Monday 26 February 2018

Modern and Interactive Lessons with TES TEACH with blendspace!


Teachers as well as students who only depend on PowerPoint for designing lessons and making presentations probably have wished that it offered more options such as adding YouTube videos to the screen and making a short quiz to start or end the lesson with in order to increase students' level of engagement with the lesson. Well, now there is an easy and free option for making powerful and interactive lessons which will enhance the classroom environemnt. This tool is TES TEACH with blendspace

First, it will be so helpful to see this tutorial video which introduces the tool and offers a step-by-step guide to how it could be used:

What is special about TES TEACH with blendspace? 

An example of the options that TES TEACH offers
When you use Tes Teach with blendpace, you will easily support your original lessons with online content to effectively illustrate your points and to give examples of what you are teaching. For instance, while designing the lesson, you can easily search online to find information, pictures and videos to support the content of the lesson. These online resources can be attached to the slides directly in a neat way without having to download them to your device first.

I have designed a lesson using Tes Teach with blendspace to teach Macbeth. The lesson can be viewed simply by clicking here. I attached pictures from Google and videos from YouTube to illustrate the lesson further and to increase the students' engagement and understanding.Moreover, it linked me to 'Tes' where I could view what teachers have prepared and published about Macbeth, and many of the materials are free to use.

In addition, the students can join the lesson using their computers to take a quiz which can test their preparation for learning about a certain topic and their understanding at the end of the lesson. Also, as a teacher, you can evaluate your students' engagement with the lesson or even with Tes Teach as a tool for teaching through the interactive options of 'like and comment'.  Therefore, the teacher will be better able to plan for the next step after tracking the students' development and engagement through the various options that Tes Teach offers.


Some Pedagogical Underpinnings behind TES TEACH with Blendspace

Using computers along with the web supports blended learning, which is a term that refers to integrating technology with the traditional methods of teaching to give the students more space to work collaboratively and eventually independently. For instance, instead of telling the students the play of Macbeth and delivering all the knowledge by him/herself, the teacher can include what he/she expects the students to learn in the slides and ask them to watch the videos, read parts of the lesson together and share the knowledge with one another. In this way, the students work collaboratively to scaffold one another while doing the task, and with his/her observation of the students' development, the teacher can intervene to scaffold the students when he/she thinks it is getting too challenging for the students. As a result, the students' level of autonomy will increase, for they practice the skill of exploring knowledge by themselves. The teacher can also assign some tasks to be done as homework, which will give the opportunity for more engagement and interaction during the class.

Suitability for Palestinian Teachers

As I have mentioned in earlier blogs, the Ministry of Education in Palestine supports the use of technology in the classroom and is constantly providing more facilities and freedom to teachers to effectively use technology in classes. Hence, teachers can make use of Tes Teach with blendspace and design their lessons to enhance the students' understanding and engagement. Palestinian students are generally literate with technological tools and will easily accept and appreciate a tool such as Tes Teach with blendspace. However, English teachers will not be able to manage all their classes in the computer lab to make the students interact with the lesson. Nevertheless, this tool can still be used in the classroom with one computer device and a projector, and a smart teacher can make it as effective as when each student is using a computer. For instance, the teacher can divide the class into groups and make the quiz as a competition between the groups.

Any concerns?

A teacher needs to track his/her students' development and to see to what extent using the tool is efficient in order to know how to use it in future lessons. The students' response will determine how the teacher should use the tool and should determine the explicitness of instruction. Furthermore, teachers and presenters should be careful when using the online resources to design their lessons. These resources should be used to support the lesson and to make it more interactive and engaging; however, the teacher should keep the original content of the lesson and not over-depend on online resources to achieve the general outcome of a lesson.

40 comments:

  1. Hi Yousef! I think it is a very effective medium for blended learning. Even in exam based contexts like the one where I teach, with such a tool, educators will get scope to practice teaching autonomously and creatively by redesigning their course plan to suit learner needs.

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  2. Frankly, because of the pressure on the students and their demand for the program Bourboint it became boring and ordinary in suspense, but this application will communicate with the Internet and be an individual learning and take into account the individual differences and enhanced by the teacher to the student alone, this attracts the student and also everything that was connected with YouTube voice and image The more I wish, the greater the student's interest in learning and encouraging it
    بتول ناهض عيسى

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  3. Hello, Yousef, how are you? At the beginning, the blog you made is more than wonderful. At least it was one of the most fascinating things for me. It is unique. If you study more, you can learn a lot. I love it and I think I am waiting for you to teach me the next chapter at Al Najah University. Marah Mahmood

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  4. Hello, I'm Ru'a Ghazal. This is a nice job actually. It is great for the students as they will collaborate with each other and for the teachers to check the student's engagement. But, actually, it is not such a problem we face to download an image or attach a video in the PowerPoint. In addition to that, not all the rooms in our university are supplied with a projector and what is needed, and it is hard to convince some teachers to use this. Good Luck.

