Issue 2 of Dot and Line e-zine for educators.

Dot & Line issue 2

Sometimes you just want a quick Google Slides or PowerPoint Template. These resources have your covered.

Paula, the creator of Slides Mania is the sweetest lady! She started creating templates as a hobby, and WOW! does she have some fun templates.

I am NOT a fan of Teachers Pay Teachers. We already spend a lot of our own money on resources so I try to provide resources for you all for free. However, some teachers also do this on TPT. Click the link below to see the free Slides Templates teachers have provided.

This is the first Google Slides template site I found. They have some great stuff!

My friend, Matt Miller, is the perfect example of providing free, and amazing, resources for teachers. In the post below, he shares lesson ideas to use with different templates.

Slidesgo.com limits you to 10 free downloads a month, but I find some good things here.

mental health, daily gratitude journaling improved their mental well being up to 12 weeks after daily journaling. The study found four psychological benefits of gratitude journaling that improve mental health. 1. Gratitude unshackles us from toxic emotions 2. Gratitude helps even if you don't share it 3. Gratitude's benefits take time 4. Gratitude has lasting effects on the brain

November always has some fun gratitude challenges. This is a simple and quick way to daily improve our mental health. Remember, you don't have to share your gratitude for it to improve your mental health, so even if you just say it in the mirror each day or privately journal it, it will benefit you.

<a href="https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_gratitude_changes_you_and_your_brain">How Gratitude Changes Your Brain.</a>

Tara Martin introduced #gratitudesnaps a few years ago. You can use Snapchat to journal your gratitude daily.

#gratitude30 on Twitter has daily prompts to help you with your gratitude journey.

Google Sheets is not the app many people 

think of when you talk formative assessment. However, you can do some pretty amazing things with it.

<a href="https://infinitelyteaching.com/2020/12/17/self-checking-pixel-art-tutorial/">Tutorial</a> and template

<a href="https://infinitelyteaching.com/2021/09/26/self-checking-magic-squares-sheet/">Tutorial</a> and template

<a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/15FerDBtPGsbfC9Znrra7AbL4rCfj3VNk9VCEXCof-bY/copy">Template</a>

Wakelet of created Google Sheets Activities

<a href="https://infinitelyteaching.com/2021/09/12/self-checking-google-sheets/">Tutorial</a> and template

Sometimes you have a photo you want to use but you want the background transparent. Remove.bg is an easy way to do this. Now, we've already talked about Creative Commons usage, so don't abuse this site.

Unscreen.com works like remove.bg but for videos and animated GIFs. The example is a Bitmoji video from Snapchat.

Creating Self-Directed Students with Formative Assessment

No more BORING presentations. Up your presentation game.

Sometimes you want to create a presentation that is not in Google Slides or PowerPoint. Check out these resources for some amazing options.

As the name suggests, this is a cartoon-like presentation. I love the animated writing feature. It has some nice free features.

Genial.ly has more than just presentations, but it is a fun presentation alternative. You will also find some animated templates here. Some features are paid but the free version has some nice tools.

You can create presentation inside Canva. They are easy to share and they have some interactive components. Don't forget to sign up for you free teacher account on Canva.

If your presentation has a lot of images, Adobe Spark is the tool to use. It helps you create professional looking presentations quickly.

This one has been around for awhile but many people don't know about it. I love fancy it looks. The museum template is so fun.

Google Applied Digital Skills has a gratitude lesson and template to use with your students.

This is a simple no code tool that allows you to share information in a Chrome Tab. Watch the video below or check out the link.

<a href="https://tabmaker.withgoogle.com/">tabmaker.withgoogle.com</a>

<a href="https://twitter.com/i/status/1456002715964870662">click to watch video</a>

Formative assessment allows students to check their own progress and decide what they still need to work on. Self-monitoring is an important skill for students have. Formative assessment can be as simple as providing answers to an activity, but it can also be fun and interactive. Here is a collection of formative assessment ideas.

Make Math Not Suck - iterate. Take this idea and make it your own.

<a href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1acBR8mE3mmLyZMF_CZBBhhd2CGItyFilVxE-DrZF77Q/template/preview">click to open</a>

You can create drag and reveal type activities in

Build a Snowman (or <a href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1OUtCn1sc0ACNRDoaYoz9Y3Udl_0o8Q2PMt_-XU7WFPM/template/preview">Build a Monster</a>) is self-checking if you give students the final image. I usually have them check with me when they are finished.

Google Drawing or Google Slides. I prefer Google Slides because you can have multiple slides. Check out the example. As I say in

<a href="https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1ug-kJ9lYLMdxe1W9Xbeti9HQ6mT--A-QpRNh6oqPNRU/template/preview">click to open</a>

On November 9th, you can join Microsoft Reimagine as Common shares about inclusion in education.

I have been singing the praises of Blooket for awhile now but seriously, if you haven't checked out Blooket, RUN, don't walk, to Blooket.com. Every time I play this game with a new group of students, I get, "so just another Kahoot site," and then they play it and they are hooked. I haven't had a class yet that hasn't asked for more. I have also been posting HW lessons as check your understanding opportunities. My high school students love completing the CYU multiple times to earn tokens for new icons. If you find a site that makes high school students want to do work then it's a great site.

You can make your classroom activities more fun with the use of images. Sometimes the images we find don't meet usage requirements or aren't exactly what we are looking for. Here are some tips and tricks to make images work for you and your students.

Whether you want to create a custom image or customize a Bitmoji, Google Drawing has you covered. Check out these tutorials to create amazing graphics.

When searching for images in Google, you can select Tools then usage rights and select Creative Commons licenses to make sure the images you are choosing are free to use.

This is a difficult time for educators. The stress is piling up and many educators are leaving or looking to leave education for their own wellness. I'm not using the phrase "take care of yourself", because as an educator that makes me a little angry. It's hard to take care of yourself when the expectations are high and the support is low. It's hard to be your best when so many things are more challenging. We have less time to prepare and evaluate because we are covering for other teachers due to a lack of substitute teachers or because we have more professional development because schools want us to "fix" the perceived

learning gap. We have larger class sizes because teachers have left or are not applying or schools won't spend the money on more teachers. Couple these issues with increased negative behaviors from students and you have a recipe for disaster. Especially when teachers are told to "just build relationships" to fix the issue. I have great relationships with my students but that doesn't prevent them from making questionable choices sometimes. Why am I bringing all of this up? Because there is one simple action we can do daily that has shown to help our mental wellbeing - GRATITUDE. In a study conducted by Josh Brown and Joel Wong, using 300 college students who were seeking counseling for

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