Journal 3 - "Keep Them Chatting"

Cole, J (2008).Keep them chatting. Leading & Learning with Technology. 36, 32-33.

Many teachers can find it difficult to hold stimulating classroom discussions and to keep students’ attention in online discussions. So what is a teacher to do? According to Jeanie Cole, teachers don’t have to write off class discussions just yet. In her article “Keep Them Chatting,” Cole offers suggestions for creating stimulating and successful online discussions. Her first suggestion is “to plan the objectives and outcomes for the discussion” (Cole 2008). Cole then suggests that teachers use questions in these discussions that encourage students to work together to learn the material. Some types of questions that can help achieve such results include, but are not limited to, the following: high-level, open-ended questions, the inquiry method, the discrepant event inquiry method, and personal examples. Guided chatting can be the answer to all of our classroom discussion problems.

Question 1 – What makes “chatting” a good community building tool to use in the classroom?

Chatting is a great tool for any teacher to use. It can be customized to work with any subject at any grade level. It encourages students to collaborate with each other on classroom projects. Chatting is also a great classroom tool because it creates a way for students to research and discover the material for themselves. I believe strongly in helping students take responsibility for their own education in order to make learning more personally relevant and successful.

Question 2 – How can teachers use “chatting” assignments to introduce students to other technologies?

Another great thing about chatting is it gives teachers a great opportunity to introduce students to other great technologies available today. Chatting can open the door for students to use such great (free) collaborative online tools as GoogleDocs and wikis. These tools can open the door for even more in depth student collaboration. Chatting is just another way to help our students become technologically savvy in a very technological world.