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  5. I think it is beautiful, it can reduce leisure time and use it useful things to develop ourselves and we can bring many videos of the way and benefit from them

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  6. i like this program because teacher will easily support his original lessons with online content to effectively illuminate your points,teacher can easily search online to find information, pictures and videos to support the content of the lesson.

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  7. I wish I knew about TES TEACH before. It’s an AMAZING tool for presentations despite the fact that our labs in the Uni aren’t supplied with the best technological tools. I believe that it’s very helpful especially for professors teaching many courses. Those professors who don’t have enough time, will actually be benefited by TES TEACH.

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  9. Lovely training video ,clear and simple and this is a great tutorial for an amazing resource for teachers
    By Hiba Yasser

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  10. An excellent way to make a presentation without using powerpoint. I know others programmes in which you have to pay money in order to add a YouTube video.TES Teach is neat and flexible way to insert videos inside the presentation.

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  11. In the beginning this application close to power point programm. Any teacher use Tesco Teach With blendpace he or she is very elegant. He can put many tools in this application such as: pictures, videos from YouTube,website,and pdf. This application help the teacher and student parties.Frankly, I hope to graduate and be employed to use to use this programm in education.

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  12. This is a super amazing program to use for making presentation and teaching,instead of the traditional and boring programs as PowerPoint or Word. I think if the teachers use TES Teach, that would make the students more interested and engaged in the subject. Moreover, it's easy to use, It's free and you can attach anything you want. Really it is a brilliant innovation.

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  13. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  14. Wonderful, this app is perfect for presintations. It would be amazing if l knew about this application befor. Actually each teacher should use it because students like this way of teaching. It will enhance students' participation in the classrom and make it easier to understand the lessons by providing videos,pictures and quizes at the same time. This app will be one of the best teaching methods one day

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  15. I think it's a very helpful app. It allows us to improve our language for free. The problem here in our country is that most of the conversation courses are for beginners which focus on the basics that we are already familiar with. Insted we know the basic things in conversation but still we need to employ our knowledge in our conversation skills.
    So it's really helpful and useful.ارين مسالمة

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  16. Wonderful,using powerpoint in teaching is usefull because it makes the students more attractive and they get the information in a simple way.It helps the students to understand the lessons easily by using videos and pictures. This application has many advanteges for the students and teachers like,saving time and it is fast and easy.Most teacher use it because it is more affective than traditional ways of teaching.
    Ruba Ali

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  17. Hi Yousef! I really liked the idea of having one application that contains powerpoint, google, youtube and flicker all at once.
    One good point about it is that it preserves time and effort. Instead of wasting your time jumping from a browser to another and copy-pasting on powerpoint, this application makes it all easier and faster.
    It also has great categorizing features that you can add documents, pdfs, videos, photos, links and also quizzes.
    It is also featured by google, youtube and flicker which is really good in looking up information easily on the topic.
    You can literally create a whole, well-organized class using it.
    It also has privacy features which is something good.
    Another thing that I really liked is the discussion part.
    If I one day became a teacher I would definitely try it out!
    -Lena Ismail

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  18. Finally we will get rid of traditional ways that we use.TES application is the most gorgeous application for teaching and for making presentations .The idea of simplification which the application has is very important because it will save time and help us to make it quickly without wasting time .

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  19. I love this new app! It took seconds to download, it's easy to navigate, the menus and icons are easy to understand and follow. I love the layout of the library and how simple it is to locate a topic of interest .this free online platform makes it easy to plan, build, and deliver a lesson by integrating content from YouTube, TES resources, your own files, and other digital media somewhere on the internet.

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  20. This application is great because it enables students to learn the lesson in a fun and exciting way and also receive information easily and also helps students who have difficulty to understand the lesson to display pictures and videos that enable them to understand the article,
    and Boosts the speed of the learning process and increases its efficiency.
    It's a better way to teach than traditional methods we used to

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  21. TES Teach with Blendspace is the perfect platform for creating interactive lessons to engage students and share via Google Classroom. Also, it is free and easy tool teachers
    love for lessons, project,....description.

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  22. This is such a brilliant tool to use! Since students of this generation are very competent with technological methods, this will highly track their attention in the classroom. Besides, it allows you to use information from different sources without the need to download any. Also it has the option of making a quiz that teachers prefer but they usually avoid using because they will need to copy great number of papers. Since it also allowed for students, I will use it in the coming presentations.

