Elementary Newsletters

Hello, sparkly people! It’s the final week of the first nine weeks, and we have some tech treats for you. (But don’t worry: there’s no pumpkin spice anywhere near this email… we all know Cinnamon Apple is the superior fall flavor! 🍎)

Here are a few updates from the Digital Learning Department for your enjoyment. Please let me know how I can help you plan engaging and meaningful lessons, troubleshoot what’s going on, or act as a thinking partner for your classroom. ❤

🏕️October Game On

• It’s here! It’s live!

• Earn the “The Teamwork Trek 🗣️: Student Collaboration Trails” badge and unlock the power of student collaboration! Earn the "Teamwork Trek" badge by demonstrating your ability to create engaging digital spaces for student-to-student interaction. 

🍬 New! External Badge Bingo!

• Earn Game-On credit for professional certifications like Adobe, Canva, Padlet, Pear Deck, and more.

• Get 3 = your first badge, and keep going for more—collect all 9 for the ultimate BINGO!

• Don’t miss out—badge season is officially open!

🎃 No Tricks, Just Treats (that use the tech you already have!)
A short roundup of low-prep, high-fun tools to bring some seasonal joy:

• • Canva Treats

    1. Pumpkin Power Words

    2. Autumn vocabulary activity—I modified this template so you can make it a click and drag activity instead of a printed activity

    3. Follow the Math Pattern

    4. Candy Corn Letters

  • ChatterPix Kids for storytelling (iPad only)

    1. Check out the resource page from our Digital Learning Playbook to see how students can tell a thirty-second story with their own voice and an image in ChatterPix Kids

  • Beebots

    1. State Fair activity

    2. Build a Jack-O-Lantern activity

    3. Ghost Math activity

    4. Fall Fest activity

    5. Not the topics you’re looking for? Let’s work together and bring in Marilyn Poweski—she and I will build one with you or FOR you!

  • Choice + Escape

    1. Halloween Choice Board (by Tonya Nugent & John Sowash) – note that not all of these are ideal for your classroom, but there’s some good starting points!

    2. Halloween Haunt Digital Escape Room (for upper elementary and beyond)

    3. Halloween Math Mini Escape Room Google Form from Brandi Jordan, ideally suited for grades 3-5

  • 📩 Reach out if you want to collaborate on building your own or implementing any of these!

💍 Parent Engagement in Canvas

• One of the perks of using Canvas instead of Google Classroom is that your families can access your course without having to log in as their student. Canvas allows a Parent Observer role which will let families SEE what’s going on in the online classroom without any of the privileges of submitting work for that student. Huzzah!

• Guardians have to attach themselves to their student once, and then they’re linked for the entirety of the student’s CFB career, and guardians can attach themselves to many different students

• Feel free to share these directions with your students and their adults!

  • English: Canvas Parent Observer Role Directions (1).pdf 

  • Spanish: Spanish Canvas Parent Observer Role Directions - Google Docs.pdf 

👉🆕 Updated Canva + Canvas LMS integration

• Teachers can now use External Tools🔌 in the LMS to give students their own copy of a Canva design. Students can submit it back to Canvas in one click, directly to SpeedGrader. Teachers can even see student work in-process, without having to wait for students to submit!

• In other words, the Submit to Canvas button in Canva now works as you’ve long hoped it would! 🥳

• Video Directions for teachers to assignment Canva and for students to submit Canva assignment.

• Note: You’ll have to be in your campus Canva team when you create/edit the Canva design

Reminder! 🍐Pear Start 

• Are you looking for an AI assistant to help you write assessments or gamify your lessons? Have you hit the paywall with Magic School AI? Great news: we pay for Pear Start through our subscription to Pear Deck, and it’s great! 

• Visit https://start.peardeck.com/tools and choose Pear Start if prompted after logging in. From there, you have all sorts of options to plus up your instruction. Remember: you are the content expert, and AI can sometimes hallucinate (make up facts as if they’re true), so you should definitely not take everything it says/creates as if it’s the absolute truth and way. It’s a great thinking partner, not a thinking replacement.

Hang in there—one more week and then we’re on Fall Break! 🍂

🍐Pear Start 

• Are you looking for an AI assistant to help you write assessments or gamify your lessons? Have you hit the paywall with Magic School AI? Great news: we pay for Pear Start through our subscription to Pear Deck, and it’s great! 

• Visit https://start.peardeck.com/tools and choose Pear Start if prompted after logging in. From there, you have all sorts of options to plus up your instruction. Remember: you are the content expert, and AI can sometimes hallucinate (make up facts as if they’re true), so you should definitely not take everything it says/creates as if it’s the absolute truth and way. It’s a great thinking partner, not a thinking replacement.

🍐Pear Deck: Student Toolbox

• Pear Start  has added a new tool - Student Toolbox! Students will now be able to have the content in a Pear Deck read aloud to them AND translated ( +read aloud)🙌🏽! View these instructions to learn more 🤩. 

👩‍🏫👨‍🏫 Canvas Teachers

• You can add and remove extra teachers on your own! 

