In this fast-evolving era, classrooms are being flooded with technological tools, almost every day, with a push towards one-to-one accessibility.
“Boom Cards” are one such innovation riding this wave. It is an interactive digital resource that students can use on any internet-connected device. And, Boom Learning is an online platform that has a variety of digital activities which students can do at home to practice important skills. Basically, the newbie “Boom cards” are the task cards created by teachers for students to do that are game-based. Each boom card has a task for students to complete, and the cards are self-grading so teachers can easily track students’ progress.
Boom cards cover almost every subject and grade level. However, some card decks are available at zero cost, while some cost money.
This is an excellent tool to use during distance learning as it help students practice literacy, math, and science skills easily from home. They are perfect for the classroom, too. Teachers can use them during literacy centers if they have iPads or computers and to easily differentiate learning for students. As aforesaid, students get instant feedback on their work, so teachers don’t need to grade them.
This post will teach you what you must know about Boom Cards, why you should use them and how!
What You Must Know About Boom Cards?
- Boom Cards are digital, self-checking, task cards.
- Users can preview and play 4 cards from ANY deck for free.
- Creating student logins is quick and easy! In your dashboard, you can simply click on “Add Many Students,” and enter nicknames for each student. The tool will automatically generate passwords, but you can create personalized passwords too! Some students may already have a login and password for another account—like Google Apps/Google Classroom so you can just use the same ones!
- Decks can be played in two ways:
Fast Play: With your free account, you have unlimited access to playing any purchased or free Boom Cards through an interactive whiteboard, tablet, or other smart device. However, in Fast Play, you are unable to record student progress. Additionally, with a free account, you can create a group of 5 students and assign differentiated assignments to each.
Sending Hyper play Links or Assigning to Students: You can easily send Boom Cards to individual students or groups of students. Hyper play is available with Basic, Power, and Ultimate User Accounts. - Boom Cards give access forever: Once you get access to a Boom Deck, it is in your “library” forever. You will always have free access to assign and play your Boom Decks but only in “Fast Play” mode.
- “Student,” “Teacher,” and “Classroom” accounts: On Boom learning platform, students can only play assigned decks and view his/her own progress on their assigned decks. Teachers as well as parents can organize classrooms, add/remove students, assign decks, buy decks, and use the deck editor to create their own Boom cards and assignments. And, Classroom accounts are shortcuts for older students to log in and set up their own accounts.
- Boom learning platform grant students a “notebook” where they can store their cards: By having access to notebooks students can “Remember” and “Trash” cards that are assigned to them.
Why Should You Use Boom Cards?
Of course! They’re a fun way to learn. But few more reasons to go for Boom Cards are:
- Boom cards are paperless.
- Decks created by The Printable Princess which have audio directions as well as audio picture names for ELA picture names. So, you get to know students whether students are practicing correctly.
- Boom cards are interactive and self-checking. Students can easily submit their answers and get immediate feedback showing if the answer was correct or incorrect. They also get the opportunity to fix it.
- To use boom cards all that a student would require is access to a computer, tablet or phone.
- You can effortlessly differentiate by assigning different decks to individual students or small groups. Or assign the same deck to entire class.
- You can also assign these via Google Classroom, Seesaw, Class Dojo, Remind, Microsoft Teams, Canvas, or other suitable platforms.
- Your students can play together on a Smart board or on a Zoom call by sharing screen.
- Boom cards are available for free as well as at a cost of $15 a year for a basic membership and up.
How to Use Boom Cards?
To use Boom Cards you need to create an account first. Here’s a link to it, click here.
Post account creation; you need to decide on the type of membership you would like.
Choosing a membership:
When choosing membership you need to know some basic vocabulary that the site uses:
Section – The number of classes that you are allowed to create. If you are in a self-contained classroom you might only want one section, while middle school and high school teachers would require more. Sections can also be a great at differentiating. You can group your students by academic need, and assign different assignments to different levelled groups.
Decks – Every single product that you get from the website is called a deck of cards. These decks contain a group of task cards that usually focus on a particular skill. Private decks are the one that you create yourself that live in your library. Creating your own deck is easy and a whole lot of fun once you master it. If in case, you want to make decks and sell them to other teachers, then you would’ve to pick the Ultimate membership to make a public deck.
Points – When you wish to purchase a deck of cards you would’ve to check how many points it costs, and how many points are in your bank. Depending on the membership you choose, you will start out with some points and can spend as per your requirement. Once those points are used up, you can purchase some more points within the store.
Setting up a classroom:
The next step is to add students. The platform allows you to add students individually or as a group. Every student gets a little avatar that they can change once they log-in. You can also change the usernames and passwords as per your convenience.
Besides these, under this tab only you can assign work to students individually or as a group.
Downloading boom cards:
There are a heap of cards to choose from, and more are being added every day. You can download cards easily and use it for whole-class instruction, intervention work, guided reading, centers, early finishers, and homework.
Video support/tutorials:
