I'm looking for educational technology recommendations.
I volunteer as a teacher trainer at my church, and recently, I've become more and more aware of the lack of technology use by the teachers of in-person classes at church (myself included). And I'm quite sure that my church isn't the only organization whose in-person class offerings are suffering from this. With resources out there like Coursera, Khan Academy, Wikipedia, YouTube, etc., many of the in-person class experiences I've had in the past now seem totally antiquated.
But I still think the in-person class experience has a place, and I'm pretty sure that in-class technology can improve it by increasing student engagement and leveraging people's technology addictions rather than ignoring them.
Yesterday, I stumbled across Poll Everywhere, which I used (pretty successfully, I think) in my class today. The app allows you to create simple quizzes and display real-time, SMS-based feedback from students. I also looked into Socrative, which had a nicer interface, but I didn't like the fact that students also had to register for accounts.
So all of you teachers out there… Any recommendations on in-class apps that you've successfully used to engage students a little better?
(Or maybe I'm way off base and should just keep in-person classes as low tech as possible. If that's what you suggest, let me know!)
Much appreciated!
Image Source: Calico Spanish (labeled for reuse).