Fresh Grade: Jessica S., Mitra, & Sam

video:

Communication platform between teacher, parent, and students

Lesson plans

  • Save time with easy-to-use tools
  • Align activities to standards, frameworks, and assessments
  • Not readily used among teachers

Digital portfolios

  • Store and highlight learning
  • Portfolio customization
  • Keep track of student learning through different forms of media evidence
  • Online journaling for self-reflection
  • Learning journey documentation
    • Remains over the years

Announcements

  • Post announcements for upcoming events
  • Can see who has read the announcements

Activities

  • Post schedules and homework

Progression reports

  • Great for communication concerning student learning progression
  • Early intervention
    • Teachers can post in real-time and parents know where their children are at
  • Engages parents
  • Evidence of learning is readily accessible.

Report Cards

  • Standards-based, score-based, and anecdotal grade books
  • Formative, summative, and interim assessments

 

FreshGrade vs FreshGrade Next

  • FreshGrade: Upload one photo at a time (takes some time
  • Fresh Grade Next: Upload multiple photos at once

 

  • FreshGrade: Gradebook program and portfolio look very different on different devices
  • FreshGrade Next: the same on all devices

 

  • FreshGrade: announcements go to the whole class
  • FreshGrade next: announcements can be customized, can be used like email.

 

What families have to say…

  • Amazing direct communication tool between parent and the teacher
    • Important you tell parents that they cannot take photos off FreshGrade – they are only meant to stay on FreshGrade
    • Also important to tell parents that when they comment on teacher posts that no one else can see returned comments
  • Some parents prefer traditional paper reporting
  • May not work for those who are not tech savvy
  • To ponder… will the pressure of photographing students affect their learning? Be meaningful and thoughtful when you take photos.

Pros of FreshGrade:

  • Convenient for teacher
  • Instant sharing so parents don’t have to wait until conferences to find out how their students are doing
  • Window into the classroom
  • More timely assessments and reports
  • Environmentally friendly
  • Multimodal engagement for students
  • Progress
  • Google Translate

Cons of FreshGrade

  • Privacy
  • Inconsistent use
    • Teachers don’t always use it consistently — it takes a lot of time to put in effort to FreshGrade.
  • Parent expectations and time
    • It’s not about having a daily instagram feed – should be posting quality over quantity. Not about snapping pictures everyday without putting in thoughts
  • Limited engagement
    • Younger years do not produce as much learning materials as evidence of their learning – more about taking pictures of what’s happening in the classroom
  • Intimidating
  • Glitches
    • FreshGrade next is fairly slow
    • Inconsistencies about whether or not parents have viewed a post

Tips and Tricks about FreshGrade

  • When first starting to use FreshGrade, think about it as a communication tool and announcements
    • Pair up with a teacher who knows a lot about it
  • Focus on one subject
  • Learn about it together with another teacher
  • Educate parents
  • Use iPad supplied by school
    • Legally you’re not supposed to use private devices to document things happening in the school.
  • Photograph groups and tag students
  • PicCollage for multiple photos
  • Meaningful posts
  • Less is more
  • Share as highlight