Areas is a complimentary digital portfolio tool that released previously this year and has actually quickly turned into one of my leading suggestions for trainees and instructors who wish to bring Portfolio-based evaluation into their class. Since it pertained to my attention in the middle of the last school year, some instructors may not have actually attempted it since they already had a digital portfolio in place. Now that the new school year is here, take a look at
Areas and its numerous functions for students and teachers including some that were just launched for the new academic year.

You can develop an Activity that is as basic or as complex as you would like. A simple Activity would be something like “attach a picture of your marshmallow tower and explain what you d do differently next time.” An intricate Activity might be something like asking trainees to tape-record a short video explaining the crucial points of a presentation theyre making and how those points line up with the requirements youve assigned. Heres a list of some sample Spaces Activities.

Curriculum Goals & & Tags lets you import sets of standards with which you desire to “tag” your Activities. The sets of standards that are readily available to import is rather impressive. There are the typical state and province standards typically utilized by public schools as well as standards often utilized by independent schools.

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To create an Activity in Spaces just sign into your teacher account, choose the class that you want to designate an Activity to, and then click the blue “develop” button under the Activity heading in your account. All you have to do is write the instructions for what you want your students to do. You can merely import those instructions instead of manually composing directions in Spaces Activities if you already have actually instructions composed in Google Docs or Word. Areas will even let you record a video to discuss the instructions to your trainees. When students submit their Activities projects you can review them in your Spaces account just like you can review any other items that they add to their portfolios.

Head here to find out more about Curriculum Goals & & Tags or view the video at the bottom of this post to see how easy it is to include Curriculum Goals & & Tags to your Spaces account

Curriculum Goals & & TagsCurriculum Goals & & Tags is another new Spaces feature for this year. Ive seen other digital portfolio services try to do something comparable, however none has made it as simple for instructors to implement as Spaces has.

To import Curriculum Goals & & Tags into your Spaces account just sign into your account, pick a class, then click on “Curriculum Goals & & Tags “on the left hand side of the screen. Youll then see a search box pop-up where you can browse for requirements sets according to state, province, or organization.

Learn more about Spaces Activities right here or enjoy my short video at the bottom of this post to see the teacher and trainee point of views of Spaces Activities.

Activities” Activities” is my preferred brand-new feature in Spaces. Activities are exactly what the name implies, activities that you can designate to your students to complete and include to their Spaces digital portfolios. And because Spaces uses group portfolios and private portfolios, you can designate Activities to groups or individuals.

After youve selected the set of standards that you wish to import into your Spaces class, you can then add requirements tags to your assignments in Spaces. This is a great method to assist parents and students understand how a task aligns with a curriculum goal.

Three Reasons to Try Making Spaces Digital Portfolios.

Disclosure: Spaces is currently an advertiser on FreeTech4Teachers.com

1. Accessibility.
As I wrote previously this year about.
Areas, accessibility was among its huge selling points when I tried it for the very first time. Areas offers a method to make sure that the announcements, Activities, and feedback that you post for trainees can be accessed by them in a range of ways.

Parent involvement.As I alluded to above, parents like to see what their kids are working on and digital portfolios are a terrific method to facilitate this. Parents can be welcomed to see their kids Spaces portfolio. Welcoming parents to view their childs portfolio likewise supplies them with the opportunity to talk to their kid about what theyre finding out in school.

When you post in your class Space you can compose it out, however you can likewise tape-record audio and video messages to accompany that written message. I can do that by composing a message and I can utilize Spaces integrated audio and video recording tools to post the exact same message.

3. Group Portfolios.
One of the things that makes Spaces somewhat special in the digital portfolio area is that there is a built-in way to create group portfolios within your class account. Your students can have individual portfolios where they show their specific work, but they can also belong of groups in which they share their work.

How to Get Started!The quickest method to get going is to sign-up at https://app.spacesedu.com/signup then create an account utilizing either your Google account or email address. Then you can create a class roster and welcome your trainees to sign up with. From your instructor dashboard you can rapidly produce private areas for them to use once theyve signed up with. This video strolls you through the procedure of creating spaces for your trainees and this video shows the trainees point of view.

The much better use of group Spaces is as a location where students can share their work in development and get feedback from each other as well as from their teacher.

You can appoint students to particular group Spaces to share with each other and with you. The much better use of group Spaces is as a place where students can share their work in development and get feedback from each other as well as from their instructor.

Spaces is a totally free digital portfolio tool that introduced earlier this year and has rapidly ended up being one of my leading recommendations for trainees and instructors who want to bring Portfolio-based evaluation into their classrooms. Activities are exactly what the name suggests, activities that you can appoint to your trainees to include and complete to their Spaces digital portfolios. Areas will even let you record a video to explain the instructions to your students. When students send their Activities projects you can examine them in your Spaces account simply like you can review any other items that they add to their portfolios.