Collaboration Beyond Classrooms

When I hear educators talking about Web 2.0 in the classroom, I keep hearing about 2 particular applications: Wikispaces and VoiceThread. We’ve already shared Adam Frey’s thinking about the future of education. Next up is Ben Papell, one of the founders of VoiceThread, who I met on the exhibit floor at NECC 2008. As you might imagine, he echos earlier comments about breaking down walls and fostering collaboration.

On VoiceThread, you can post a bit of media and then let other comment on it by adding voice via phone or microphone, text, audio file, or video. His demo of the product impressed me because, unlike a text-based discussion thread, you see all of the responses at once, surrounding the file. This creates a very interesting visual representation of the conversation. Of course, multimedia response options open up another whole area of creativity.

VoiceThread has quickly worked it’s way into teacher lesson plans because it is easy, online, and free. Teachers don’t just connect their classrooms, they create a participative environment for access across time and space. I found this detailed explanation of how Michelle Pacansky-Brock, an art history teacher, plans to use it. The comments range from participatory to doodling to thankful. I look forward to seeing how this tool develops. VoiceThread could be used to create Social Learning environments.