Practical Ed Tech Tip of the Week – 5 Ways to Use Padlet in School

Padlet is a versatile, collaborative tool that I’ve been using for years with students in my classroom and teachers in my workshops. Over the last couple of weeks Padlet added some new features including an option for sorting notes and an option for creating flowcharts. Given that Padlet has new features, it’s a good time to update my list of five good ways to use Padlet in school.

Padlet for group research and discussion:
A few years ago I showed my special education students a short (18 minutes) video about cultural changes that took place in the US during the 1920’s. After the video we discussed what they saw. Then I had students search online for other examples of cultural change in the 1920’s. When they found examples they put them onto a Wallwisher (Padlet’s previous name) wall that I projected onto a wall in my classroom. The wall started with just text being added to the wall and quickly progressed to YouTube videos being added to the wall. Once every student had added a video to the wall we stopped, watched the videos, and discussed them.

Padlet as a showcase of your students’ work:
If your students are creating digital portfolios, creating slideshows, or producing videos you could use Padlet to display all of your students’ best work on one page. Create the wall, call it something like “my best work this year,” and have your students post links to their works.

Padlet Mini as a bookmarking tool:
Padlet Mini is a Chrome extension that you can use to bookmark websites. When you click the Padlet Mini extension in your browser you will be presented with the option to save to one of your existing walls or create a new Padlet wall. Click here for a video on using Padlet Mini.

Padlet for Making Flowcharts
Padlet’s new flowchart option makes it easy to make a flowchart from a series of notes. Have students use this option to demonstrate understanding of a concept like the water cycle.

Padlet as a KWL chart:
Padlet can be used to create a KWL chart that students can contribute to anonymously (or not anonymously if you want them to sign-in). Create a wall, share the link, and ask students to share what they know and what they want to know about a topic. If you allow anonymous posting you might get contributions from shy students who might not otherwise speak-up in class. Of course, if you allow anonymous commenting you should have a conversation with your students about what an appropriate comment looks like. (You could also turn on moderation and approve all notes before they appear). The new notes sorting option makes it easy to rearrange notes on a grid.

Here are the week’s most popular posts from FreeTech4Teachers.com:
1. 7 Ways to Use Google Keep in Your Classroom
2. 5 Ways to Show YouTube Videos Without Related Content
3. 10 Ways to Use Google Earth in Your Classroom
4. How to Create a Flowchart on Padlet
5. Screencast-o-Matic Now Offers Background Music
6. Cite It In – A Free Tool for Creating Reference Citations
7. Practical Ed Tech Chromebook Camp & BYOD Camp Discounts Extended

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