synchronous communication tools
Skrbl, found at this link, is a multi-user web 2.0 whiteboard that is quick and easy for students to use. It is a creative way to share desktops, files, upload pictures, and ideas for collaborative work. Students can also look at a single screen and organize their thoughts collectively using text, free form sketch, and shapes. This is a way for students and teachers alike to share desktops and ideas without having to have a paid desktop sharing tool. This tool can help a team work together in a more effective and efficient manner when it comes to the brainstorming and planning part of a project. It allows teams to look at a single screen and organize their thoughts collectively. Skrbl allows users to collaborate without creating an account, giving access to a whiteboard for free and the ability to save the whiteboard as HTML or as a Print Preview, but without an account it limits your features. With a free account, users can invite up to 5 guests to view their Skrbl and allows you to add photos to your whiteboard with limited data storage. This very much limits the use of Skrbl, but one can sign up for the team account allowing for additional collaborators and adds storage to your space. In order to successfully use this tool, users will need some patience. The icons in the program seem to be straight forward, but the their actual ability to control the text and shapes, especially the free form sketch, can be a bit frustrating. Also, once you have written in a text box and moved on to another item, you are unable to go back and edit, which makes it a bit difficult. Another disadvantage is that the website is very slow. If you want to save or publish your Skrbl, it tends to take several minutes for the process to be complete. Last, the URL is not password protected therefore, anyone who visits your session can edit or delete the data on that session. This tool could easily be used by teachers and students alike. Teachers could use this in PLCs to collaborate and share. They can also use this to brainstorm and plan projects, lessons, etc. Students can use this as a project planning tool and collaboration on other learning assessments but it is nearly impossible for the teacher to monitor what is being posted on here.
Because of its very limited features and frustrations, I did not like this tool. However, I recognize that my students may be better at this tool than I because of their use of social media that is similar to this, like SnapChat. Since the educational experience is about them and not me, I am willing to use this as a pre-project planning tool for the students to brainstorm outside of the school walls. Me as a science teacher, can use this to demonstrate to students how to work out math problems. |
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Interactive slide shows in PowerPoint are non-linear presentations, often used for reviewing knowledge, but can creatively also be used other ways as well. This is done by using hidden slides, action buttons, hyperlinks, formatting and enhancing graphics, inserting sounds, clip art, movies, and hyperlinks (including E-mail links) to get the users interacting with the PowerPoint.
This tool allows student to go beyond just clicking on a PowerPoint to go to the next slide and allows them to interact with the slideshow to construct knowledge and review knowledge. It goes beyond simply reading slides and forces the students to think. This is a very useful tool that can be used by teachers to review concepts with students. It can also be used to create interactive lessons that will allow students to construct knowledge rather than just rote memorization from fact written on a slide. It is time consuming to create an interactive slide show but can have positive effects on student outcomes because it forces the students to go beyond just seeing and copying words from a slide. Students could use this to spice up a project presentation. Other than that I think this is very limited tool for students. I see the benefit to using this, and I like this much better than a traditional linear PowerPoint, and may design some to put online for student enrichment and review, but I do not use PowerPoints because I currently use a flipped classroom in which I make videos for students to watch and interact with. The one thing that I did struggle with however, is how this is classified as synchronous communication. To me, synchronous communication would mean that dialogue can occur simultaneously back and forth. While the interactive slide show can provide instant feedback to the user, that is the extent of the dialogue. There is no communication beyond that. |