on the images in the posters opens a series of guiding questions. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesA Great Journal for History Teachers15 Tools for Teaching History With Technology - A HandoutThe Origin and Meaning of Memorial Day 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. Last week I wrote a post about AlfaTyping which is a good site for creating and managing online typing courses for your students. Since I published that post I have received a couple of requests for other online typing instruction and practice sites. Here are some of the others that I've tried over the years. I have tried to exclude Flash-based games from the list. ABCya.com offers a slew of fun typing activities for kids. One of my favorites is Typing Rocket. Typing Rocket is a sixty second game in which students make fireworks explode by typing the letters that appear on the rockets in the games. In the sixty second span of the game students try to correctly type as many letters as they possibly can. The rockets speed up as the game progresses. Typing Club is a popular website offering free online touch typing lessons for students of all ages. Whether you use the Typing Club website or the free Chrome Web App the lessons work the same way. Typing Club provides 100 free activities that begin with the basics and progress in difficulty until you can touch type on your entire keyboard including the use of lesser-used keys like "<" and "{." As you type during each lesson you are given instant real-time feedback about your accuracy and speed. Unlike other typing lessons that make you wait until an activity is completed to determine your accuracy or speed, Typing Club recalculates that information with each keystroke. Z-Type is a simple and fun typing game. The game has an easy level and a difficult level. The game is played the same way on both levels. To play Z-Type all that you have to do is go to the website and type the words that are falling from the top of the screen. When you have correctly typed a word a laser shoots it. The object is to shoot the words before they reach the bottom of the screen. Dance Mat Typing is a nice little resource from the BBC. Young students (four to eight years old) can receive clear, informative typing instruction through Dance Mat Typing. There are four levels for students to work through. Within each level there are multiple lessons and practice activities. The very first lesson that students receive is placement of their hands on the keyboard. Each lesson and practice activity offers instant feedback in visual and audio form. Power Typing hosts a small collection of five typing games that students can use to develop their typing skills. Power Typing also offers typing lessons for Qwerty and Dvorak keyboards. The two games that I found easiest to access are Alphabetic Rain and See Don't. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related Stories10 Resources for Teaching With Primary Sources - Best of 2015-16 School YearAn Illustrated Mathematics Glossary - Best of 2015-16 School YearShare to Classroom Gets Your Students on the Same Page - Best of 2015-16 School Year 

All of this week I am on the road working with teachers in Texas, Kansas, and Arizona. Rather than scrambling to write blog posts at the end of each day, I'm taking this time to feature some of the most popular posts and new tools of the 2015-2016 school year. At the end of October Google added a drawing option to Google Keep. The drawing tool in Google Keep offers a large variety of line colors and thicknesses. Drawings can be added to existing notes or can be created as stand-alone notes. And like other Google Keep notes, drawn notes can be shared from Keep to Google Docs. Creating drawings is just one of many ways that students can use Google Keep. Here are ten ways that students can use Google Keep on Android devices. 1. Draw notes. 2. Make to-do lists. 3. Type notes. 4. Color-code and sort notes. 5. Create reminders. 6. Share notes with other students. 7. Share task lists. 8. Record voice notes. 9. Take picture notes. 10. Send notes to Google Docs. By the way, this post was drafted in Google Keep. This post originally appeared on Free Technology for Teachers if you see it elsewhere, it has been used without permission.              Related StoriesGood Tools for Learning to Type - Best of 2015-16 School Year10 Resources for Teaching With Primary Sources - Best of 2015-16 School YearAn Illustrated Mathematics Glossary - Best of 2015-16 School Year