Edmodo Tool Review

Name of the Web 2.0 Tool: Edmodo

URL of the Tool: https://www.edmodo.com

Primary category: Communication Tool

Description: Edmodo is an online educational community that has been compared to Facebook. With Edmodo, teachers can post assignments, videos, notes, polls, tests, etc. to students, students can also post to their groups, educators can connect, and there are many communities (groups) everyone can be part of. This tool also allows people to chat (not privately, but as a group) and have their own ‘wall’ very much like Facebook – only with the added safety of being an educational social tool.

How to access Edomodo: You do not need to download anything in order to use Edmodo and one cool thing about it is that there is an app you can install for use on your smart device.

What skills do you need to have to use Edomodo? You need to know how to navigate a website like Facebook and you must have a valid email address. There are no extra devices or software needed to use this tool.

How to use Edmodo:

1. Sign up as a teacher using a valid email address.

2. Create a group (and/or join groups) & share your group code (or join URL) with your class (i.e. s4tr5a or https://edmo.do/j/73uvui). Only those with the code can join and you can close the group once all the students have joined you can lock the group – if you need to add more, you reset the group code and give it to the people you need to add. Once you have joined a group, you won’t need the code anymore.

3. Once you have your group, you can explore and see what content you want to add – notifications, quizzes, polls, create small groups, etc. There is a planner, and a snapshot tool which allows you to create quizzes that align with common core standards – this can be done very quickly because the tool has thousands of questions already created.

 

4.     There is an app store where you can buy or get free apps to use. It is growing daily and you can browse apps by subject.

5. There’s a library with unlimited space where you can connect to your google drive account and also store, manage, and organize documents, pictures, videos, etc. Students have a similar feature called backpack.

6. There is a discover section where you can join different communities (groups)

7. As a teacher, you can collect badges and make badges to reward students.

I used Edmodo to add a poll for the UH Coogs group I created. It was so simple to make because Edmodo is so user-friendly. People from the group will be able to answer the poll question.

Usage: I used Edmodo with my 5^th and 6^th grade classes for the past two years. I have not used all the many tools or apps Edmodo provides. It was successful and I plan to use it again. Edmodo made it very easy to navigate through all the screens and the students really liked getting badges and using their backpack. I used Edmodo for quick polls, quizzes, and homework assignments as well as to communicate with parents and post deadlines. As a teacher, my school and district use Edmodo for communication mainly. Although we still use email first, Edmodo is used for our weekly newsletter in our school and to share pictures and other announcements. The district uses Edmodo to connect teachers – I am signed up for a technology conference and am part of the technology community where I receive notifications about upcoming deadlines, workshop opportunities, and where I can connect with other teachers who share similar interests.

Advantages and disadvantages: For me, an advantage was that my students could post their homework, answer questions, watch videos I posted for them, chat with me or each other (actually have educational discussions and not privately), and everything could be done in one place - one safe place. Other advantages include the ease of use, being able to track students’ assignments and usage, free apps for many different subjects, community (group) involvement, sharing information and ideas with other educators, free and affordable apps, library (storage), educational social networking, and so much more! Parents can also track students' progress and check out their children's assignments. Like Facebook, it even suggests teachers I might know! 

The disadvantage I found was that they really loved to be on Edmodo since their parents approved, so I would get a bunch of notifications about their activity since I was the administrator.

Recommendation: I recommend this tool for districts, teachers, and students who want to connect socially in an educational setting and have a lot of freedom to socialize safely as well as have an easy to use tool that is web- and app- based that has a lot of great features for educational purposes. Students really like it and it is very friendly. The app is not as friendly and does not have a lot of the features in the online tool, but it does work well.