New Approaches to Writing

I recently stumbled upon a free webinar based on a new book, ‘Reinventing Writing’ and quickly registered  on WizIQ  and joined. The time participating in Empower students with collaborative writing tools was well spent. WizIQ is a good website to browse for free webinars and resources for teachers.

screenshot WizIQ Webinar

You can access the recording of Empower students with collaborative writing tools for free by joining WizIQ. The slides from the webinar have also been saved on Slideshare.  The online services are clearly explained and cited throughout both the webinar and slides.

The focus of the webinar was what tools can we use to support all of the processes and related activities involved in writing including topics such as note-taking, research, using images and publishing.  This leads to thinking about other learning activities such a reading, collaboration, presenting and other learning activities can be approached using online tools.

The webinar makes no attempt to cover the full range of writing activities or tools that can be used. It focuses exclusively on online services which are easily accessible to teachers and students. I have summarized below some of the highlights of the 87 slides in the presentation to encourage you to watch both the webinar and view the slides.

9 areas where online tools can change teaching and learning:

• Reinventing paper – epaper and ebooks (devices such as Kindle and iPad and a number of sites to download free or inexpensive eBooks are provided. Also includes ways to publich eBooks)

• Reinventing Notetaking (services: Evernote, One Note)

• Reinventing Notecards (social bookmarking: Diigo, Delicious)

• Reinventing Your Filing Cabinet – clouds and cloud syncing (services: Dropbox, Google Drive, One Drive and move files between services with Mover.io)

• Reinventing Essays (services: Google Drive, One Drive, Etherpad) and related services for creating bibliographies (EasyBib) and converting files (Zamzar) and other functions.

• Reinventing Journals & Book Reports – blogging and microblogging (Twitter and class twitter links provided)

• Reinventing Group Reports (services: wikis such as Wikispaces, PBWiki and group website creators such as Weebly, Wix, Webs and Google Sites)

• Reinventing Brainstorming – mindmaps (service: Mindmeister), graphic organizers (service: Classtools.net) and outlining tools (services: Hackpad, Google Drive, Etherpad, Office 365)

• Reinventing Illustrations & Scrapbooks (services: create cartoons in toondoo, Voicethread, infographics, bulletin boards in Glogster, graphics in Canva)

Additional information naturally arises in the audio in the webinar and on the slides.