My Favourite Web Tool

 One of my favourite web tools of all time is Classtools.net.  Now don’t let the visuals of the website fool you, sure it looks basic but it has some really simple and easy to use tools that can enhance the quality of your classroom teaching. 


Overview
This website is free and contains tools to help manage your classroom.  You can create free educational games, quizzes, activities and diagrams and host them on your own blog, website or intranet.

My Favourite Tools

• Venn Diagrams
  
• Post It - upload an image/text and add notes
  
• Animated Book 
  
• Source Analyser
  
• Random Name Generator
• Flash Quiz

My personal favourite is the countdown timer.  It’s simple and easy to use.  You click on the timer, and adjust the time.  You then click ‘countdown’ and away you go.   You can even upload a song for the timer to countdown to or choose one from the list.   I use this to help structure my lessons and provide clear pacing to my activities. 


I also use it as a behaviour management tool.  For example, in an hour lesson I will put 45 minutes on the timer.  The expectation is that they work for 45 minutes of the lesson. If they are not working I stop the timer and I wait for them to be quiet or focus back on their work.  If there is any time left on the timer at the end of the lesson I keep them in.  If the timer ends before the end of the lesson it is free time! 


Challenge: Using the Arcade Generator template create a quiz for one of your classes.