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  23. At first, I feel that it's complicated but when I see the video every thing is appeared clear. This is a place where you can imagine, build, organize, control, creat and even use magic.
    It is definitely a useful tool for teachers cause it allows them to use technologies with their teaching organizing their time and help them to get red of their stress and have time to work in some else. It will help them to get better results for a better job. Moreover, it's helpful for the students, they will feel in a good mood that this is something new. I am a student and I Know how l would feel when l learn in an extra ordinary way, how my attention will be attract, how l will do, and how the result will be.
    Students like new things which take them away, steal their hearts and minds, visit new Earth.
    It a place where you can use pictures, sites and the spices of your thoughts. It allows to check your information and knowledge about anything.
    نرمين جمال عبد الرازق حسين علي

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  24. Intresting! This mix in a class by having videos, games and these stuff would make that students pay more attention comparing with the style that we got used to especially in schools.

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  25. I like this app because I can use information from different sources without any downloading .It enables student to learn and receive information easily .Also, it is easy to use from teachers.Having games,pictures and videos in a class is the best way to teach students.(اية فلاحة )

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  26. It's brilliant , i love the idea , something like that will definitely attract the students .
    But you see in Palestine teachers don't really know how to deal with technology so they can't use it .
    Hopefully in the future after i become as official teacher i will use it in my classroom .
    By Eman Zuhd .

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  27. To be perfectly honest, due to the heavy weights on students’ shoulders and their interest for the program Bourboint it ended up exhausting and common in tension, yet this application will interact with the Internet and be an individual learning and consider the individual contrasts and upgraded by the educator to the understudy alone, this interests the students and furthermore everything that was associated with YouTube voice and picture .The more I hope, the more brilliant the students’ enthusiasm for learning and empowering it
    By.Huda qabaha

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  28. It's a beautiful application and I liked it because it contains the whole programmes in one application which is more easier and helpful . Also , the most important thing that attract me which is identifying who use this application before they use it . For example , If you are a teacher , student or parent and according to whom they use they give them some principle that is helpful for them . Also , they identifying the subject that you want and give us a collection of information such as youtube , picture and activities and this keep time and which is not found in any application ever .So, it is a smart application

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  29. It is a very good idea, but it should be planned more by training the teacher and the learner how to use officialy it in a way that serves the purpose set for it, which enables the student to benefit more

    By.Noor toum

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  30. I am sure that such a tool like TES TEACH with blendspace would be such an effective method to use in classes. I believe such a method would increase the level of engagement for the students, but we always forget about how confused the students would become within the use of technology. It is true that new technology can develop many skill, but what makes sure that students won't get bored especially when they spend more than half of their time - after lessons - using smart phones and new technology. For me, as a student, I used to get bored during such lessons that overuse technology, and this means that such a method is supposed to give tips of how much of the class should include technology.
    By Razan Ghazal

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  31. I read about this tool for the first time from your blog . I think that this tool is very effective and enjoying for the classroom engagement . For instance ,Students practice the skill of exploring knowledge by watching pictures and vidoes etc . ..
    However under physical and social conditions in Palestine , as a teacher we cants use this tool significantly because we have one computer lab for each school .Sothat , its very difficult to entegrate tecnologies for each lessons and grades.

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  32. I liked it because it contains the whole programmes in one application. And it could be helpful for thouse teachers who teaching many courses and they do not have alot of time.

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  33. - [ ] Well , this app is really incredibly useful in a way that it keeps sending you as a user new vocabulary everyday to memorize them and use them in daily life,and the app give you the chance to determine your level of English so it provides with the suitable vocabulary according to your level of English.Another great feature that the app offers it is learning other languages like Hebrew,Chinese and more other languages.So , as a user you can learn more than one language in the same time.Moreover,the app lets you get involved in chats to practice your language and it also gives the chance to join some language groups. Therefore , i recommend everyone to use this pretty useful app to improve their English or any other language.
    By: Sara Amarneh

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  34. I think it is a helpful Application which we can use it inested of the traditional teaching . If teachers and students use the TES Teach , thier subjects would be very intresting and it will attract the audince attintion.Moreover, it allows you to add information from different sources without the need to dawnload it . تيماء خفش

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  35. Honestly speaking, this is a dream come true for teachers. It’s very advanced and easy to use. And for students, it’s eye catching. It’s different in comparison with what they’ve seen. So it’s a win-win project to be aimed for.

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  36. Amazing!I think it is the most effective way in teaching because using powerpoint„video and this kind of technology attract the attention of the students.It is also help the teacher to explain the information and the lessons in lovely and easy way.

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  37. I think it is a way to increase the interaction between students and teachers and works to attract the attention of the student whether in explaining the lesson or to explain some of the lessons or exams, but it is difficult to convince some of teachers to use this program in education
    By:أريج سليمان قواريق

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  38. Games are the favorite part of the students during the study.It affects students and makes them enjoy.I think it is one of the most effective ways, it motivates students to learn and encourages them to participate and cooperate between themselves and understand the lesson correctly.From my opinion, it is an excellent method can used at the end of the lesson as a feedback to be sure of what the students are learning. Also , it's a way of breaking the traditional ways of learning and students often prefer to stay away from the routine in learning.

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