Addressing Important Topics Facing Administrators Today
The Power of the Learning Loop
Seesaw, a Learning Experience Platform trusted and loved by 25 million educators, students, and families worldwide, is making a profound impact on some of the most important topics school administrators are facing today. Tailored for PreK6th grade students, Seesaw enables schools to actively involve parents, guardians, and family members in what we call “the learning loop”, fostering a collaborative partnership in their child’s educational journey. Engaging students in these crucial developmental years can yield positive and enduring effects academically, socially, and emotionally, instilling a lifelong love of learning.
This impact report includes testimonials from educators and school leaders from Canada, highlighting successful strategies they are employing to implement Seesaw and the positive impact it’s having on their school community and student achievement.
Seesaw’s Learning Experience Platform supports OECD Future of Education and Skills 2030 Conceptual Learning Framework from the Student Agency for 2030.
Reference #1: “Students with involved parents or caregivers earn higher grades and test scores, have better social skills and behave better at school.”
Reference #2: “Research shows that responsible and positive family engagement with schools improves student achievement, reduces absenteeism and strengthens parents’ confidence in their child’s education.”
Reference #3: “When students play an active role in shaping their lessons, they are more likely to participate, ask questions, have open and candid discussions, express opposing opinions and make challenging statements.”
Reference #4: “An effective learning environment is built on ‘co-agency,’ i.e. where students, teachers, parents, and the community work together. Teachers play a key role in designing a learning environment that values agency.”
Seesaw helps schools develop strong family relationships as partners in their child’s learning. This is particularly critical for supporting families of all types including immigrant families, divorced families, families overseas, and those with non-English speaking family members. This helps foster a sense of belonging, provides support, bridges geographical gaps, and ensures inclusive participation in their child’s education. Parent-teacher conferences, translation assistance, and involving extended family members all contribute to building a strong foundation that lays the foundation for a child’s success in life.
“I send all my parent communications through Seesaw. I love that all my families are connected. This is especially important for parents who don’t live together, as they can see their child’s work and stay informed about the great things happening in our class and school. This has been instrumental in fostering positive home-school connections.”
“I am a pre-kindergarten teacher, and my little friends are often unable to share what they have done throughout the day. Seesaw provides a window into the classroom, allowing parents to see all the wonderful experiences and learning that are happening in the classroom. At the beginning of the school year, when new children may be experiencing some separation anxiety and are a little teary at drop-off, it is comforting for parents to see a picture of their child smiling and happily engaged five minutes after drop-off. It allows parents the opportunity to carry on with their day knowing that their child is happy and in good hands. Seesaw allows me to do this!”
- Mary Almeida, PreK Teacher, Ontario
“In our school, we often remind teachers to use Seesaw to give parents a window into the classroom. Although we like to invite parents to come into the classroom to be part of learning activities and to volunteer, some parents aren’t able to do so due to work or childcare situations. Allowing them to view their student’s learning experiences through photos and/or videos gives them a sense of what their children are learning and how they are working with their peers.”
- Sally Schooten, Vice Principal, British Columbia
“I am the principal of a small English school in Quebec, Canada. Many of our families are French mother tongue and also military parents. School and home being able to communicate in their mother tongue and have messages translated has made home/school communication easier and more enriching for all!
Over 70% of our parents are in the military, and a couple of years back we had many who were deployed. Many parents have told me how much they appreciated being able to see what their children were experiencing at school. Our younger kids also created Mother’s and Father’s Day videos to put on Seesaw for these same parents to view from afar. The parents were very touched.”
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Shelley Longney, Principal, Quebec
“Families find it easy to open and view items within the Seesaw platform. Therefore, I have increased parent engagement. Parents are more willing to ask questions or seek clarification because the ability is right at their fingertips. The families are always eager to see if their child’s work is being featured or to catch a glimpse of the classroom at work. I get commended on my communication, and it is because of the Seesaw app.”
- MaryAnne McGraw, Middle School Teacher, Ontario
“Students are so excited to share their learning with their families. They constantly ask to take photos and videos of their work to add to Seesaw. Parents love seeing their children excited about learning and witnessing it in real time. As a French Immersion teacher, it’s also really fun to have the students showcase their second language learning to their parents.
