Wednesday, February 3, 2016

10 Things I Love About Seesaw




If I could only have 1 ipad app for students in my school district, I would choose Seesaw. Here are 10 things I love about it!


1. Students can dictate to publish their writing by clicking the iOS microphone feature to the left of the keyboard. This should not be in place of developing important handwriting and mechanics skills, but it could be a real time saver for primary grade teachers on progress-monitoring day. The class can be busy writing and publishing on Seesaw while they get important assessments completed. 




2. Parent engagement in their child's education is increased! They can easily download the Parent Seesaw app and receive updates when their child uploads work. Parents can add comments about their child's work.


3. This is one free app that takes the place of several apps: interactive white board, voice dictation, digital portfolio, and blog.


4. Easily customizable access- teachers can open up features gradually and use it to best meet their needs. Some teachers may only want to use it as a work-flow tool to get projects from shared class ipads to student laptops or the teacher computer. Others may select features that give students permission to view and comment on each other's content. Some may choose to add parent access. Flexibility and options make this app ideal for almost all elementary classrooms. My one reservation about using it with upper elementary students was the animal cartoon avatar images. Once I found that they can be replaced with a photograph or other image, I knew that Seesaw would be welcomed with older students as well.


5. No logins; scanning with QR code is easy enough for preschool aged children. Older students can login with emails and passwords if the teacher chooses.

6. Great way to practice and save reading fluency samples. Students I work with regularly snap a photo of their reading passages, then record themselves reading. I can add a comment to share their words per minute rate from that week.

7. Annotating photographs- students find examples of their learning (ex: shapes, plants) take a photo and label it. Authentic, real world examples of learning!



8. Students can reflect and explain their thinking. Something every teacher wants them to do more of.



9. Students can reflect on their week's work, and self evaluate to choose a piece of work to add to their portfolio. Many teachers have students add one writing project per week and students must carefully evaluate to determine their best work.

10. This introduces students to early digital citizenship skills. If teachers allow students to see each other's work, they can discuss ownership of original work. If teachers choose to allow commenting or open the blog feature, they can teach skills like participating in an online community and conversation threads.

Seesaw's blogging feature is  a safe, controlled way to publish student writing. Teachers can opt for writing to be shared with only classmates, parents, or even students in another classroom! This may be the next best thing to Kidblog!




11. It is a perfect portal for collecting students' work from any app, which is the main obstacle for most teachers who try to integrate technology! Anything the student creates that can be saved to the camera roll can be uploaded to Seesaw.The teacher can later download and share student work on a class blog or Facebook page if desired. This is a great tool, whether the student share a few ipads or have a 1:1 classroom.



12. This app helps teachers transform the way teachers use technology in their classrooms. Instead of only being used during centers and inside recess, where they become digital busy-boxes filled only with skill based apps and games, ipads can become learning tools that play an important role higher level thinking. The features help develop students' skills with communication, critical thinking, and creativity!


That was 12 instead of 10. I have a feeling I could keep going. The more I use this app, the more I love it. Thanks Seesaw!