Want your students to become more engaged in their writing? Have your students write their thoughts and ideas in Padlet. Padlet is like a virtual smartboard or wall. Students and teachers can express themselves in real-time on through the use of a mobile device or computer. Put up a prompt, give them a visual as them a question. It boils down to giving each child a voice. We live in a world where we demand things instantaneously and lose motivation or become frustrated when things aren’t at our beck and call. Our students also live in this world and might get more frustrated then we get (But to be fair, they never had dial up!)
What Padlet does for on task and work flow in the classroom is takes it to 2017. The idea of asking a question and seeing 22 heads avoiding eye contact or praying not to get chosen to answer the question has gone the way of the Dodo bird. You might occasionally hear “It’s not fair, my iPad isn’t connected properly” or “my post is moving and Jake’s post is on top of mine and I am in the middle of writing a good sentence, I don’t want to lose my train of thought”. Can you believe this? This is what I hear from time to time? Student’s are actually engaged and want to participate. They feel empowered. They have a voice and here is the clincher: they don’t have to wait their turn!
There are tons of ideas online:
Some ways I have used Padlet in the past was by showing my class a very detailed picture and asking them to describe the picture in 2 sentences by creating boring non-descriptive sentences. This becomes challenging for them. But by turning the tables on them now, it becomes more useful having a conversation with them during some type of revision small group activity.
Try it with this:
It’s a hard task for students but very rewarding once you finally permit them to write a detailed paragraph about the emotions from the perspective of the girl.
The Eclectic Teacher 