A kindergarten student who was quiet and shy had started in French Immersion, and the parents were worried that their child would struggle to learn a new language and be engaged. They asked the child how things were going but got little response at home. Throughout the year, we were able to take videos of class interactions, and the child completed independent activities through Seesaw that showcased their language learning for their parents to see.”
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Tamara Harder, French Immersion Teacher, Saskatchewan
School Participation & Attendance
Students are much more likely to participate in school when they feel supported by their family and school staff. Seesaw helps increase school participation by creating joyful and inclusive experiences that engage all types of students to have a positive learning experience. This helps teachers effectively reach new students, shy or reserved students, and facilitate remote learning for sick or injured students. These factors help foster improved attendance rates and continuous learning experiences for all students regardless of their situation.
“Seesaw gives my students the opportunity to use their new language skills without feeling shy or embarrassed, as they know they are submitting their work to me. I love how the tools allow them to be creative and show their parents what we have been doing in class.”
- Danessa Poiron, 7th and 8th Grade Teacher, Manitoba
“I taught grade 4 remote classes where I worked with students synchronously using Teams. I worked with my students on core curricula: numeracy, literacy, science, and social studies. Students also had time to work on PBL work asynchronously. Seesaw provided students with purposeful work for skill reinforcement and assessment. They were also able to use Seesaw to upload and share the work they chose to do asynchronously. This work could then be shared in class during literacy communication time.”
- Stephen Dudar, Grade 4 Virtual Educator, Manitoba
“Seesaw fosters meaningful engagement between home and school. It’s exciting to hear students ask, ‘Can we put this on Seesaw so my family can see?!’—and of course, the answer is always yes. By engaging families, it provides students with a real-world connection, showing why their learning matters beyond the four walls of their classroom.”
- Kimberly Mertens, Academic Support Teacher, New Brunswick
“Seesaw allows families and me to see where students are at in any given situation and understand their thinking at that moment. I appreciate that students can use class time or work from home if they are absent or want to add materials, and I can mark and respond when I’m not busy teaching or helping one-on-one. I also value being able to quickly assess standards and review those scores for a deeper understanding of what each student can do independently.”
- Clare Ellison, Grade 5 Teacher, British Columbia
Student Engagement
Seesaw is instrumental in promoting student engagement through its versatile features tailored to support diverse learning needs and preferences. Seesaw’s “Daily Check-Ins” enable educators to gain insights into students’ interests, well-being, challenges, and situations, fostering a supportive and empathetic learning environment. Seesaw also enhances learning experiences by animating diagrams, incorporating audio elements, and allowing for annotations, making complex concepts more accessible and engaging for students. Whether documenting a science experiment or a STEM project, Seesaw facilitates hands-on learning experiences, promoting active participation and deeper understanding. Seesaw supports joy and celebration in the classroom, reinforcing positive behavior and creating memorable learning moments that inspire students to thrive academically and emotionally.
Equity & Access
Seesaw serves as a powerful tool for promoting equity and access in education by addressing the diverse needs of all pupils, regardless of their backgrounds or abilities. Seesaw is designed to meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) content accessibility guidelines and equip teachers with the resources and tools they need to implement Universal Design for Learning (UDL), multiply their reach, and personalize learning to ensure that every learner receives the assistance they need to succeed. Seesaw also serves as a source of motivation for populations with ASD and ADHD, and facilitates the documentation of learning for students with special needs, supporting educators in implementing individualized education plans (IEPs) and 504 accommodations effectively. Moreover, Seesaw breaks down barriers related to poverty, educational challenges, and language barriers by providing equitable and accessible access to educational resources to students and their families. For example, Seesaw supports multilingual students and their families by providing resources in multiple languages and fostering inclusive learning environments. By ensuring equitable support and attention to all students, Seesaw promotes inclusivity in education, ultimately empowering every learner to achieve at their fullest potential.
“When I am looking for a way for my students to fully engage with a topic and to show me that they have a good understanding of it, my first stop is always Seesaw! My students can experience a lesson richly and interact with it at their own pace. They develop ownership of their learning in a way that was not possible before we began using Seesaw.”
“Students’ excitement to learn is re-energized on Seesaw. Motivation increases. It is just amazing how much of a gamechanger Seesaw is for teaching, learning, assessment, and communication!”
