Navigating EDMODO to Create an Efficient and Organized Digital Classroom

Edmodo, learning management system, technology

What is Edmodo?

Edmodo is an online learning management system that you can use in your elementary, middle school or high school classroom. It allows you to communicate with your students, assign work, grade work and connect with other teachers around the world.

As a teacher, you are in full control of the account and your classes. You can create posts to encourage student interaction however, students cannot create chats for themselves. It is a closed network that requires a teacher invitation to join. All conversations are archived instead of deleted.

Edmodo boasts having 44,000,000 users world-wide making it the biggest social media network out there.

Why do I need this in my life?

#1 – Integration: Edmodo is one of the few learning management systems that integrates both Google Drive and Microsoft OneDrive. What does this mean? It means that you can easily pull files from either source to assign your students. Not only does it make it a breeze to assign from either Google or Microsoft but it will also make a copy for each student for you. Many of us have experienced the ease of this with Google Classroom but how many of you convert your Microsoft files to Google? Edmodo saves you the time to have to do this.

Google Drive, Microsoft OneNote, assignments, force copy

In addition to easily uploading the assignments, you will also have the option of adding it to your grade book. This allows grading to be super easy.

#2 – Grading

Which brings me to my second reason why you need Edmodo in your life… Grading… Google Classroom doesn’t consider itself to be a learning management system because it does not have an option for a grade book. Edmodo covers this. When you are assigning a task for students to complete, simply click that you would like it to be added to your grade book.

In your grade book, you will have options to

adjust grades,
create new grading periods,
create new grades
or export to Microsoft Excel.

Creating a new grading period is helpful when your school year is broken up into quarters or trimesters. Being able to export the grades comes in handy if you are still using a grade book, for parent conferences or to use as a checklist.

#3 – Groups:

Edmodo gives you the ability to create groups. As a middle school teacher, I create a group for each class period. Last year I taught science to grades 6 and 7. Each class period had a group. In the group, I would assign homework, classwork and tests. Within that group, I had the ability to break down into smaller groups. This came in handy for projects or when I needed to distribute materials to my students. By further grouping them, I assigned classroom accommodations to my special education students. Copies of class notes or modified tests or quizzes were easily distributed into the smaller groups. ONLY students within these small groups could see the information, no one else in the class was privy to it. Differentiation is simple and private with this feature. These smaller groups would also be ideal for literature circles or book clubs.

#4 – Communication –

Edmodo eliminates the need for other apps. Instead of having a homework page, using Remind to tell parents about upcoming or missed assignments and Google Classroom to distribute assignments, Edmodo does it all. I use Edmodo as one platform to communicate with students. As a special educator, it is helpful to both students and parents, to have one place for them to go. There is a feature in Edmodo that allows parents to log in to see the happenings of your classroom. Parent involvement can go either way so if you do not want them to have access to certain posts, there are ways to block them from seeing them. Including them will eliminate the need for other apps to use. When thinking again about our students, I find it easier for them to have everything in one place. It is more organized and efficient. There is an Edmodo app that can be downloaded to your phone. If your student has a question about homework, they can post it in Edmodo and you have the option to write back. Of course, as the teacher, you would set up parameters as to when and if you would respond after school hours but the option is there.

As with anything else you use in your classroom, you need to choose what will work best for your students. If you are interested in everything Edmodo offers (and believe me when I tell you there is so much more) then download my FREE Edmodo guide to help you get started this school year.