Part 5 - Collaboration, Sharing, Peer Review and Project Based Learning

Cloud Computing - Part 5

In this section, I’ll address benefits that cloud computing can provide that the traditional computer/application model does not provide, namely increased collaboration.

There is a trend in education today to move students to project-based learning. Students are put in teams to solve a task. This collaborative learning style is shown to improve student
performance. Howard Mahoney, a California high School principal says, "[Students] can't just repeat what their teacher said. They have to learn how to work cooperatively in
a group". (D'Orio, Wayne. "Working Together". EdTech November/December 2008: 35 ). Having students work together to solve a problem is as a growing trend. Cloud computing is the perfect vehicle to
facilitate this collaborative learning style.

Teachers can set up spreadsheets, documents, presentations in Google docs. These documents are shared with student teams. Each student can edit, add to and access the document, from school or home. The teacher can check the revision history for any document and see which students are contributing and which students are not. It is a perfect vehicle for managed collaboration.

Another aspect of putting document online is providing peer review. Online documents can be shared. Envision Schools is a group of four charter schools in the San Francisco area. The schools are tasked with helping their students become the first in their family to attend college. Although the four schools have different themes, the all share a technology-rich environment. This environment combines project-based learning with regular exhibitions of student work. (D'Orio, Wayne. "Working Together". EdTech November/December 2008: 34 )

This student work can be easily shared by publishing it online using Google docs. The five core values that project based learning can foster are: inquiry, research, collaboration, presentation and reflection. Google documents makes collaboration and presentation much easier than with standard computer models.

Another aspect of putting student work online is that students are more accountable with an online document tool. Their work is tracked with a document revision history. Here is a screen-print of a documents revision history.

As you can see, each time the student logs into the document it is noted. If more than one student edits a document, their names go into the revision history as well. This revision history is a valuable tool for teachers to use with their students.

Teachers can access a student documents and look at the review history. Then can see how much time the student put in to the project, what date they started, what date they finished and what editing changes were made. If a document was accessed once, and a large block of text pasted into the document, it is a red flag that the student is plagiarizing (copying) other work. If a student is required too work in an online document, the teacher can access the document and check on the student’s progress, make comments and guiding the student along. If a document is a team project, each student who is assigned to the project has their own login. The teacher can see what students accessed the document, when and what changes they made.

Sharing information with Parents – Another Benefit

Moving student documents online not only benefits students, but also their parents. Parents can see how the work is graded and see the work that the students are producing. As a parent of three teenagers, I can testify that my children rarely bring their work home for me to see. If parents are included in the access to google docs, they can see what their children are doing.

All the teacher needs is a parent’s e-mail address and the parent can be added to any document as a viewer or collaborator. I personally would be reluctant to add a parent as more than a viewer. The old problem with parent’s doing their children’s work would take on new meaning. Of course with the revision history, the teacher could see just who (parent or child) was doing
the editing.

Sharing the documents with the Online Community

Another advantage of having the students do their work is the “share” feature. After all the collaboration is done and the document is finished, it can be shared. Google docs gives teachers the option of sharing document with just members of the school community or with
anyone with Internet access. For a student, having their work compared to the work or others is a powerful motivator. This Peer Review has been proven to increase student production.

If a student submits a writing assignment using paper and pencil, the usually is little or no revision Using the model that teachers set up the assignment and share it with their students is also valuable to assignments that require Internet research. Students tend to stray off topic when web surfing. A teacher can create a hotlist with links to websites. Since the document is already online, students can click to go to the places on thw Internet that the teacher wants. Students stay on task.

Using Google docs with your students also opens up another way too communicate. Since the document sharing, e-mail is all online, students have another way to ask questions of the teacher. If a student is too shy to ask in class, they can contact the teacher through the Google e-mail platform.

The online platform does not have to be the final “resting Place” for a google document. Google give the user many choices for storing the document. A document can be downloaded as a Word Document, web page, PDF file, plain Text, rich text or Open office. If a document needs to accessed while the computer is offline or if the document needs to be attached to an e-mail, it is simple to download the file and deal with it in the traditional ways.

Online documents also is beneficial in case of a disaster. When schools were destroyed in Hurricaine Kattrina in New Orleans, those districts who had set up online communications outsourced from their districts found a great benefit.

If a district sets up Google Docs and the district building is damaged or destroyed by a disaster, they still have their documents and work. Teachers can continue to communicate with their students through the google interface. A off-site solution like google docs provides this benefit

In the Next Section, we'll look at some sample lesson plans that you can use in your classroom.