Larry Ferlazzo’s Websites of the Day…

Last month I posted The Best Online Tools For Real-Time Collaboration. I was exploring those tools more for my own professional development and professional relationships since, because of time zone issues with our International Sister Classes Project, it seemed unlikely any real-time collaborative work was going to work with my students.

At some point, however, I can see how our classes might consider doing joint projects not in real time (I believe that type of relationship is also called asynchronous. However, if I can’t spell it or pronounce it without a dictionary I’m not going to use it!).

I using the word “Best” hesitantly. I suspect there are quite a few other online tools out there, and I haven’t experimented extensively with any of them. If you have some suggestions, I’d be happy to hear it and put out a revised version in the near future. That’s one reason I’m not going to be listing sites in any kind of ranked order.

In order to make it on this list, the web application had to meet a number of criteria. They had to…

1. …be free.

2. …be accessible to English Language Learners.

3. …have specific collaboration tools. Most Web 2.0 tools, of course, have collaboration potential if you just email your password to somebody else. In order to make this list, however, the online application had to have a specific “value-added” and simple process to invite and work with others to develop shared projects.

4. … not require any downloads.

A number of sites on the “real time collaboration” list are also useful for working together not in real time. Rather than share them again here, I’m going to suggest you just explore that list on your own.

Also, wikis are online tools that should probably be included on this list. However, I still have not gotten around to using them, and still don’t really know how. I’ve posted in the past, though, about some good resources sharing how to use them in the classroom. You can check them out if you’d like.

While you’re at it you might want to review all of my other “The Best…” lists.

Here is my very tentative and unfinished list of The Best Online Tools For Collaboration — NOT in Real Time:

Fliptrack has a “Friendship Slide Show” feature that lets you jointly create slideshows, including music, with friends and family.

WeBook is an interesting new site that lets you create a topic and then invite people to share stories around the same subject. It looks simple and seems like it might have a lot of potential.

Mixbook allows you create a slideshow with collaborators. It seems fairly similar to Fliptrack — without the music — but I might be missing some differences.

Google Maps has a neat feature so you can create maps with others. The fine blog Free Technology For Teachers has a nice video showing how it works.

Zee Maps is another simple tool for collaborative map creation.

Shutterfly seems to have a special collaborative feature that allows you to make joint photobooks.

There are a number of online word processors that invite easy collaboration, and not the least of these is Google Docs. You can find others by looking at the list of sites I’ve made for real-time collaboration.

Write With is a tool I’m adding to this list.  It’s a simple way to create documents collaboratively.  You can watch a short video on it here.

I just added a new one called 2collab. You can read my post about it here.

Here’s one more site I’ve added to the list — Imagination Cubed. You might want to read my post describing it.

I also recently added another site called Sketch Planet. You can read my post about it here.

And here’s yet another application I’ve added to this list. It’s called Panraven, and I’ve posted about it here.

I’ve added one more site — it’s called Dipity. You can read my post about it here.

Etherpad is the latest very, very easy way to collaborate in real time and not in real time. You just paste a bunch of text in a window and, without even having to register for the service, send others the url and everybody can edit it in real time. It also has a chat option.  You can go back to the url address at any time to make further, adjustments, too, which is why I’m also adding it to this “The Best…” list. (Etherpad was bought by Google and is shutting down in March, 2010)

Here are a couple of site that I haven’t really tried yet, but appear to have some potential:

Protagonize is going to be a wonderful site for student collaboration, but not until they create a feature that allows private groups to be created. The site’s owner says that’s going to be coming soon. The site allows you to write basically collaborate in writing “choose your own adventure” stories that take you on different paths. ESL teachers also call them Action Mazes.

Kaltura is another site that seems to have some possibilities, though appears a little complicated to me. It’s a collaborative video-creation site, and you can either modify videos that are already on the web, or ones that you upload.

(Note: I’m adding The Broth to this list)

Grapevine is an audio “chatboard” that I’m adding to to this list.  It’s super-simple to set-up a private forum where students can listen and respond to others and don’t have to be online at the same time.  English Language Learners can communicate with other classes around the world, like in our International Sister Classes Project or just be given a simple speaking assignment to complete.  Anybody can use it to collaborate together.  I love its simplicity and ease of use.  It’s still in Beta, so you need an invitation to join.   I received mine within seconds of requesting one, though.

Revizr lets you upload a document, which then can be “marked-up” by others (each person’s comments appear in a different color). It’s a pretty easy-to-use application, so I’m adding it to this list.

Doodle Wall is a new web tool that lets you easily…doodle. You can draw on your own and keep it completely private, or provide the password to others to draw collaboratively. It also has a chat feature.  It worked pretty easily for me, though once I saved the picture and went back to see it, it kept on moving around when I moved my mouse. I’m sure there’s an easy solution to this, though. And like other tools this list, students could work with students in sister classes to draw a collaborative art project and write about it.

Babelwith.me is the newest addition to this list.  No registration is required, and it takes a few seconds to set-up a private chatroom.  Of course, a number of other tools on those lists do the that same thing.  However, Babelwith.me lets you do it and automatically translates what you’re saying in the recipients language and in the language you’ve written.  This last feature could be very helpful with English Language Learners communicating with sister classes in other countries.  Another great capability — and this is why Babelwith.me is on this list — is that the chatrooms themselves appear to stay active indefinitely, so users can come back to them whenever they want to continue the conversation.

Yack All is a new application that lets you create a private chatroom.  In one way Yack All is less convenient than most of the ones I’ve mentioned because it requires registration and sign-in (though it’s extremely easy to do so).  One nice feature, though, that Yack All has but many of the others do not is that it saves the chat indefinitely.

Zoho Discussions is a super simple way to create “chatboards” that would work well for “sister classes.” There are a lot of alternatives, including ones that have the ability for users to participate in a chatboard by leaving audio messages.  But I’m including it here just because it’s so easy.

Please share reactions and other suggestions!

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