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Fifty of the best ed-tech products for schools
These 50 educational technology products and services are the winners of our 2012-13 Readers' Choice Awards
FluidMath (Fluidity Software)
FluidMath is a teaching and learning tool designed for users of pen-centric platforms such as tablet PCs and interactive whiteboards. It features accurate recognition of handwritten math symbols, allowing teachers and students to share concepts and explore ideas electronically.
“FluidMath is the best software for teaching and learning mathematics I have used in my 25-year career,” said Nils Ahbel, a math teacher at Deerfield Academy in Massachusetts. “FluidMath recognizes standard math notation written in handwriting and brings the math alive. … With FluidMath, the tablet PC is not used as a substitute for manipulation skills, but rather as a tool for investigation. This change in perspective is incredibly important—it helps students be mathematicians and not just learn mathematics.”
Gaggle Apps (Gaggle Inc.)
Gaggle Apps are online tools for students to communicate and collaborate in a safe, filtered, and controlled environment. Tools include eMail, digital lockers, discussion boards, chat rooms, blogs, assignment drop boxes, and more.
“Our third, fourth, and fifth graders have safe monitored eMail, social walls, blogs, IM, homework drop boxes, digital lockers, and more with this online resource,” said Camella Herrin, technology facilitator for Cabarrus County Schools in North Carolina. “The opportunity to teach students the ethical and correct usage of such online resources has been phenomenal. We began with eMail and have now begun to branch out to social walls for our fifth graders and blogging between teachers and their students. The levels of control are managed by the designated school administrator for Gaggle, and this allows different apps within Gaggle to be rolled out as teachers and students are ready for them—not before! There is even an app called GaggleTube, which is filtered YouTube. Teachers approve educational and timely videos, and students may access them within GaggleTube in a safe manner.”
Gooru (Ednovo)
Gooru is a free search engine for learning. Teachers and students can use Gooru to search for rich collections of multimedia resources, digital textbooks, videos, games, and quizzes created by educators in the Gooru community. Collections are aligned with standards and currently cover every math and science topic from grades 5-12, with other subjects coming soon.
Gooru “has been instrumental in our efforts to flip our entire school,” said Greg Green, principal of Clintondale High School in Michigan. “Gooru provides 30,000 free resources that enable our teachers to flip our classrooms and to meet our students’ personal learning needs. … We have received so much attention; however, we could not do it without Gooru assisting us. They provide us an invaluable, web-based LMS solution that is unmatched, with plentiful resources and collaboration capabilities.”
Infosnap is a provider of online admission and registration solutions for K-12 schools. It offers secure, customized online forms based on a school or district’s existing enrollment processes. Data submitted through these forms are delivered from the infosnap software to the school’s student information system, and administrative tools enable school leaders to polish the data and run customized reports.
“The Carlisle Area School District uses infosnap for pre-registration and registration of new students, as well as annual student and staff updates,” said Stephanie Douglas, director of technology for this Pennsylvania district. “Infosnap has saved our district tens of thousands of dollars in copier, printer, paper, toner and other expenses to create packets of forms. As important, it has increased the efficiencies to gather emergency, medical, demographic, and other information from students. Instead of waiting for students to return completed forms over the first few weeks of school, we hade 72 percent of [the necessary] student information before the opening day of school. With the integration to our student information system, this information was available for teachers, staff, and administrators immediately—removing the need for support staff to read all forms of handwriting [and] enter [the data] into our SIS. … Implementing this system was one of the biggest and most positive changes for our district in recent memory.”
8 Responses to Fifty of the best ed-tech products for schools
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peejs66
July 24, 2012 at 12:16 am
DreamBox is thrilled to be included in eSchool News 50 Best Edtech Products for Schools. Thank you! We do want to correct the description of the underlying technology, though, because the intelligent adaptive learning platform evaluates much more than right and wrong answers. The engine evaluates the strategy used to solve the problem, the pace at which the student interacts with the software, the number of hints requested, and more. In fact, the adaptive learning engine collects, analyzes, and responds to about 48,000 pieces of data per hour, per student. The adaptivity is extraordinarily fine-grained.
tfrantz
July 24, 2012 at 3:01 pm
Thank you, eSchool News readers! Lightspeed Systems is honored to have My Big Campus recognized as one of the Top 50 Edtech Products. We encourage you to log on, create a free account, and start creating an engaging, collaborative learning experience for your students. See you around Campus!
britmullins
July 25, 2012 at 9:25 pm
Thank you! SoftChalk is proud to be one of the 50 Best Edtech Products for Schools. As readers of eSchoolNews and eCampusNews, as well as professionals with roots in higher education, we couldn’t be more honored. We know how hard it can be to find the right tools to meet the ever-changing needs of the higher ed classroom, and we’re proud to offer a content authoring solution that meets the mark!
zanepub
July 30, 2012 at 11:41 pm
Zane Education wants thank everyone that voted for them.
We appreciated being the only company selected for actually delivering K-12 curriculum content as opposed to the various platforms and support tools.
Using online video and the innovative use of subtitles (The Missing Piece) to enable all students to study a wide range of curriculum subjects AND improve their reading and literacy skills AT THE SAME TIME, is important to us and we appreciate the support of all those that share our belief in providing equal access for all students.
And for those of you in schools and classrooms that have yet to experience the benefits and positive results of Visual Learning in the classroom supported by online testing for each topic, the use of free Lesson Plans and the interactive study tools provided to help each student to fully explore each topic, you can view out free Curriculum Topic of the Day at the following link:
http://www.zaneeducation.com/Videos/freevideo.php
We believe that enabling each child to study at their own speed is key to helping each child achieve their greatest potential.
And thank you again!
cortboulanger
August 1, 2012 at 10:30 pm
Thanks to eSchool Media readers for including Middllebury Interactive Languages on this list. We are proud to be among the 50 products making a difference in our schools. But this is only possible working with our partners – teachers, administrators, parents and students – to provide access to superior world language instruction for all students.
We hope you’ll visit the Middlebury Interactive Facebook page to keep up to date on our activities. https://www.facebook.com/pages/Middlebury-Interactive-Languages/141015515949753
Thanks again.
presencelearning
August 7, 2012 at 6:49 pm
Thank you so much to eSchoolNews readers! PresenceLearning is honored to be chosen for this esteemed list of ed-tech solution providers. PresenceLearning (http://www.presencelearning.com) is the leading provider of live online speech therapy services to K-12 schools. We are delivering over 5,000 live sessions a month and helping kids master the language and speech skills they need for success in school and life. We are growing rapidly by helping school districts overcome critical shortages of SLPs and serve their special needs students better. See a video of a real online speech session at:
http://presencelearning.com/online-speech-therapy-videos
chris.buecksler@schoolwires.com
August 9, 2012 at 7:20 pm
Thank you eSchoolNews readers for selecting Centricity2 as a Top 50 Ed Tech Product for Schools. Schoolwires sincerely appreciates the selection and is proud to serve more than 10 million users with our website, content management and safe social learning solutions to drive engagement in the classroom and K-12 community.
angiecasteel89
August 14, 2012 at 5:24 pm
Scientific Minds is excited to be included in the Top 50 Ed Tech Products for Schools. Thank you to all who voted for us! At Scientific Minds, we take great pride in making quality, online products for grades K-12 that provide practical, easy-to-use solutions for classroom success. Both teachers and students benefit from the brain research used to develop our main product, the Science Starters, which deliver science content in small “chunks” accompanied by vivid, memorable images and graphics. We invite you to check out our new online professional development for elementary teachers at https://www.scientificminds.com/ProfessionalDevelopment.aspx.