I believe that in my future career online collaboration will be big and will be a useful tool. As the new curriculum is coming out, teachers are needing to come up with many new activity ideas and long range goals for their students. As well, as each year passes teachers always up date their lesson ideas and how they approach things within their classroom. Online collaboration helps all teachers find new and engaging ideas and give them support with new strategies.
I think that as I am entering the profession online collaboration will be an important thing. Even now when I am starting to plan a new lesson I look online for ideas that others may have come up with. Taking others' ideas and altering them to fit your classroom and your students' needs creates better educational opportunities for your students. Every teacher does not need to "reinvent the wheel" when it comes to teaching their students, there are many ideas and resources out there, it just takes time to look for them. Online collaboration will help to minimize the time that is spent by teachers looking for resources because they have some bookmarked or have sources that they know and trust.
Below are some videos that talk about why online teacher collaboration is such a good thing and why more and more teachers are moving towards it.
Not only is online collaboration a wonderful way for teachers to connect and to learn new ideas and strategies, it is also a wonderful way for students to engage with one another. Online student collaboration helps students share their ideas when they aren't even in the same room, which helps for at home projects. Blogging, Google Docs and using other various tools that connect learners can help students in their learning process.
I think that in my future career, I will begin to use online collaboration with my students so that projects can be completed easier and so that those students who have trouble working in a group face-to-face can have that chance to be productively active in the group. I know that throughout my schooling doing group work was always a pain, I hated having to find a time and a place to get together because with everyone's different schedules it can be near impossible. If you allow students to use such tools as Google Doc, each student can work on the project from their own home and on their own time. This also helps those students who have great ideas, but who are unable to share them because they may have trouble with social situations. These students would be much more actively involved if they were able to contribute from a safe environment.
I believe that student online collaboration has its many benefits, as long as you teach your students about internet safety and that you have access to their product. There can be issues with some students sharing inappropriate things within their collaboration, but this is no different from an in class work time. As long as you are monitoring the situation and know that the site is safe for the students to use, online collaboration can greatly effect the education of our students.
What about those students who miss class or have trouble paying attention in class? Having an online tool where the students can access after school hours to receive help on their homework, to view what was done that day, or to look at what their homework was will aid in many students finishing their work. These types of tools are also helpful because they allow parents to become a part of your classroom. If we allow parents to see and comment on what we are doing within our classroom, they feel more at ease because they are up to date. I believe that it is those parents who are kept in the dark that have trouble with the classroom teacher, because all they want is to be involved and to have their voice heard. Allowing parents to be part of online collaboration will help them get their voice out there and to let other students know what they think of their projects (hopefully in the positive or constructive way- this can be monitored as well).
I have found one site that talks about how important it is for students to be connected and learn from each other at all times. This means that we allow allow other classrooms into ours and that we don't isolate our students in any way. This article addresses the positive outcomes that online usage can have in the classroom and how much a student can learn and grow from having that outside connection.
Finally I have found another video that talks about the importance of online collaboration between people and how much people learn from it!
What are your thoughts on online collaboration, either between teachers, students, parents, or a combination of the three? Share your thoughts or any other resources that you may have that talk about what online collaboration can do to your classroom and to your career!
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