This week I am happy to be attending the Technology Integration Conference that Keystone AEA has organized for educators in and around Iowa. I am looking forward to learning from a host of great speakers, but I will also be giving a couple of presentations of my own on two of Microsoft’s newest tools for the classroom: Office Sway, and Office Mix. So, in this blog post, I thought I would share some resources to help get you started with one, or both, of these free tools in order to help you decide if either would be a useful addition in your classroom.
What is Office Sway?
Sway is a free, online, presentation and storytelling app. It is also the newest member of the Microsoft Office suite. It was designed to work on all devices, and is available to anyone with a free Microsoft account or an Office 365 school account. If you haven’t seen it before, you can read my introduction to Sway from an earlier blog post. You can also read the blog post I wrote for Microsoft UK on classroom uses for Sway.
The slides to my upcoming presentation below, as well as some examples of some great Sways that have been created by students and teachers for a whole variety of different educational outcomes.
Educational Examples of Office Sway in the Classroom
- One page website
- Photo journalism
- Procedural writing
- School event flyers
- Presentations
- Sways within a Sway
- Classroom resources/syllabus
- Interactive lesson delivery
- Sharing student work
- Professional development
- Student reports
What is Office Mix?
Office Mix is a free add-in for PowerPoint 2013 or later. It allows you to add more interactivity to a typical PowerPoint presentation and is a great tool for flipped and blended classrooms. With Office Mix you can create screencasts that include video, simulations, inking and live quiz questions. Once finished, you can publish your Mix online for your students to access, and see the data associated with each student who views your Mix.
Right now Office Mix is only available for Windows devices, but it is a free download and can be used with a free Microsoft account or a school Office 365 account. I first wrote about Office Mix several months ago, but it is evolving all the time and new features are being added regularly. The slides from my presentation are below, along with some great resources to learn more about Office Mix.
Learn More About Office Mix
- Mix for Teachers – The official Office Mix website for teachers
- Office Mix Training from Atomic Learning
- 5 Ways Office Mix Will Transform the Way You Teach
- Download the Office Mix Help Guide (PDF)
- Expert Educators using Office Mix in the Classroom
- Getting Started With Office Mix
- Office Mix YouTube Playlist of Educational Uses
- How Office Mix is a powerful tool for blended or flipped learning
So, if you are looking for something new for your classroom, Office Sway and Office Mix are well worth a look. Both have a lot of potential, and both are free! 🙂