- Lisa White, Librarian, British Columbia
“Seesaw keeps my students engaged while recording their progress. Since one-on-one time is limited, I can catch up on their progress after school. This also allows me to give proper and precise feedback to the student and their parents. This way, we are all in the loop and working together towards the same goals.”
- Cathy Boucher, First Grade Teacher, New Brunswick
“Seesaw’s versatility allows me to reach my students at their level. I love how it elevates their engagement and enables me to easily track their learning progress. Creating my own activities and resources lets me customize and bring my students’ identities into the classroom!”
- Nadine Appleton, Curriculum Coordinator, British Columbia
“Seesaw allows me to provide my students with choice when completing tasks and assignments. This enables differentiation while empowering students to showcase their learning in meaningful ways. I find student outcomes are so much greater when they can respond or complete activities in ways that build upon their strengths.”
- Jennifer Resch, Vice Principal, Saskatchewan
“Seesaw creates an opportunity for students who arrive in our classrooms with many different needs and abilities to express knowledge, understanding, and reflection in the best way they know how. Students who may have been marginalized or not included in the lesson, activity, or reflection now have an opportunity to express themselves in the best way they know how!”
- Kati Devlin, Pre-K-6 Inclusive Education/Resource and EAL Teacher, Manitoba
“I had a student that was a very tactile 1st grader, who loved drawing but needed one-on-one instruction to focus and produce any type of response to stories. His biggest learning challenge was a speech delay that made him struggle to make himself clearly understood. Through the multimodal tools in Seesaw, he could draw the actions or details that had most impressed him, and we gained insights about the connections he’d made. His confidence as a learner grew!”
“Having many formats available for student responses in Seesaw makes a huge difference in my classroom! Students who aren’t yet able to share their thoughts in writing can tell me what they are thinking. Visuals and audio instructions help my English Language Learners. Seesaw helps me make learning accessible for all students.
I got to teach a student this year for the second time since I have a grade 1/2 split. She really struggled with reading in grade 1 but has flourished as a reader this year! She is always so excited to come and read with me and frequently surprises herself with how much she is able to read. She came to me asking if I would read her a picture book from our classroom library. I said, ‘You read it!’ She was sure she couldn’t. I assured her that I would be there to help if she needed it. She ended up reading the whole thing, not needing my help at all! I had her record herself reading to send to her mom. She was so proud!
- Sharon Drummond, First and Second Grade Teacher, Ontario
“One of the things I like best about my experience with Seesaw is my ability to customize lessons for exactly what I want to teach and to differentiate for my students. I especially appreciate having activities for my English Language Learners that they can do independently.”
- Tracy Kernaghan, Grade 1 Teacher, Saskatchewan
“What I love most about my experience with Seesaw is seeing students work collaboratively and independently. This is even more appreciated when a student with special needs feels more confident being able to do a task ‘independently.”
- Sandra Dehaan, K-8 Special Education Teacher, Ontario
“What I love about Seesaw is how accessible it is for students, especially those with learning disabilities. Speech-to-text lets students who struggle with writing tell amazing stories. The video recording feature allows students to explain their thinking about a math problem in a safe and non-judgmental way. And it helps with communication to students’ families on what they are doing in school. It has become an essential tool in our grade 3 to 5 programming.”
- Kathleen Phelan, Vice Principal, Alberta
Student Achievement
Seesaw’s Learning Experience Platform correlates with improved end-of-year assessment outcomes by focusing on elementary learners’ unique needs. Unlike other products, Seesaw enhances the elementary student, teacher, and classroom experience with age-appropriate solutions. It equips teachers with tools and curriculum to maximize students’ potential during their crucial foundational years. Seesaw fosters critical thinking, comprehension, and fluency assessment, facilitating tailored interventions. It promotes collaboration between families and teachers, aligning strategies with classroom curriculum and empowering both educators and families alike to drive academic growth and student success through joyful and dynamic learning environments.
Teacher Support, Retention & Positive School Culture
Schools across the world are facing teacher shortages. In light of this reality, keeping existing staff happy and engaged while developing teachers who are new to the profession are critical drivers of positive school culture and academic achievement. For experienced teachers, Seesaw helps to alleviate their workload and enhance their productivity with easy-to-administer assessments, ready-to-teach lessons aligned to their standards, multiple ways to differentiate, and parent communication tools that are seamlessly connected to student learning. For teachers new to the profession, Seesaw provides tools that align with effective teaching practices like promoting student voice and choice, providing scaffolds and opportunities for differentiation, and lessons based on effective teaching methods (gradual release of responsibility, for example).
