Padlet: My online project board
I really struggled with this task. Padlet was not the issue. It was easy to set up and, other than my issues getting the images to show up after uploading material, was very straightforward. I even taught two colleagues how to upload information so that I could meet the requirements. It was the concept that ended up being the struggle. The nature of my job (providing support to students and teachers) should have made this an easy task to envision. That was not the case. I started and changed three different times before settling on this project. I really wanted this to be a communication/collaboration tool for students and teachers, but I could not figure out how to make it work without asking both groups to totally learn something new. Our district also does not want us to use any program that requires students to create accounts because of the online privacy issues. I’m not totally sure if students can access this with just the link. I will be trying to create some samples for reviewing Executive Function skills and posting them on my Canvas page for students to try. We are all struggling to keep our heads above water and teach both remotely and in-person at the same time. Trying to teach hands-on skills is a further stress. I just didn’t feel that I could ask anyone to use this on top of what they were already required to do. Instead, I chose to create a project planning board for our 10th grade Pre-Tech Academy program and seek input from the three instructors (1 was just hired prior to making this).
The Pre-Tech Academy students research the major career clusters in Career and Technical Education. For each cluster, they choose a job and find the description, education, training, salary and job outlook. These are usually done on a poster and presented in class. I thought it might be fun to create a Padlet for them to use that had everything at their fingertips. Students would use the Padlet to view the introduction and career materials. I spend time in the Pre-Tech Academy class each day so I knew the general process for these career cluster research tasks. I talked to the teachers and they were on board. I put most of the links in directly from their assignment sheet (shown in the last column). I also found some specific information that they would find useful. By putting all of the sites on Padlet, we can make sure that the student is able to access the correct information quickly. There are links to the jobs and information needed to research as well as a Google Slide template to use for the presentation. I thought maybe students could either work in groups and split the slides by members, each having one slide to find information for and report out on or complete the task independently. If done as a group, the group could choose the theme and collaborate through Padlet or, more likely, Google Slides. Members of the group may be in-person or remote. After an initial group meeting to decide who would do which slide, they could work on their own to gather the information and complete their slides. Each member would report out on his/her own slide during the presentation. I even tried my hand at having them upload the link to their presentation on the Padlet. This might be too much so they could just share the slide deck with the instructors so it could be shown on the SmartBoard during the presentation. So, my Padlet is actually more of a collaboration tool with the instructors for designing the project but it could also be for students to access the project requirements. The creation was truly a collaboration with two (and then a three) fantastic teachers!
Requirements:
Text only: The section on What are we going to do? Under the Introduction in column one. I just typed in the agenda for the project so that students and co-teachers could keep the timeline in mind.
Link to outside website: Under Resources: the link to My Next Move. This is one of the possible sites that gives information on specific careers in this cluster.
Embedded video: I’m not sure this is correct, but the Resource for GPS for Success has a video in it. I had trouble finding stand alone videos that would fit with the project. I really wanted to find one of Mike Rowe’s videos on trade schools but I was unable to find one that fit the project.
File upload: There are several file uploads. First, under the Programs in this Cluster column, I uploaded the descriptions of the programs BOCES has to offer in this cluster (file is called Overview). Second, my colleague, Tammy Allen, who teaches the 21st Century Skills portion of the Pre-Tech Academy uploaded her description of the slide requirement for the project.
Link to Google Slideshow: The Project Template in the Project Upload column gives the students a pre-made template for the presentation with specific directions for how to complete.
Voice Recording: I used the voice recording to introduce the Cluster study and project. It is in the first column and is titled “Listen to this first!” I could not get the image to come up like other samples did with the sound waves.
