Skype Jobs for Students
To piggy back onto my last post about Alan November’s call to make students contributors to their own learning, I wanted to share the “Skype Jobs” of my students.
There is a sense of excitement in the room, when our students get ready to conduct a Skype call. I almost want to compare it to a “traditional” vision of a newsroom before a deadline. Everyone is buzzing, running here, running there to get ready for their job assignment. Don’t ask why, but I have the memory of a scene in the “Watergate”movie with Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman in my mind.
(click on the image for a larger version):
- Calendar
- Responsible for adding Date & Time of planned Skype connection to shard & embedded Google Calendar
- Greeter
- Greets the partner school.
- Makes initial introduction.Talks about Geographic location.
- Share
- Shares something special about class, school, city, state or country.
- Could be song, dance, souvenir, project, sports team, etc.
- Q &A
- Asks specific questions for data collection.
- Responsible for keeping conversation fluid
- Photographer
- Responsible for documenting connection with still images.
- Videographer
- Responsible for documenting connection with video.
- Backchannel Writers
- Documenting conversation, questions, answers and classroom happenings during the connection on a backchannel chat (Ex. Today’s Meet)
- Backchannel Cleanup
- Responsible to save backchannel chat as a Word Document and cleaning up duplicate comments and mark questionable statements to be verified.
- Live Blogger
- Blogs skype call live to classroom blog
- Blogger Word Problem
- Creates a Math word problem from data, questions and answers collected during skype call
- Google Earth
- Finds location of skype partner and measures distance in miles & kilometers.
- Google Map
- Responsible for adding placemark of Skype partner’s location to embedded Google Map on classroom blog.
- Info Station
- Responsible to search for any data question on the spot.
- Verifies any questionable information as well.
- Data Entry
- Responsible for adding data collected into embedded google form on classroom blog. Ex. distance miles/km, temperature in F/C.
- Elapsed time
- Responsible for noting time Skype call started and ended as well as calculating elapsed time.
I love the idea of the student jobs! We’ve only Skyped with a few classes so far, and I have basically run everything for my third grade students.
Today I signed up for your Around the World in 80 Schools project and am looking forward to starting it. Now I’m even more excited because you’ve given me some fantastic ideas about how to let the students take a more active role.
Love it! Thank you!
Linda Yollis
P.S. Thanks for mentioning our classroom blog and the teaching commenting wiki on March 16. I appreciate that!
.-= Mrs. Yollis´s last blog ..Getting Ready for Earth Day ~ April 22 =-.
[...] big star is an entry from Langwitches. This is a blog written by a former tech master from our school who has amazed us all by her [...]
I really, really like this post. Thanks, Silvia. I assume we all assign student jobs, but you have done a great job of listing and explaining the necessary jobs to make a Skype session more meaningful for all the kids in a class.
E
This might be the greatest post I’ve read in a while. I love every single role you’ve come up with.
Do you have a higher resolution version of the graphic available or only what’s on flickr?
.-= greg´s last blog ..12th Grade Research Paper Resources =-.
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Silvia,
Thank you for sharing this list. One of Alan’s quotes has stuck with me throughout the last few years: “we must outsource the work we do in the classroom to our students.” There are so many opportunities to do that in our daily practice, and this creation of jobs for skype calls is a prime example of this.
.-= Patrick´s last blog ..More of This, Please =-.
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Excellent visual and strategy of involving students in their learning. I really like how involved everyone is, and I would never have thought of some of those roles! Also love how you connect each role with responsibilities that tie in other disciplines and skills. Clearly thought out and detailed!
I’m curious to know how you started introducing the tools to the students – blogging, backchanneling, etc.
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