How do I connect to colleagues, parents, students, and the world?
ISTE-nets-c objective 5.c states that teachers should "use digital communication and collaboration tools to communicate locally and globally with students, parents, peers, and the larger community." I have met this objective by using multiple communication tools to connect with my peers throughout this course and investigating other ways to communicate more effectively with students and parents in the future.
Google Hangouts
I use Google Hangouts to have one-on-one video chats and group conference calls, as well as chatting and sharing links with peers. The usefulness of meeting this way and sharing our work with each other was proven on our last meeting, when three of my classmates said they were interested in using Weebly for their portfolio after I showed it to the group. |
Remind
URL: https://www.remind.com/ Remind is a text and chat app that lets teachers connect with students and parents without seeing each other’s phone numbers. Remind is free to use, and offers many services. The most basic service is a one-way message that a teacher can send to all students and parents. Teachers can set up multiple class lists, schedule their announcements, and use the service through both the web and on their phones. Teachers can also set up the Chat service, which allows for two-way communication between a teacher and student, or a teacher and parent. I find it very reassuring that Remind takes privacy for both parties seriously. From looking through their website, I learned that Remind has a Teacher Advisory Board to help improve their services. There are a few other services like Attach, which allows teachers to send links to documents (think school permission slips, assignment instructions) and outside resources. There’s also Stamps, which allow students and parents to give feedback. I found Remind to be easy to set up and their website made it easy to navigate. However, I have a practical concern. My placement school has a high level of poverty. I don’t know how many students or parents can afford cell phones, and if they do, they might have limited numbers of texts every month. Messages can be sent via email, but again, I’m not sure how many of my students have computers with internet access at home. So although the service is free, I wouldn’t want to make my students incur overage charges on their cell bills. |
Group Email Lists
At the private school I used to work at, I used group email lists to communicate announcements about library programming to the whole school, certain departments, and custom groups of students. Although I no longer have access to that email account, I plan to use this approach when I begin my placement in the fall.
At the private school I used to work at, I used group email lists to communicate announcements about library programming to the whole school, certain departments, and custom groups of students. Although I no longer have access to that email account, I plan to use this approach when I begin my placement in the fall.