4 ways to have Students write for an Audience

Students should write a lot in school but too often, they are writing for an audience of ONE (the teacher). They are given a task of writing creatively or an essay on a topic or a story, their thoughts and ideas are amazing. They work hard, put forth great effort and complete their work. They are proud of it. They are excited about it. The "due date" comes and BAM! the student is hit with the realization that all that hard work will only be viewed and appreciated (or even worse, just skimmed) by one person: the teacher. We want, no-we need, to provide our students with a bigger audience. We want them to be heard! An audience of one does not produce a very high level of concern. But an audience of hundreds, if not thousands makes it real and gives the writing meaning.  Here are a few ways to create a large audience for your "authors" (students).

1. Create an ebook. Creating an ebook isn't as difficult or complicated as one might think. In fact, there is a tool that you can use that you are already familiar with--Google Slides. Yes, great for presentations, but it can also be used for creating an ebook, which can be downloaded and shared. Create a new google slides, change the dimensions of the slides to the standard 8.5" x 11." When finished, go to "File"--"download as"--and then click "as pdf." This is a great way to create a picture book. With the "sharing" feature of Google drive, collaboration is not only possible, but easy!

2. Google Docs: Writing a story via google docs makes it easy to turn into a "webpage" and share or post.

3. Widbook: Allow students to create a online/ebook with this site and get it added to the Widbook collection of other ebooks. This tool allows students to work collaboratively on the writing project.

4. Blogs: Tools like Blogger gives students a voice and an audience. In our world today, more than ever the youth want to be heard! So give them the opportunity to blog about: what they know, what they learned, what they think, what they feel, what they dream about, what they fear, what they want to know, what they wonder, and what they want. A blog gives them a voice to share and be heard.

Create and publish Interactive Maps with Scribble Maps

Scribble Maps is a great mapping tool that allows the user to create interactive maps and share them via email, image, link, directory, or embed code. They can even be shared via social media such as Facebook and Twitter. You do not need to create an account to use Scribble Maps. To create a scribble maps, simply go to the site and click "create map." The maps you make are saved and you can access them and edit them via a password you set for each unique map. Each map is given a unique Map ID so you can share the ID and the password to allow others to colalborate on the map with you. Scribble Maps has a variety of tools such as: draw, scribble, lines, measurement, place markings, text, boxes, circles, etc. You can also upload pictures to place on your maps as well. Scribble Maps would be a great tool to use when planning a route or trip. It could be use in many ways in any history/geography class. Perhaps your students are reading a book that invovles some sort of trip or journey? You can use scribble maps to make that route come alive and see it in an interactive way. I encourage you to check out Scribble Maps and see how it could help you in your class.