UPDATE: As of April 2018, Padlet has changed to a paid subscription model. Free access is now limited to 3 boards. Once you’ve deleted a board, you can create additional boards.
For those interested in exploring Open Educational options, you may wish to try a suite of apps from apps.opened.ca hosted in the ‘Sandstorm’ ecosystem (a Canadian housed space) – you can even host the apps on your own server. Scrumblr and Brainstorm are the closest I’ve found to Padlet. You might also be interested in Etherpad (like a google doc but FIPPA compliant!). For more information, please visit ‘Open ETech: Free Range Ed Tech’.
Visit this blog post for a description of digital whiteboards and a few alternative applications including: Jamboard
A collaborative whiteboard or posting board is a great way to share information and collaboratively create content. Consider a classroom brainstorm that often entails students raising their hands and sharing, one at a time, while the teacher or another student records on the board… now think about the possibilities if groups of students or pairs of students have a shared Padlet wall open and are all adding and sharing ideas and resources in real time! Once the brainstorming has taken place, the teacher can follow up with a group discussion that might involve evaluating, sorting and classifying responses… something that can be difficult to make time for when the act of brainstorming and recording is lengthy.
Using the Mapping template, students might collaboratively create a geo-located map for place based learning activities, response to a novel that involves a journey, sharing information about cultures and places around the world, etc.
Embedding media like videos and images is simple, and Padlet even allows users to record videos or take pictures in real time and places them directly into their documents. Create and share mind-maps, plans, diagrams, portfolios, maps and more. Remember to always consider privacy and copyright permissions when sharing images, video or other content online.
Another valuable affordance of Padlet for teachers is that you can ‘moderate’ your posts using the privacy settings so that you view anything a student posts and approve it before it becomes ‘live’.
Important features and considerations:
- Accountability: MODERATE your wall using the MODIFY menu (the ‘settings wheel’ in Top right corner) to help provide some accountability for students (‘Modify’ –> Require Approval). In a f2f classroom, the T can also circulate while students work and approve posts (using a mobile device) as T circulates, interacts/prompts/probes. You can also ask students to self-identify using initials or you can have students work in small groups or partners.
- Privacy: Using the SHARE menu, you can adjust privacy. Consider: is the content sensitive at all? If so, there are also techniques like question boxes to support co-creating ideas/questions around more sensitive issues – the T can then preview the questions and discuss with the class the next day. Will students share their photos? names? what are the school/district norms and expectations or permissions needed? This is NOT a FIPPA compliant space so it is very important that students not be required to login and/or provide any personal or identifying info. (Metadata including things like location services in images provide data so it is important your students are aware of how to protect their own privacy)
- Accessibility: You can create a custom URL using the ‘SETTINGS wheel’ (top right corner). This is also where you add a title and instructions/description. Consider: Do all of your students have devices? Will this be an individual or small group or partner? Are there visually impaired students? Other learning needs?
Visit https://padlet.com/ and click on “Create a padlet”. Then double-click anywhere to start writing, it is that simple! The URL can be shared with anyone. To explore some of the settings available, please refer to the video demonstration at the end of the post.
