A Community Walk…Skype Me
Posted by: Dean Shareski in Classrooms, Google Earth, One-to-One, flat world, skype, socialnetworksThis morning I worked with Grade 5 and 6 students who all have a tablet PC. I’ve been talking to them about building networks and wanted to demonstrate mine in meaningful, fun, engaging way.
So I decided to take them on a tour, using some interactive maps and showed them the power of networks, open API (don’t worry I didn’t actually use that term) and personalized learning.
At 9:17 local time I sent out a tweet looking for help. In 2 hours we managed to talk with 10 different people from mostly North America, save for Jeff Utecht who was in Malaysia at a conference. We got to have a brief chat with each one, found out a little bit about them and even asked one or two intelligent questions. Using Community Walk (as you can see my community is not walkable) we created placemarks and I added some video snapshots as well.
Here’s the map we created on the fly.
Wedding map to share with guests
Kids were amazingly focused, running around the room helping each other, teacher laptop in hand right beside her students asking questions, looking like a learner herself, talking to people who help me learn. The students were customizing their maps and adding items of personal relevance and also making connections to the activities and whereabouts of the various guests.
A pretty cool morning.
Technorati Tags: avonlea, prairiesouth, jeffutecht, tinasteele, sharonpeters, barrydahl, paulhamilton, jeffboulton, jamesohagan, brianmull, susanmorgan
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November 6th, 2007 at 3:08 pm
Truly enjoyed the experience! Of all the activities and lessons that my students completed, they were always MOST engaged when we were collaborating with students from other places. Think of the skills being built with activities like this - multiple literacies, geography, language skills, cultural skills, the list can go on. Great stuff! Hopefully the students can connect with other students in meaningful ways. The map is great! It really helps to visually place people on a map. Good luck with the rest of the project!
November 6th, 2007 at 7:11 pm
Hey Dean. It was fun to drop in on you and your class this morning. It was so powerful for me to be able to see the kids as they were interacting with me. I love the way this kind of networking is shrinking the world. No one is very far from anyone else in the world now. If our kids grasp the reality that we are all neighbours, they’ve learned something truly important! Technology has such tremendous potential for helping to break down all kinds of walls and barriers. –Paul
November 7th, 2007 at 1:28 pm
I have been telling everyone who will listen what a neat project this was! I wish I had had my camera hooked up. Thanks for letting me participate!