I just wanted to write a quick post about how THRILLED I am with the new GROUPS feature in class dojo! If you have never used Dojo before, check out my review post and see why I love it so much! In general, it allows you to give or take away points from students for anything you can think of. NOW YOU CAN GIVE AND TAKE POINTS FROM GROUPS THAT YOU CREATE! Students can be in more than one group even! It makes it so easy to reward students who are already working together, instead of one at a time! This is seriously my favorite feature of all of Class Dojo! 

How do you use the groups feature? What are your thoughts? If you haven't used it, are you excited to? let me know!

There are just some apps that are so simple its almost rediculous. In this edition of apps I LOVE, I will be talking about CamScanner. 
*NOTE: While the information may come from the developers website, I AM NOT PAID OR COMPENSATED IN ANY WAY FOR MY REVIEW OR MY OPINIONS. They are strictly my own. I do not review apps that I have never used or don't use in my classroom*

CamScanner for Android and iPhone:
Scan any Documents
With CamScanner, any documents you see in real world can be digitized and saved right away with your mobile phone. Just take a photo, and CamScanner take care of the rest.
- Scan any kind of document in seconds, texts or graphics.
- Scan multi-page documents
- Auto-crop scanned photos
- Save scan results to system album
- Create PDF files for scans

Manage your Documents
Access, edit and manage documents anytime and anywhere as you need. Want to quickly find some docs? CamScanner enables quick search in seconds.
- Add notes to any documents
- Add tag to any document for easy search
- Set passwords for important documents
- Backup and restore documents to/from SD card

Share Documents with Collaborators
Easily share document scans in PDF or JPG to collaborators via email. Or you can save them in the cloud, fax and print out those documents. 
- Fax scans via network
- Send PDF files via email
- Print files wirelessly with Google Cloud Print
- Upload files to cloud storages

Sync Documents in Real-time
Conveniently browse through and view all your content on any device. Edits made on one device, it simultaneously syncs to all your others.
- Sign up and get 200M free space to save documents
- Free upgrade to Full version for educational users

There are SO many different way that I use this app. I "scan" important documents right onto my computer so I don't have to use one of my very limited copies. I also use it when there is a worksheet or document from another teacher that I want to use, again, instead of making a copy, I can just "scan" it. 
The best thing is being able to scan in any sort of documentation such as notes from a students, passes, detention slips, etc. I can have it on record without keeping the physical copy. This helps so much with desk clutter and organization! 
Lastly, I can scan in a student's work! If we work on white boards, I can just scan a picture of it and I have it! no need to turn in a hard copy! Once they're done, I scan, then they just have to erase it!. 

When I was putting together my binder, I knew it would benefit my students to have a binder as well. I once had a teacher who had specific rules for our class binder and we were graded on them. This summer I was fortunate enough to run into her and I got to discuss how exactly she had us organize it. I keep my lessons arranged the EXACT SAME WAY as my students, that way we are all on the same page. Here is a look into how my  students must stay organized:

The VERY first page in their binder is their table of contents. Everything is organized in the order it was assigned. I have a whiteboard near the front of the class that I update for them. it is THEIR RESPONSIBILITY to keep their ToC up to date. 

To make things easy to find, students must keep all their papers and handouts in the same order as they are listed on their ToC. They also must NUMBER the papers in the top right corner according to their number on the ToC. This makes it easier to find a certain assignment when flipping through the pages. 

I know what many of you are thinking: I DONT WANT TO CHECK ALL THOSE BINDERS! 
My former teacher, Mrs. Paula Smith from Owasso High School, had a wonderful solution. BINDER QUIZZES. Every so often, whenever I choose, I give a quick binder quiz. They only have 10 minutes to complete this quiz. The quiz checks to make sure everything is updated, in order, and filled out correctly. if the student is behind on any of these things, they will not be able to complete the quiz. if they keep everything in check, there is no reason they shouldn't make a 100%. Here is what mine look like:

Notebook Quiz 1:
1. What is item #4 on your ToC?
2. On item #3, what is bolded at the top?
3. On item #6, what is the first question you had to answer?
4. How many questions did you have to answer for item #9?
5. When can you turn in late or missing work? (Check your syllabus)

The idea behind these quizzes is not to check for understanding, but simply for organization. If it's not all there or in the wrong order, they will probably not be able to finish it or answer all the questions correctly. The other GREAT things about this is that 1) I HAVE to turn papers back quickly 2) If a grade is entered wrong, they hopefully still have the paper can we can correct the error.