6 Popular Ed Tech Resources For Teachers/Students:Pros and Cons

BY VERONICA HUNT

Any educator or student needs a set of tools to grow and succeed. We have prepared a compilation of six popular Education Technology (EdTech) resources. Although we divide them into two categories for teachers and students, these resources can serve for both audiences with the same efficiency.

FOR TEACHERS

LessonCast is a three-minute slideshow video created by teachers for teachers. The main purpose of this web-based tool is to present a short plan of a lesson or any instructional materials for workshops.

Pros

• The short length of a 3-minute clip allows teachers to grasp the main points of their peers’ techniques.
• This form of interaction allows making changes to a separate piece of content in the course of a discussion. You can record each slide independently from others.
• You can also add audio, transcripts, questions, comments, feedback, and even assessment tests in case you share a lessoncast with students.

Cons

• It serves as an additional resource and cannot substitute traditional preparation practices.
• To develop multimedia presentations novice teachers will require the participation of seasoned teachers who obtain more experience in certain issues.
• The tool offers few options to transform such videos for lessons and training students as well.

Edmodo is a learning management system (LMS) that allows teachers, students, and their parents collaborate beyond the classroom. It forms a digital portfolio of students’ achievements, enables distant learning, and provides non-tech teachers with easy-to-use features.

Pros

• The system collects various learning data, assignments, textbooks, and instructional guides. With its help, teachers can create tasks, follow due dates, attach files, add links, and even assess the submitted work leaving comments to it.
• An educator can also use Edmodo’s calendar setting dates for upcoming tests and other classroom events.
• For separate projects, you can divide classes to “small groups”. All assigned tasks as well as resources will be visible to a chosen group solely.
• Teachers and students can safely communicate and share resources within one platform that has a similar feed to Facebook.

Cons

• An iOS application requires improvements since it lacks some web version functions.
• The absence of a customized assessment feature which could allow teachers evaluate students based on the particular criteria.
• The calendar is difficult to navigate even with the latest advancements.

Khan Academy is an online video library gathering thousands of helpful videos on various subjects.

Pros

• The resource helps educators engage students with interactive video tutorials and encourage independent learning.
• Math teachers can use a huge database of Math problems as templates for their classroom tasks.
• The tool helps to monitor the students’ progress. Eight out of ten educators confirmed it in a SRI survey.

Cons

• Using Khan Academy as a flipped classroom tool increases teachers’ workload and time for preparation to their lessons.
• Video tutorials can help acquire some basic skills only for high school programs.
• The catalog of subjects is incomplete since some grades lack resources.

FOR STUDENTS

Glogster is a desktop and iOS tool for creating multimedia posters. It combines all types of media to enrich and deliver your content message.

Pros

• Students can create interactive presentations, reviews, reports, and class projects producing multimedia glogs with pictures, text, and video.
• It synchronizes on any devices and gives an access to 40,000 learning resources.
• Simple editing and posting tools simplify the process of crafting a glog.

Cons

• The resource covers only 9 disciplines and 80 classroom topics whereas the design of templates is unpretentious.
• The tool requires the best internet connection. Besides, the website is rather slow to use it with other web-based programs.
• The students’ profiles are set to public and anyone having a Glogster account can get private information of other users.

Quizlet is a memory-boosting tool that serves as an interactive database of user-generated content. It can become your digital vocabulary and help you tackle any exam preparation without stress and confusion.

Pros

• A student can memorize terms and their definitions better through self-created sets of flashcards or already uploaded sets.
• It allows to add images to each term and definition. Audio is uploaded automatically.
• The tool has a set of interactive tests to train and check skills in a particular set.

Cons

• It is based on a term-definition algorithm so you can’t apply it to all aspects of learning process.
• Tests need further development because soon you get bored with the same training activities.
• Self-created sets of other students can have some mistakes since no one checks them.

StudentShare is an online database of academic examples. The resource gathers various types of already written and uploaded works by real students. Students can use such samples to follow the proper structure of an essay or other papers, their style requirements, and cope with referencing easier.

Pros

• The resource displays only those papers which are double-checked by a team of trained editors. It covers the whole range of academic subjects.
• There is an advanced search feature which allows to find a sample close to your topic.
• A variety of topics and subjects can become a good source of inspiration for students.

Cons

• The database lacks examples in several subjects like Archeology, Sports & Recreation, Performing Arts.
• Samples do not display the grade received for the particular paper due to private data issues.
• To use the resource you have to subscribe and choose a subscription plan.

We have analyzed only six EdTech resources for both students and educators. However, there are much more of them since every year new mobile apps appear trying to compete with other well-known services.

 

Author bio:

Veronica Hunt is an EdTech expert and an experienced blogger from Philadelphia, PA. She sees her purpose in providing her readers with up-to-date info in the spheres of marketing and psychology.