School headphones are good for way more than listening to the occasional video. If your classroom is equipped with laptops or tablets, a set of classroom headphones are a must. You’ll find that your students use them at least once a week for everything from listening to music on work days to reviewing materials through recorded notes. If you need inspiration, here are a few more ways to put those headphones to good use supporting your students!
For Elementary
-
Record Read-Alouds
As any elementary teacher knows, new readers need to read aloud as much as possible. It builds confidence, encourages students to sound out words phonetically, and increases word recognition over time.
With as many as 30 students in a classroom though, it’s tough to allot time for each student to read aloud individually. Reading aloud as a class is great, but struggling readers can easily get lost in the mix. And while you can always assign reading aloud to parents as homework, it’s harder to track students’ progress when you don’t hear them yourself regularly.
Classroom headphones with microphones allow students to record read-aloud assignments on classroom devices like iPads and save them to a shared folder. Headsets with microphones keep noise levels down as kids don’t have to speak quite as loudly.
Even if you don’t listen to each recording, you’ll be able to check in on the students who need it most. Another benefit? Kids who are embarrassed to read aloud in front of their peers get to practice on their own.
-
Wind Down after Recess
Every teacher needs a few tricks to calm a wired class. When breathing exercises and stretching gets old, try mixing things up with your classroom headphones.
Download calming music or meditation apps for kids to your classroom devices and allot a few minute to listen to them after recess. While you can always use a speaker, headphones are great for days where your students are particularly distracted. Cutting out ambient noise will help them settle more quickly so that you can get back to teaching.
-
Brain Breaks
On the other end of the spectrum, sometimes your kids just need to get a break from focusing on lessons. While you probably aim to use physical activity for most of your brain breaks, using classroom tablets and headphones for a few breaks can be a nice change of pace.
-
Games and Apps
Gamification is one of the hottest buzzwords in education, and most teachers have at least one educational app or game they swear by. A lot of those apps come with noise, and without a set of learning headphones, games will just add noise and chaos to your classroom.
When you’ve got a noisy activity planned on your class tablets, our practically indestructible Flex-Phones will help keep your room quiet!
For Middle and High School
-
SSR Time with Audiobooks
Sustained silent reading is one of the most research-backed ways to improve students’ reading ability. If you teach ELA, you probably already incorporate SSR as much as possible…and you’ve probably noticed that some students never seem to enjoy it.
Audiobooks are a great way to help reluctant and struggling readers to engage more with books. While they aren’t a replacement for printed books, they’re a great supplement to help stories come alive and capture students’ interest. While purchasing audiobooks for every classroom device isn’t realistic for most schools, students who enjoy and benefit from audiobooks will usually be willing to buy their own.
-
Research Days
There’s a reason the MLA Handbook now offers citation models for Youtube videos. With channels like Crash Course and Ted ED, students can get legitimate information from videos for their papers and projects.
When students are in the lab for research days, classroom headphones and earbuds will not only help them tune out distractions– they’ll allow them to access engaging educational videos without disturbing their classmates.
-
Foreign Language Activities
Foreign language classes in particular can benefit from a set of classroom headphones. From listening to pronunciations to recording assignments with mics to watching foreign films, classroom headphones and earbuds are a great tool to support language immersion and acquisition.
-
Public Speaking Review
No matter what subject you teach, your students probably present at least a couple of times per year. Students improve their public speaking skills dramatically when they watch recordings of their presentations. Seeing themselves present helps them notice their mistakes and identify areas to improve next time.
After presentations and speeches, provide students with a video of their work through a shared folder. Have students listen to themselves in class and grade their presentation with the help of a self-reflection form.
Simple as they are, learning headphones are an essential tool for helping your students utilize the latest in educational technology. Once you have a set, both you and your students will discover even more creative ways to incorporate them into your lessons and assignments.
How have you used headphones in your class? We’d love to hear from you in the comments below!
