We have won another award for our videoconferencing programming.

 I recently had a chance to work with a school to run a videoconference on teaching others how to use Scratch. This was an amazing opportunity for these students, and it demonstrated amazing success at allowing students to teach others through technology.

 I strongly believe in the use of Scratch for helping students to learn the basics of animation and programming. What makes this program so great, though, is that it has the capacity to allow a student to really delve in deeper into looking at what is going on behind the scenes and/or make the program interact with our world. 

Make magazine posts a great article about a kid who created a guitar to interact with this program. Kids teaching kids is a wonderful thing. Kids modeling for kids possibilities of programs is awesome. 

I am in hopes that I can work with more classrooms next year to share their expertise in their technology via videoconference. 

 Technology for Teachers had a great idea on one of his recent blog postings about using Vokle, an online tool for hosting and recording a live web conference, to bring an author into a classroom and use the chat as a back channel for questions. 

Not only that , but it could also be used by classrooms to work on projects with one another, or bring in an expert for a project. Especially with the help of the recording feature, so students running the interview or research could record for later use. 

In the past I have used Ustream, but have been concerned that many schools block Ustream. Perhaps Vokle would be one that may be less likely to be blocked. 

Better yet, why not have students create a broadcast about something unique in their area. 

Lots of ideas and possibilities here.