Giggling Voices. Wiggling Legs. Energetic Bodies. Elementary classrooms are filled with students who are trying to contain so much excitement and energy that they physically can’t be still. In fact, getting them to pay attention to a lesson or practice session can be tough for even the most experienced teacher. Because of this, it takes more than great classroom management. It takes really creative lesson planning to ensure students stay focused. Teachers must make sure students learn all of the required standards while also keeping them engaged in learning.
With this in mind, I want to share some ideas about how using Google Slides in your elementary classroom will help you improve student engagement. Seriously…Google Slides is a must-have google app for any elementary classroom. Pair it with Google Classroom for highly engaged learners of all ages! Additionally, I’ll share how this Digital Phonics Bundle will show students how much fun learning and practicing phonics can be!
Benefits of Google Slides
There are so many great reasons to use Google Slides! First, collaboration is so easy! Teachers and students can all interact together. This is certainly one way to ensure that every student is on-task and learning!
Second, it is an extremely versatile digital tool. You can use it in SO many ways! This allows you to save valuable instructional time by teaching the students how to use Google Slides. Students get comfortable using this digital tool and are able to use it in so many ways… whole-group, small-group, independent practice. It also works with any content area!
Third, it is so student-friendly. By creating and assigning learning exercises for students to complete, teachers can take the guesswork out for students about exactly what they need to do. Teachers can create templates, and then students just complete the learning tasks designed by the teacher. It could be a fill in the blank activity, open ended questions, or even having students write their own narratives. You can create drag and drop activities, creative writing tasks, activities with digital manipulatives, word sorts, and more. Everything the students need can be contained on a slide. Even our youngest students can use it with ease!
Lastly, Google Slides allows students to be creative. They can select how to design their own project, report, or activity. You can let students use this as a creative outlet to share their knowledge. Customize fonts, add images from the Google images search feature built into Google Slides, and then share their work with peers, family, and even previous teachers! No matter the age or grade, Google Slides can truly benefit everyone.
Ready-to-Use Activities
Don’t have time to create your own templates? I can help with that! If you teach literacy at any age, you need this Digital Phonics Bundle! This is especially perfect for K-2 teachers to provide targeted literacy practice for nearly any phonics skill.
Short vowels? Yes! Blends and Digraphs? I’ve got you covered. R-Controlled Vowels? You betcha! This best-selling bundle even includes vowel teams, diphthongs, hard and soft c and g sounds, and stable syllable -le! This bundle is MASSIVE!
It includes everything you will need for your students to practice phonics skills.
In order to help students acquire all of these vital early literacy skills, there are engaging practice activities for them to work on. Students will have a blast while building words using digital letter tiles and filling in the missing letters from words. Additionally, students will love the word-building puzzles, sentence building with word tiles, and word sorts. There’s even a word search! Based on feedback from teachers, students’ most favorite activity is the phonics picture puzzles. All of these creative activities will be completed in, you guessed it… Google Slides!
Google Slides Sight Words
Tired of flashcards? Are you always looking for new ways to practice sight words? Well, here is the perfect solution for you! These digital sight word games and activities benefit beginning readers in so many ways.
Why do you need these Google Slides activities for sight words?
- They can be used for whole group instruction, small group instruction, or even independent practice.
- This literacy activity fits the needs of kindergarten, first, and second grade teachers and students!
- Sight Word Google Slides are perfect for both in-person and virtual classrooms.
The activities are filled with Fry and Dolch sight words. In order to keep students active and engaged, there are many hands-on tasks for students to complete. There are 14 different ways to practice each sight word!
For example, students will trace dotted letters on handwriting lines with moveable letters, build words with letter tiles, and also type in the missing letter for words. Additionally, students will build sentences, complete word searches, and count the letters of the word.
The activities are also designed with scaffolded support in mind. Therefore, they will increase in difficulty as students work through the words. This is especially helpful for meeting the specific and diverse needs of all of your learners. You can use this to easily differentiate sight word assignments for students!
Missing Addends Practice
This Missing Addend Google Slides activity supports student-centered learning. There are 29 Slides with missing addend word problems that have number bonds, opportunities to construct number sentences, and provide written explanations. Furthermore, the activities are all hands-on. Students will have a blast with moveable pieces and textboxes to input answers.
It’s designed for students to work through digitally. Therefore, they can do it at home for homework or at school during math group rotations or during their independent work time. You could even use it to introduce the concept of missing addends to your class! Students will love digital learning resources after completing these Slides!
Google Slides for Fact Families
Just as I described above, this is a great digital activity for teaching number sense and fact families! There are 34 Slides with number bonds and related fact problems. For hands-on practice, students use moveable pieces to solve for missing parts of numbers. Number bonds will make complete sense after these Slides! This really reinforces students’ knowledge of the inverse relationship between addition and subtraction.
Google Slides in Elementary
There is SO much to learn in elementary school. Students are learning how to read, how to compute and problem-solve. They’re learning grammar and writing, and even how to be a good friend. Considering all of this while also taking into account that these students are only 5-10 years old, it is so important that we, as teachers, make their school experience engaging and meaningful.
Whether you use physical manipulatives or digital manipulatives like those mentioned in the activities I shared, it’s important that students have something to do that maintains their interest. They are not going to learn from lectures and worksheets. Even though elementary teachers know they have to use developmentally appropriate instructional strategies, we don’t always have the planning time we need to make the most of each lesson. All of these resources I shared allow students to practice hands-on in a digital setting. I have no doubt that your students will love all of these digital resources. If you want to dig in and see what Google Slides is all about, check out this Digital Phonics Freebie! Let me know what you think in the comments section below!
One Response
Thank you for sharing. This is very helpful since Google Slides can be used whether the classes are online or face-to-face.