Skype - Great way to communicate with places from another campus to around the world.
- One way of utilizing Skype is by partnering with other schools. I could see this being used by classes at different campuses. You could host a debate between classes. The 6th grade Social Studies curriculum has a rainforest debate that would work well, with each class taking the specific roles.
- Another way to use Skype is to partner with one of the many museums or university programs that offer guest speaker programs. Even NASA offers great opportunities to listen in on talks or communicate with experts and astronauts. Students are certainly engaged during these sessions. With careful planning and question preparation, the Skype sessions can be powerful learning experiences - allowing for students to interact with and explore places generally out of reach.
Padlet - I love Padlet. It works for me. It is easy to setup and easy to share.
- Targeted resource page - I often setup Padlets for teaching units. You can include video links, documents, websites, and notes easily modified. You can open up the Padlet for users to add resources too. I've created a writing focus Padlet that teachers added to. We clustered like resources together and added comments as we went through the unit cycle.
- Padlet can be used as a collaboration tool. As students research a topic, they can post to the Padlet with comments and resources. As the Padlet administrator I can move the resources to cluster together like items. I've also posted questions on the Padlet and had students add responses and resources underneath. I do require students to provide their name for accountability.
More than anything, the tools in this assignment increase engagement by making students active participants and accountable. The interface of Padlet is intuitive and simple. The accessibility of Google Drive makes it flexible for classroom, lab, or library. Skype opens up students to opportunities and places that are generally out of reach.
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