  • From your canvas course, click People on the left side

  • Click + People in the top right corner

  • Add the teacher’s email address, and choose teacher at the bottom of that menu box

  • Click next, review your changes, then click add user

🌟 Canvas Annotations to Save Paper

• Did you know that students can annotate documents inside of Canvas? You don’t have to print all the documents OR you could have some printed and some online for student choice! 😁 

• Students can annotate on top of a .doc, .pdf, .jpeg, .ppt or anything that has a visual component! Canvas will automatically convert all of those file types into a PDF so students can not change your original content, but can still add their own text, comments, highlights, strikethroughs, and drawings. Visible learning anyone 💁🏽‍♀️? 

• Please note: if you are trying to upload a Google file to this assignment submission, you will need to download the Google file (docs, slides, sheets) as its Microsoft counterpoint (ppt, word doc, excel), an image, or a PDF. 

Here is how to do it: (need a video too? No problem, I got you 😉)

1. Set your assignment submission type to “online” 

2. Choose “student annotation” from the checkbox menu

3. It will then prompt you to upload a document 

📁 Google Chrome Tab Groups

• Do you have 87 emotional support tabs open that you’re sure you’re going to use, but maybe just not right now?? If you want to keep those available to you but clean up some visual clutter and speed up your laptop, consider creating Tab Groups.

• Right click the tab you want to save, then click Add tab to new group.

• Name the group, choose a color, and live your best life!

• Add additional tabs to the group by right clicking the tab, choosing add to tab group, and clicking the desired group. Note: the tab group has to be OPEN to add new tabs to it.

• Clicking the name of the tab group will collapse, or you can right click the title of the tab group and close it. All the content will recall when you reopen it!

🏕️September Game On 

Earn the "Exploring the LMS Wilderness: Configuration & Deployment Quest" badge and become a seasoned digital explorer. This badge celebrates your ability to navigate and master the complexities of your LMS.

To earn this badge, you must submit evidence of completing at least 2 Exploring the LMS Wilderness tasks in your campus Game On Course:

• Screenshot your UPDATED Canvas Meet the Teacher page

• Screenshot your Google Classroom Banner AND course card

• Screenshot a Google Assignment LTI from your Canvas course

• Screenshot your Module organization in Canvas or Google Classroom (Include any keywords or emojis you will be using as standard) 

• Use a Canva Code Widget in a Canvas page

• Show proof of using 2 Accessibility tools from the Playbook

When you have both pieces of evidence ready, submit the September quiz in your campus' Canvas Course. 

Canva Teams

• Canva has teams to help keep you organized, and each team has its own sharing permissions. 

• Switch between teams in the bottom left corner of Canva, clicking your current team, and then choose the specific team you want to look at

• Note: people from different teams can not collaborate on a document 

Happy Tuesday, party people! Please enjoy the latest PK-5 What the Tech?!

🎯 Amira

• iPad users: if you’re getting a frustrating (but cute!) dinosaur error screen, I’ve put in a work order with the district to hopefully get that issue resolved. It looks like the issue is trying to use the Amira APP instead of using the Amira website. You can definitely have your students log in to class link and then Amira through the safari browser, but there’s not currently a quick link to digital resources or class link on the iPads… which is its own other ticket that’s also been submitted. You could print a QR code that goes directly to Class Link, or one that goes to Digital Resources, but then you’ll have to teach your students to use the camera to scan a QR code and get to a website… maybe easier said than done! I know this is a frustrating issue, and I’m frustrated along with you!

• Chromebook users: if your students have headphones without a microphone, you may need to have them manually change microphone input every time they plug in their headphones. This guide shows the three easy steps; this version is printable. Unfortunately, there’s not a default setting we can adjust—this will be something those students will learn and then eventually do by reflex.

💻 Block/Unblock a Website

• To get a website blocked or unblocked, submit an SOS ticket/work order, and navigate to Network/Wi-Fi. From there, choose Request to Unblock/Block and follow the prompts. You’ll need a screenshot of the site to unblock/block, and a short description of it.

• Not all sites will become available, but at least you won’t be left guessing!

🌎 Emergent Bilinguals

• We have a great Technology Supports for EB Students resource full of help sheets, tools, and strategies to support students as they build their English skills. 

• A quick reminder from the Multilingual Department: we want to avoid translating everything and instead want to stick to translating instructions and using cognates to encourage literacy. For newcomers, though, translations can be a helpful launchpad!

🌟 T-TESS Goals + DLS 

• Do you have any T-TESS goals involving student engagement? What about goals involving  technology or digital resources? Your DLS is more than happy to help you reach those goals! Reach out via email or a Teams Message so we can get started together. 

🏁 Game On: September Challenge

• 🏅 Congrats to our teachers who earned their August badge, and congratulations to the August 2025 Campus Leaders! These campuses have the most badges per staff member—and don’t worry: we did the math to take into account campuses with larger/smaller staff sizes.

• 🌲🌳The September badge is now open, and it celebrates your ability to navigate and master the complexities of your LMS (learning management system). Check it out, and earn your badge!

🏅 Canva Teams

• Canva has teams to help keep you organized, and each team has its own sharing permissions. 

• Switch between teams in the bottom left corner of Canva, clicking your current team, and then choose the specific team you want to look at

• Note: people from different teams can not collaborate on a document