TOP PICKS | 27 TOOLS
Best Student-Collaboration Tools
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Drawp for School - Create. Learn. Collaborate.
Blank canvas will help kids express themselves creatively
Bottom line: This handy tool encourages collaboration and creative expression, and it makes sharing assignments and giving feedback a snap for teachers.
Grades: Pre-K–12
Price: Free to Try, Paid 30-day free trial; $9.99 per month per teacher and $99.99 per year per teacher for unlimited classes, subjects, and cloud storage.
Makers Empire
Stellar 3D design hub promotes innovation, collaboration, and creation
Bottom line: This is a great design and creation tool that teachers and students can use to be innovative and share ideas with a vibrant community of makers.
Grades: K–8
Price: Paid The 3D Learning program at $2,499 per year (and $1,999 for renewal) allows access for unlimited teachers and students. The Learning By Design program at $4,999 per year includes all features of the 3D Learning program plus additional support and professional development. Custom packages are available upon request.
Minecraft: Education Edition
Stellar collaboration tools, controls make Minecraft classroom-ready
Bottom line: An excellent tool to engage students in learning, collaboration, and critical thinking is now more accessible than ever to teachers.
Grades: K–12
Price: Paid $5 per user per year; schools may qualify for volume licensing.
NowComment
Rich collaboration and discussion site engages students and teachers
Bottom line: It's a versatile discussion platform for teaching, peer reviewing, and fostering active reading, and offers much more than traditional word processors.
Grades: K–12
Price: Free
Popplet
A compact, simple organizational tool for minimalist presentation
Bottom line: Great web-based presentation tool for beginners.
Grades: 1–12
Price: Free, Paid Subscription pricing ranges from $0.50 per student per year (over 1000 students) to $2.00 per student per year (up to 50 students).
Skype
Live video communication has potential to open lots of doors
Bottom line: With a bit of work and a measure of patience, Skype can be an excellent classroom tool to expand students' horizons.
Grades: 1–12
Price: Free
GroupMaker
Improve classroom management and encourage collaborative work
Bottom line: Don't be deceived by the design; multiple tools lie within this handy classroom-management tool.
Grades: 2–12
Price: Paid $1.99
MURAL
Multifaceted message boards help kids collaborate
Bottom line: MURAL can encourage individual team members to contribute to a project by making idea sharing and presentation a simple, visual process.
Grades: 2–12
Price: Free, Free to Try, Paid For educators and students, MURAL is free. For everyone else, the membership costs $12 per year.
PenPal Schools
Give students global perspective with pen pal projects in any subject
Bottom line: A thoughtful, ready-to-go platform that facilitates authentic, cross-cultural collaboration.
Grades: 3–12
Price: Free Free for teachers; however, school- and district-wide plans are available and add integration with learning management systems and student information systems, advanced reporting, and access to premium projects.
Spiral
Provide instant feedback with collaborative, multimedia assessment tool
Bottom line: Engaging, easy-to-use tool that supports both formative and summative assessment while allowing for student collaboration.
Grades: 3–8
Price: Free, Free to Try, Paid Spiral Teacher is free forever and covers up to five classrooms. The Pro Teacher subscription is $39 per teacher per year and offers unlimited classrooms, student accounts for home use, and progress reports. The Pro School subscription is estimated at $3 per student and offers the features of Pro Teacher plus additional features, including full integration with the school's LMS.
GooseChase EDU
Digital scavenger hunts provide dynamic, fresh learning experiences
Bottom line: Students and teachers will enjoy the powerful learning of a modern scavenger hunt.
Grades: 3–12
Price: Free, Paid Free version supports 1 live game and 5 teams. Plus version is $49 per year and supports unlimited live games, 10 teams, and 40 participants per game. Premium version is $199 per year and supports 40 teams and 200 participants per game and has email and phone support.
Minecraft
Spiraling sandbox of adventure and creation gets kids to dig deep
Bottom line: An irresistible and seemingly limitless incubator for 21st-century skills that, with a little guidance, can chart new courses for learning.
Grades: 3–12
Price: Paid $26.95 for desktop, $19.99 for consoles (except Wii U at $29.99)
ePals
Kids learn together in well-rounded, collaborative global classroom
Bottom line: A safe communication system and excellent learning materials help create a global youth community.
Grades: 4–7
Price: Free
Actively Learn
Empowering social ereader keeps kids actively, independently engaged
Bottom line: Far beyond the average ereader, this tool helps students connect and stay engaged while teachers easily measure progress.
Grades: 4–12
Price: Free, Paid A free version is offered for teachers which includes access to thousands of books, assignments, the ability to import 3 articles per month, the ability to embed questions, notes and media, and a gradebook.
