edmodo Collaboration & Communication: Andy McKiel
Reviewer: Andy McKiel
Position: K-12 Curriculum Coordinator
District/School: St. James-Assiniboia School Division
Number of Students in District/School: Approximately 8500 students
Product: Edmodo
Goals:
Our administrators were looking for better ways to communicate student learning between school and home. Our teachers have been looking for opportunities to encourage their students to work collaboratively in online spaces in a safe and secure environment. Our students would like to have access to social networking tools within the classroom.
Response:
Edmodo has enabled our administrators to highlight events that are taking place within the school community. Our teachers have found that Edmodo has been a great tool to enable their students to demonstrate their learning and provide their peers with descriptive feedback. In addition, our teachers find that the secure nature of posting notes and assignments within Edmodo groups encourages their students to take more risks (safely) than if they were posting their thoughts and ideas more publicly to a blog.
Learning Curve:
Our staff has found Edmodo to be extremely easy to implement. We began our district implementation with a one hour webinar that could accommodate up to 50 self-selected teachers/administrators. Over thirty participants took part in the webinar, and we were able to highlight the many features of Edmodo, and provide participants with the details they needed to get started the very next day.
How We Use It:
Many of our schools use the calendar feature within the Edmodo groups and communities to highlight upcoming events and activities. Classroom teachers are posting assignments and providing their students with descriptive feedback based on the work that they submit through Edmodo. Our teachers also share their questions and success stories with teachers in other schools throughout the district.
What’s Ahead?:
We're currently focusing our efforts on increasing the number of teachers and students within our district who are using Edmodo to connect and collaborate. By encouraging our teachers to share their success stories, and describe the value that Edmodo has added to the teaching and learning that takes place within their classrooms (and beyond), we've found that other teachers are eager to get started.
Reviewer’s Notes:
We've been thrilled with the positive impact that Edmodo has had in our classrooms and schools, and can't say enough positive things about Edmodo. This is an incredible tool for communication and collaboration, and the fact that it's free and easy makes Edmodo a tool that no teacher should be without...
