Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Using Google Docs & Skype To Discuss The Revisions Of Your Students Term Papers


How many times have you had to rush through a discussion with your students about their term paper? You have tried to talk with them in early in the morning, during class or after school but the time was too limited. You can write the corrections in red on their draft but sometimes they don’t understand what you want them to change so the revisions take much longer or they don’t get done at all. What if you could talk to your students during a previously arranged convenient time to discuss the revisions? Google Docs and Skype could be used to go over the necessary corrections. First of all your students need to upload their term paper into Google Docs and invite you as a viewer. Your students would need to go to https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=writely&passive=true&nui=1&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google.com%2F&followup=http%3A%2F%2Fdocs.google.com%2F&ltmpl=homepage&rm=false and create an account and then upload their term paper. If you would actually like to type some things in their paper, they would have to invite you as a collaborator, your choice. Then, you and your students would create an account in Skype. No worries, all of this is free! Go to http://www.skype.com/ to download Skype and create your free account. Each of you would need to have a microphone/headphone set plugged into the computer to communicate with each other. A decent headphone/microphone will cost about $20.00.

Bob Kuhn, an English teacher at the Career Center, believes he can help more students using this method in addition to the face to face consultations that he offers his students in the class.

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