Today’s tech snack can be found at the following url: https://www.activetextbook.com/
What is it and how can I use it in my classroom?
Activetextbook is an online tool that allows you upload any pdf file and make it interactive. When you upload a pdf, you can add items to individual pages called overlays. There are several different types of overlays you can add. You can add quizzes, text, pictures, videos, embedded items, hyperlinks, and music. You can add as many overlays on a page as you want. When you are done adding content to your pdf, you can share the "textbook" with your students via a url. (no registrations required by the students) In addition to making active "textbooks", you can create online courses. Courses consist of 2 or more activetextbooks you have created. Students can access your course via url but need to registrar by creating a username and password in order to track progress and see quiz results.
To begin using activetextbook as a teacher, you have to create a free account which requires you to create a username and password. After that, you will be see your home interface screen which will allow you to add a "textbook" or "course". All you need to create a "textbook" or "course" is any PDF file. If you have any word document or powerpoint you can easily save them as pdfs to use this tool.
Activetextbook will work on most mobile devices and Internet Browsers. Due to this fact, it is a great tool for creating a flexible learning environment. It also is a tool that leads itself for a blended learning classroom because students can access content at home and are not restricted to the brick and mortar classroom to try to master the content. This tool makes it easy to share content without having to deal with creating separate websites for different units/lessons. You could also collaborate with other teachers for assignments and more using this site. You could insert your own questions to the documents and then have students provide their responses. You could also encourage your students, to add their own questions about passages of text they do not understand. You could also use this tool for peer reviews, and collaborative authoring.
Click here to see an example of an activetextbook I created from one of my powerpoints that I converted to pdf.
Oh the deliciousness! This tech snack is a full meal! Until next time.....