Thing 4

I love Skype! I have been able to keep in touch with my son in the Navy as he is on base across the country. We have even been able to keep at times when he has been on deployment (it depends on the speed of the Internet provider, and they were not the best in some foreign countries). I have also been able to let him see his daughter while she was staying with me and I was able to see her when they lived in CT. I can see how this tool could be used as a great asset to build cooperative learning communities with a wide ranging reach. The quality of the Skype connection completely depends on the speed of the server you have. Although, the picture quality did not hold my granddaughter's attention (she is just 14 months old now), most older students and teachers should be able to work through these skips with a little patience and practice. It is sometimes hard not to get caught up in watching your subjects lips move and then experiencing the audio delay ... at least that is how it has worked on the Comcast network for me .... I can see a lot of teacher use with collaborative work groups and lessons across the district and across many learning communities. Each group could be part of a jig saw (an old time technique, improved with technology) group that gives personal viewpoints on a variety of subjects. This would be a great way to teach and learn science concepts for districts that did not have some of the more expensive or complicated equipment .... virtual space travel or weightlessness, the possibilities could be extensive ... the time to search them out would be the hard part for me but that is what networking is about. One of the ways Amy and I discussed using Skype for our classrooms was for possible Art Instruction when larger projects were involved that would need more then the scheduled Art time. Her classes at the other schools could collaborate and share with my class on similar projects and she could be available to answer questions and give instruction on aspects of the project. We could also collaborate on cross-curricular teaching between buildings.