I love incorporating technology into my curriculum and introducing it to my students in meaningful ways. The good news is that teaching them to use technology isn’t difficult. My kindergartners can navigate iPads better than I can. The challenge is incorporating tech-rich material in a way that’s meaningful and relevant to what we’re learning and that doesn’t take away from their learning experiences. Here are a few ways I successfully introduce technology and resources that are safe, engaging, and developmentally appropriate.

Finding safe, tech-rich material for the youngest students

1. Use video to warm up, engage, and transport students.

Every tool I use needs to reinforce whatever concept we’re learning or otherwise be tied into the lesson. It must meet the standards we’re working on, and it needs to be engaging.

One tool I’ve found incredibly useful this school year is Boclips for Teachers, which provides educational videos. I can find video resources for anything, including animation and songs that my students love. It’s such a timesaver because I know I’ll find an appropriate video for whatever lesson I’m teaching, and once we sit down to watch it, we don’t have to sit through all the ads—or worse, see inappropriate images that can sometimes come up with an on-the-spot YouTube search.

We use videos as a whole group in a variety of ways. In math, we work on number sense with videos to practice rote counting, number recognition, decomposing, and shapes. In our literacy blocks, we use videos to work on recognizing letter names and sounds, sight words, vowels, or just to sing about the alphabet. (We do a lot of dancing to these songs as well!) I also think of videos as a way to reinforce a concept and make sure my students are exposed to multiple approaches to understanding it.

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