One of the reasons that Flipgrid became popular and continues to grow in popularity is that it can be used across grade levels. Another reason for its popularity is that it new features are added to it on a regular basis. With every new feature comes a new way to think about how Flipgrid can be used in classrooms. I was thinking about this as I revised my slides for a webinar that I’m hosting tomorrow and I decided to jot down some ideas for using Flipgrid. Here are seven ideas for Flipgrid activities.
1. Question of the day.
This is an easy and obvious activity. It works in any classroom to get the day started. In our current state of remote learning and virtual classes having a question of the day in Flipgrid is a good way to keep the connections between you and your students going.
2. Q&A with guest speakers.
Flipgrid has a guest mode that you can use to invite people from outside of your class to join into a conversation. Use the guest access option to invite a guest speaker to post a video and reply to some of your students’ questions. This could be a good way to host a virtual career day, to host an author, or host any expert who is willing to answer some questions from students.
3. Explain your work.
Last fall Flipgrid added a whiteboard capability. This lets you and your students draw on a white screen while recording. This is a great way to have students explain their work on a math problem or make a quick sketch of a flowchart.
4. Record a virtual tour.
About a month ago Flipgrid introduced a screen recording feature. This lets you and your students make screencast videos up to ten minutes long. You can make simple virtual tours by using the screen recording feature while navigating through Google Earth.
5. Pitch a book.
This might be my recent binge watch of Shark Tank coming through, but I think that a fun alternative to book reports and book trailers. Students can make thirty to ninety second “pitches” for the next book that their whole class should read. Students would pick their favorite book and pitch it to the class in an attempt to get their classmates interested in reading it. If you want, you could have students vote for their choice after all of the videos have been posted.
6. Make a puppet show.
I regularly hear from teachers who want to use Flipgrid but have students who are not comfortable being on camera. In that case, have students use puppets on camera instead of putting their faces on camera. Looking for an at-home art project? Have kids make stick puppets to use in Flipgrid videos. Here’s a Pinterest page full of ideas for making stick puppets.
7. Make a mixtape. Show highlights of the school year.
As the school year winds down many people start to think about creating videos to share highlights of the year. Flipgrid’s Mixtape feature makes it easy to combine videos from multiple grids and multiple contributors. You can have students share their highlights of the school year. Or you might make a new grid and invite your colleagues to contribute their highlights of the school year. Don’t forget that it is possible to upload videos to a Flipgrid grid which means that all submissions don’t have to be recorded directly in Flipgrid.
The webinar that I mentioned at the top of this post is A Framework for Using Educational Technology. It will be live at 3pm ET tomorrow, May 14th.
