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School Closure: Distance Learning Resources

Use this blog post full of distance learning ideas and resources to help navigate virtual teaching. We have a long list of apps, websites, programs, and more to help teachers keep doing what they do best..teaching kids and being there for them!

We are seeing a TON of conversations in our Facebook group as teachers prep and plan for school closures due to the Coronavirus pandemic. In an effort to keep all of the IMPORTANT information visible for our community we created this post.

This will be the Simply Kinder hub for information so that you don’t have to read through the thousands of comments. We will update it as we see things come through our group so check back often.

Ideas on how to communicate with your families:

  • Use ClassDojo which is a free. It would allow you to communicate with your class easily and give them updates and share pictures.
  • The Remind app would allow you to communicate with your families via text.
  • Create a Facebook group for your class to communicate with your families. You could post videos of yourself, or share websites and activities with them that you’d like for them to work on.

Facebook posts with answers to common questions:

  • How teachers are doing distance learning? (click here)
  • Send Home Sub Plans video (click here)
  • How to upload a custom list of videos or books for your class to watch (click here)
  • What are schools doing for food for kids? (click here)
  • How everyone’s districts are handling makeup days / contract time (click here)
  • Who and what schools are closed (click here)
  • Taking attendance with distance learning (click here)
  • Education Week Map of school closures (click here)
  • How to talk to kinders about Coronavirus (click here)
  • Social Distancing in Kinder (click here and click here)
  • Netflix recommendations for teachers (click here)
  • How to set up a class Facebook group with units (click here)
  • Read alouds by our teachers and that we have found (click here)
  • Video lessons by our teachers posted for others to use (click here)
  • Sites to listen to read alouds (click here)

Simply Kinder Resources:

Simply Kinder has lots of resources that will help you with planning.

Our Send Home Sub Plans will help you organize the work that you send home for your students in case of closure. It is present with two full weeks of activities and is fully editable. It includes:

  • books to read or watch on YouTube
  • videos to watch for essential skills practice
  • daily sight word practice based off one set of cards
  • write the room style activities that have activities on different days
  • 2 new Send Home Centers per week so they can play games
  • academic printables
  • activities to play using things they have at home.

The resource also contains editable templates so you can create more if you need them. You can get this resource on Simply Kinder here or TpT here.

Free websites:

Some companies are offering free services for teachers because of the coronavirus outbreak.

  • Time for Kids has opened up their book library for kids for the rest of the school year. Click here to go there now.
  • ABCmouse.com They are offering free accounts to schools that have been closed. Click here to apply for a free account.
  • Scholastic Learn At Home has a free platform due to shutdowns.
  • is free during school closures. Zoom is an online video platform (that we use and recommend) that you can use to host virtual classes with your students.
  • Fluency Fitness This a great website to get kids moving and work on literacy. Free for parents during the closures.
  • Freckle Freckle.com has free level access where students in K-8 can access Freckle for free. Here is a link directly to the training videos for kindergarten teachers to show you all of the possibilities that Freckle offers.
  • Kahoot! offers free access to all features to support distance learning in schools affected by the coronavirus outbreak
  • PBS Learning Media This offers elementary resources and lessons. Inspire your students with videos, games, and activities aligned to state and national standards.
  • Coolmath.com is always free and is a fun place to play math games.
  • MobyMax is providing all K-8 schools and school districts closed by COVID-19 With free Internet learning software
  • Mystery Science has pulled its most popular science lessons and is offering them for anyone to use for free. No account or login is needed. 
  • PebbleGo is offering free access to schools. A great site for helping with reading comprehension and fluency.
  • Zearn Math is always free and is great for math practice.
  • Starfall.com This is a great place to review the alphabet and an even better place for practice reading.
  • TVOkids.com This website is loaded with learning games and videos on all subjects.
  • Seussville.com This website has a lot of books, videos, and games to play.
  • Storylineonline.com This website is loaded with stories read by the authors and celebrities.
  • ABCYa is a great site that has a ton of different literacy and math games for the students to play.
  • SightWords.com is a great website where you can make games, flashcards, and more!

Free online lesson videos:

  • Cincinnati Zoo is doing a live video each day featuring a different animal and giving a followup activity. (details here)
  • Heggerty Phonemic Awareness is doing lessons for kids (we think, if we read that right).

Free apps:

We have also seen lots of teachers sharing great apps for working at home too.

  • Khan Academy Kids is available on App Store, Google Play and Amazon Appstore for free.
  • SeeSaw is available on App Store, Google Play and Amazon Appstore for free. Choose from thousands of engaging activities to use seamlessly within Seesaw. Search by grade level, subject, and keyword to find activities made by teachers like you.
  • SplashLearn offers many games to play. After it is downloaded it can be played offline with no need for the internet.
  • MooseMath app teaches counting, addition, subtraction, sorting and more. It’s free and available on AppStore Google Play and Amazon Appstore.
  • Math Slide is great to practice tens and ones and understanding numbers up to 100. It’s free and available on AppStore Google Play and Amazon Appstore.
  • Word Wagon is a great way to practice building sight words. It’s free and available on AppStore Google Play and Amazon Appstore.
  • Duck Duck Moose Reading has 9 different word and letter activities.It’s free and available on AppStore Google Play and Amazon Appstore.

We have a ton of video lists made that you can share with your families on whichever subject you choose. Here is a master list of all of our collections of great Videos that Teach.

Check out your local library. They should have an app that can be used to download digital books for free from the library.

At Simply Kinder we work together to bring you ready-to-use resources to partner with great teaching for any curriculum, a Facebook community where teachers talk all things Kindergarten, and low-prep learning ideas that your students will love. Be sure to stay up to date with all things kindergarten on InstagramFacebookPinterest, and through email. Simply Kinder: where teaching Kinder is definitely better together!

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