Collaborative Technology

Collaboration is an important part in teaching and a must in order for teachers to learn and grow. Being the only choir teacher in my school I take every opportunity I can to collaborate with other choir teachers in other schools. With the business of everyone’s schedule, it is hard to find a time for teachers to meet. Having the ability to collaborate with other teacher through collaborative technology is a dream come true.

As I was reading through the many technology resources available, I found a couple that I think could work for me. One of them is Promethean Planet. On this site I found lessons on basic music skills, to music quizzes and lessons using interactive whiteboards. This site also had lessons created by Publishers that can be purchased for $7.99. Otherwise all the other lessons are free. It would be a great place for me to share my lessons as well.

SmartExchange is another collaborative site I would find useful. This site has over a thousand activities that can be downloaded for free. I know they will not all pertain to the grade levels I teach but it is nice to see such a large number of lessons for music class. And the lessons on this site are also free.

For students I am very interested in having them Skype with other choir classes in other schools and other countries. Skype in the Classroom is a great resource to use when learning how to use Skype. Wiki in the Classroom is another site that I think would be fun to use with my students. It is a great tool to have for students to use while they are at home.

There are so many possibilities for collaboration both for teachers and for students. With all of the choices it is easy to get caught up in looking at all of them and not settling on one. My goal is to find one or two I think would be beneficial to me and my students and focus on those. Eventually I can continue to add other sites. And the best part of all of this is that it is free!