Random Word and Image Generator in SMART Notebook Lesson Activity Toolkit

As promised earlier, I am going to talk a little about the Random Word and Image Chooser in SMART Notebook Lesson Activity Toolkit. We have been using the Random Word Chooser in classes in order to choose a student to answer a question or to do something. Many teachers were still using popsicle sticks to call on students. With the Random Word Chooser, the teacher types in her student's names and then the computer will randomly select a student.

I used the Random Word Chooser and put student names in the boxes and then I put links below the Random Word Chooser to questions that students could pick from. If they got the answer right, they could go to the Press Your Luck Game (Random Image Chooser) and if they got lucky, they might win a piece of candy, an AR point, or a homework pass. In the game Press Your Luck on TV, they might get a whammy and loose everything. Since our mascot is a jaguar, that is what I choose instead of the whammy. So if they land on the jaguar, they loose all their winnings.

Our ESL teacher uses the Random Word Chooser to play bingo with her students. She gives them a piece of paper with a grid on it (like a bingo card) and then she will put in words of what they might be studying at that time. For example, the students might be studying past tense verbs, so she will type in a lot of different verbs in the boxes, then randomly select the verb. Students have to write the past tense of the verb on their paper in the grid.

Students just love being assigned to a group for work don't they? They either want to work with their buddies, or someone they know will do the work for them, and it is the same groups forming all the time. With the Random Group Generator, teachers don't have to worry about that any longer. Teachers type in their student's names, select how many groups to make and click on Generate. If the teacher doesn't like the groups, all they have to do is just click on Generate again to create another group. This makes the group very random and diverse.

If you have a favorite tool or activity that you use in your classroom from SMART Notebook, please comment below.