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This year I’ve done my annual review of the best online tools my ELL Newcomers can use for learning English.
It’s been complicated a bit by the upcoming Google changes taking place on October 23rd when they won’t be allowing student log-in using their Google credentials unless the district has approved them.
That basically means there needs to be a Data Privacy Agreement in place and I, and other teachers, will be surprised by some online sites that don’t have them, with Duolingo For Schools, ironically, being the most applicable one for ELLs.
Bye-bye, Duolingo.
I recently had student try out Memrise, and they liked it, but they don’t have a DPA, either.
Bye-bye, Memrise.
I had been hoping to have students use Google’s great Read Along site, but that apparently falls under “additional services” permission restrictions that Google has that includes getting parental permission for their use, and our district (and I suspect quite a few others) are not set-up for those.
So, bye-bye, Read Along.
USA Learns is great, but our district tech folks are not sure if they will get caught up in Google’s new restrictions. Ironically, its sponsored by the Sacramento County Board of Education, located a few miles from our school. Sigh.
Perhaps, bye-bye, USA Learns.
I really like ReadM, and our tech folks say their privacy policy might make things “complicated.”
Perhaps, bye-bye, ReadM.
The good news, however, is that most sites students are using with their Google log-in credentials do have approved Data Privacy Agreements, so they can continue to use them. And several others don’t require any log-in at all, so don’t have to deal with that problem.
So, here’s the list of sites they will continue to use:
Quill, the great adaptive learning tool for grammar and writing.
Raz-Kids (the only site that requires payment)
Loecsen (I really like its evaluation of English pronunciation)
Let me know what you think I, and my students, are missing!
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