The Personal Plan is $18 per month for teachers that do not yet have financial support from their school. This allows teachers to share and receive assignments from other teachers, unlimited uploads, differentiation for students, and much more. There's also a Team Plan for a group of individual teachers and their students; this plan is $695 per teacher per year (funded by the school or district).
A School Plan is available and is $10 per student per year for all teachers, students, and administrators in a school or district. This offers administrator accounts, research tools and professional development webinars and in-person sessions.
Classcraft
Track behavior, motivate students with clever, cooperative game
Bottom line: Classcraft is a fantastic game for encouraging positive behavior while students build knowledge and develop communication and collaboration skills.
Grades: 4–12
Price: Free, Paid The free version allows for unlimited students and classes with the base game experience. The paid version is $8 per month (billed annually) and adds LMS features, customizable avatars, and more. There's a discount of $6 per month if three teachers sign up together.
CueThink
Social approach to problem-solving promotes deep math learning
Bottom line: CueThink is an innovative, community-based platform that helps students plan, strategize, and collaborate.
Grades: 4–12
Price: Free to Try, Paid The CueThink Problem Bank includes free Problem of the Week (PoW) scenarios as well as access to full PoW content bundles for an additional fee.
Explain Everything
Powerhouse tool for creating stellar multimedia presentations
Bottom line: Teachers and students can make dynamic presentations that involve different types of media in this innovative, fun app.
Grades: 3–12
Price: Free to Try, Paid There's a 30-day free trial. The Education Plan is $4.99 per user, per year (minimum of 5 users). Individual plans are $24.99 per year.
MightyMeeting
Real-time, collaborative presentation tool can promote active viewing
Bottom line: MightyMeeting gives teachers more freedom to engage and monitor the class during a lesson, and the opportunity to have students co-construct knowledge.
Grades: 4–12
Price: Free to Try, Paid Free trial then $19/month for teacher version supporting one user, four devices, and unlimited attendees. $199/month school version supports 40 users and 80 devices.
Google Hangouts
Communication, learning, and fun converge nicely in Google's slick platform
Bottom line: It runs like a dream, works on all devices, and can be used in so many ways to enhance interactive learning.
Grades: 6–12
Price: Free
Microsoft Teams
Collaborative platform helps manage multiple groups and projects
Bottom line: It offers a ton of options for integrating learning; the lack of some typical LMS features may make it a better fit for small groups or nontraditional group configurations.
Grades: 6–12
Price: Free, Paid Microsoft Teams is included with Office 365 subscriptions, which range from free to $6 per month per student and $8 per month per teacher.
Peergrade
Feedback tool with great rubrics might work best for older students
Bottom line: With appropriate teacher support, this could be a powerful way to help teach your students about giving and receiving critical feedback.
Grades: 6–12
Price: Free, Paid Peergrade is free for students to use, and institutions can purchase a subscription with more custom integrations and personal support.
Diigo
Social bookmarking encourages discovery, collaboration, and sharing
Bottom line: With a Diigo educator account, teachers and students have a safe space to organize, customize, and share Web content while learning about a variety of subjects.
Grades: 7–12
Price: Free, Paid Users can mark and highlight 1,000 items a year with a free Diigo subscription; two paid versions, which cost from $20-$40 a year, provide unlimited bookmarking, screen capture, and highlighting capabilities.
The educator account, which is also free, lets teachers bookmark and save 20 cached pages a month (users are allowed to save multiple versions of the same page at different times to track changes) and provides unlimited highlighting capabilities
Genius
Collaborative tool lets users annotate songs, literature, web content
Bottom line: Students can collaboratively engage in the process of annotation and analysis with various texts -- both within the forum and on the web.
Grades: 8–12
Price: Free
Story Wars
Read, write, and vote on engaging collaborative storytelling site
Bottom line: A cool, competitive approach to online storytelling with a lot of learning potential -- just be aware of the iffy content and licensing risks.
Grades: 7–12
Price: Free, Paid Classroom edition available for $15/month; supports 35 student accounts. The classroom version is private to just the classroom.
Google Drive
Nifty tool for collaboratively editing and syncing files across devices
Bottom line: Google Drive is a smart choice for budget-conscious schools, with its free productivity tools and file syncing.
Grades: 6–12
Price: Free, Paid Free (up to 15GB); $1.99 per month for 100GB and $9.99 per month for 1TB (discounts for annual prepayment).
Piazza
Advanced Q&A tool compels collaboration, higher-order thinking
Bottom line: Encourage collaborative, student-centered learning with this useful platform, but make sure it's the right fit for your students.
Grades: 10–12
Price: Free
