Digital Tools Support Writing

Julie D. Ramsay’s Can We Skip Lunch and Keep Writing? (Stenhouse Publishers) offers ideas for collaborating in class and online for Grades 3-8. It’s available as an ebook for $18 and paperback for $20 plus $5 shipping. The activities in the book, including publishing podcasts and writing digital stories, target getting students “fired up for writing” through the use of communication and digital tools. Ramsey suggests picking the tool or tools that work best for you and your students and then putting your students to work collaborating with others around the world and publishing their own work.  Why not check out an online preview of the book?

Project-Based Learning with Wikispaces

The Wikispaces Blog features ideas for project-based learning. Teachers have found Wikispaces to be excellent for hosting PBL-style classroom activities in just about every curricular subject. If you’ve heard about Wikispaces, but really don’t know much about them, you’ll benefit from watching the Wikispaces videos. These are presented as tours, which include: Introduction, Personalizing Your Wiki, Files & Pictures, Embedded Widgets, Permissions, and Invitations. There’s also a 15-20 minute Wikispaces Training Camp, which will help your students better understand how to use Wikis.