Enhancing Student Engagement with Seesaw

Keeping students engaged during virtual teaching has been a challenge! As a teacher, I am searching for ways to engage my students and check for understanding. One tool I have used from day one is the Seesaw app. While pencil and paper activities are important, they can be tough to monitor virtually. How do we know what students are writing? How can we truly know they have the skills if we cannot see them? The same goes for choral reading. Listening to a class choral read virtually is tough. We need to hear them read independently daily without having to assess them each individually. Seesaw has improved my student engagement by making tasks accessible to ALL learners; the benefits are fantastic.

Today I'm going to share an engagement resource with you that has made my life so much easier. 

Seesaw!

What is Seesaw?

Seesaw is a learning journal ideal for all students. It is an organized digital record of my students' learning. I use it as a tool for collecting evidence of the learning that occurs in my classroom. Parents can be given access to their child's account, receiving notifications every time their child posts a new item.  

Why Use Seesaw?

Seesaw is the perfect way to:

• document learning
• empower students to reflect
• teach digital citizenship and 21st-century skills
• build an organized record of student work
• create a community around learning
• involve families in real-time

Reading Fluency

MLK Statement

Students can:

• Use the photo and video function to:
• explain
• describe
• read fluently
• decode
• label
• defend an opinion and position
• investigate or experiment 
• demonstrate

Reading Fluency

• Use the drawing function:
• in place of paper/pencil
• record while they draw to explain thinking.
• sketch out a story idea
• label something
• show mathematical thinking
• use "think marks" while reading

Mathematical thinking

Showing work using paper/pencil

Showing work using the draw tool

Families can:

• view their child's work and leave comments and encouragement
• use Seesaw as a way to communicate and be up to date on the learning their child is doing in school
• read teachers' reports to help motivate their child to do better because they know their teachers will provide immediate feedback

Teachers can:

• use Seesaw as a hub for students to share their work, and specifically encourage individual reflection and feedback
• use Seesaw as a place not only where student work can be stored, but where teachers and peers can provide encouragement, constructive criticism, and suggestions for improvement
• comment to provide feedback that is constructive
• create formative and summative assessments
• create or use premade assignments
• send individual students differentiated assignments

Differentiated Assignment

Seesaw is an amazing digital tool to add to your tool belt! It has encouraged creativity for my students. It has given my students a place to display their work and showcase their successes during virtual learning. 

Positively Teaching,  

Randi Muehlen