Online Projects & Collaboration Tools

Online tools provide many new options.  Students can collaborate on projects, collect and synthesize information, and write for different types of audiences.  Here are some examples.

Online Collaboration Generally

(discusses jointly edited Google Docs, Google Sites, wikis, cloud storage of video projects, crowdsourced research, Google Spreedsheets for data aggregation, Piazza, and class blogs; also considers issues of IT support, ease of use, and student privacy).

Wikis

Vanderbilt's Center for Teaching provides this helpful .

(Westfield State University)

(advice from Educause)

(an imaginative list from SmartTeaching.org)

Andri Ioannou & Anthony R. Artino, Jr., , Journal of Emerging Technologies in Web Intelligence (report on a case study in a graduate class) 

(advice, forms, and help from Wikipedia itself)

Blogs

(Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy)

(Chris Clark at Notre Dame's teaching center writes a really useful teaching with technology blog. This is one example)

 (discusses learning goals, ways to use blogs, need for student training, ways to assess student blog-writing) 

("The Buzz," the blog of the Vancouver Learning Network, compares 4 platforms)

(reflections on grading and assessing blog posts from "Sample Reality," the blog of an English professor at George Mason)

Twitter

(from Faculty Focus)

(reporting on and demonstrating Twitter experiment in a class at UT Dallas)

Educause,  

Other Online Collaboration Tools

("Piazza is a free online gathering place where students can come together to ask, answer, and explore under the guidance of their instructors. With Piazza, you can easily answer questions, manage course materials, and track student participation.”)

(a professor describes assigning students to make Xtranormal videos to demonstrate the ability to realistically grapple with counterarguments).

Jeffrey R. Young, (Chronicle of Higher Education's Technology blog)