“Seesaw fosters creativity and critical thinking in my students. By leveling the playing field and allowing all children to participate fully in activities and lessons, it enables children who may struggle with writing and reading skills to express themselves and showcase their amazing ideas fully.”
- Becky West, Principal, Alberta
“Seesaw creates an opportunity to deliver instruction that covers a multitude of learning styles and preferences while delivering high-quality content.”
- Teagan Belitski, Vice Principal, Saskatchewan
“Seesaw helps students learn to articulate their thinking. Metacognition is not an easy skill to teach; however, Seesaw’s tools provide opportunities for students to reflect and describe their learning. This piece is invaluable and adds so much to each post. My goal is to encourage all students to ‘push the microphone’ and describe what they learned, what was challenging, what they might do next time, and what they are proud of.”
- Debbie Born, Instructional Technology Coach, British Columbia
“In my grade 4 math class, my students were struggling to understand the fundamentals of angles. I decided to use Seesaw to help them go on an ‘angle treasure hunt’ throughout our school. Armed with their Chromebooks, they traveled through the building looking for angles anywhere they could find them and snapped pictures. Once back in class, they used the drawing tool to identify each angle and then the text box tool to classify each angle. It was transformative! Through actually DOING something and being hands-on in a way they loved, they were able to make connections that would have been impossible using a worksheet. I was sold—as were my colleagues.”
“Throughout the school year, my students complete personal goal-setting in a variety of subject areas. Because my students view Seesaw as a safe and familiar space, they are so honest and vulnerable regarding both their goal-setting efforts and their self-reflections that happen along the way. I am continually surprised and impressed by the raw and real quality of this goal-setting and reflecting process, and I am often touched by the growth that I have seen my students make. Most importantly though, the way that my students can see their progress and be proud of themselves for their successes is the most impactful and rewarding part of all.”
- Stefani Oakes, First Grade Teacher, British Columbia
“I am able to use Seesaw to get real-time formative assessment in situations that I wouldn’t be able to in a typical classroom setting. I can tailor each assessment to specific student needs, and I am able to monitor student progress.”
- Karen Hotson, Grade 7/8 Teacher, Nova Scotia
“What I love most about my experience with Seesaw is that it allows me to incorporate student voice into my students’ learning and assessment. Oneon-one assessments used to take me HOURS. Now I can review student work at home in my pajamas. Also, it allows young learners to share their learning very easily. There is no other tech tool that exists that is easier.”
“I appreciate having access to materials and ideas for all grade levels. I teach grade five, but my students’ abilities are wide-ranging. Having early phonics instructional materials alongside reading response activities to novels makes my life a lot easier!”
- Reagan Elysia Niedan, Year 5 Teacher, Quebec
“It is wonderful having students’ work in one place and sorted according to subject. The digital portfolio is a wonderful tool for walking parents through their child’s academic progress during student-led conferences. It also helps me with organization, and I love how it eliminates the use of paper! Environmental stewardship is a big theme in our school, and this complements our efforts seamlessly.”
- Adam Reid, Fifth Grade Teacher, Alberta
“Seesaw helps me create a good work-life balance by allowing me to quickly and easily assign differentiated lessons and have the opportunity to assess learning just as easily and in a timely manner, provide feedback to my students, and share with their families.”
- Jennifer Hinz, Year 1 Teacher, Saskatchewan
“I love how innovative Seesaw is in responding to changing trends in education. I’m excited to try the new fluency tool in my role as a reading intervention teacher. I can already see how it will enhance progress monitoring and simplify the job for educators.”
- Lauren Ozerkevich, Reading Coach And Intervention Teacher K-2, Ontario
“One of the things I like best about my experience with Seesaw is my ability to customize lessons for exactly what I want to teach and to differentiate for my students. I especially appreciate having activities for my English Language Learners that they can do independently.”
- Tracy Kernaghan, First Grade Teacher, Saskatchewan
To learn more about our award-winning instructional platform grounded in research and designed by experts, please visit: https://seesaw.com/awards-press/
