PenPal Schools
As we begin a new school year I reflect on several ideas and activities that I thought made a large impact on my students. At the suggestion of Todd Burleson I investigated Pen Pal Schools with a group of 4th grade students. For 6 weeks students joined me for a collaborative learning adventure. A student explains what we did: "In Penpals Schools we get to chat with people around the world, the people I’m talking to are from, 1 from Australia, 3 from the US, and 1 from New Zealand. We also get to watch videos that help us learn, and we read stories about the problems, and we type, and help get ideas on how to stop the problems." They wrote heart-felt responses like these: Students had deep discussions and debates around which issues were the most pressing (in their opinions). Several reasons follow for why this was such a powerful learning experience: They were engaged in authentic learning - they had a real audience to interact with Multimedia mad