Using the Remind App to facilitate Learning Issam Affaneh and Phillip Wren Qatar University, Foundation Department of English (FPDE)

Qatar also ranks in the top 10 in Wi-Fi and Internet accessibility Qatar ranks in the top 10 in time spent on smartphones (nationals and non-nationals) Qatar also ranks in the top 10 in Wi-Fi and Internet accessibility worldbank.org March 24, 2015

Reasons to use a smartphone in class (Odom, 2015) Learner-centric Collaborative interactions Motivates students to learn Supports alternative learning environments Increases teacher/student communication “Remind is used in over 70% of US public schools”

Remind functions WhatsApp-like Similar layout Individual or group chats No phone numbers needed! Announcements: Teachers update students or send documents such as PDF, Word/Excel/PPT, voice notes, videos, pictures (most formats – JPG is recommended) Chat: Teachers can also choose to initiate personalized, group, or whole class conversations. Students can share information and teachers can project for class to see.

Reasons we love this app/website Clarity in communication Personalizing communication Ease of content delivery Web-links Handouts Communicating with Parents (grade k-12) Build relationships Listen to parents Document every communication Used in over 70% of US school

Quick overview of Remind Follow me

Let’s join remind Computer, smartphone or tablet Change language setting on your phone to ENGLISH Let’s join remind Tips: When joining Remind, make sure to use a full name… especially if you are named Muhammad or Fatima

Let’s start the workshop Teachers – Create a class In settings: “People in this class can see and message each other” Set Office Hours Add a profile picture Get in groups of 4 to 5 1 Person = Teacher Others = Students Teacher – get students to join a class Teacher - Send students a welcome announcement, Students respond Teacher – create a scheduled announcement for 5 minutes from now Tips: When you create a class, make the class code easy to remember If you want to send a long ANNOUNCEMNT with more than 140 characters, you can send a screenshot of the text or a file

more than Words Teachers send pictures to the students Students do the same Teachers share a Youtube video to the class Students send a website to the teacher Teachers send a voice recording to a specific student Students send a voice recording to another student Teacher put students in pairs Send messages between each other Tips: Once you send an ANNOUNCEMENT, you can’t take it back… Just like on most messaging apps

Spring cleaning Teachers choose one student to remove from the class Other students attempt to leave the class Teachers try to archive the class Tips You can reuse or restore a class that has been archived

Joining with parents (under 13) Research using Remind at a Mixed-Income Middle school “revealed easy and convenient messages resulted in a higher response rate from parents/guardians (Opp & Nisbet, 2017).” If students input their birthdate incorrectly, don’t worry. You can simply have them sign up again with a different email.

Other Features Website has more options under Account Can connect services like Quizlet or OneDrive Can post an HTML Widget of your class to a website You can export PDF records of all announcements sent in class You can export a list of all participants in a class See list of Blocked Users Under Organize Classes, can see all classes ever made in Remind In a one-on-one chat with a student, you can be sent an email record of all interactions (Phone and Website versions)