Category: edci337-app

PenPal Schools Evaluation

PenPal Schools is a web application that enables “creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, and discussion” through Project-Based Learning (PjBL) and an emphasis on global-citizenship (PenPal Schools, 2020). It is used by schools in over 150 countries and allows students (8 and older) to engage with other learners in “thoughtfully designed, collaborative projects” (Wilson, 2018). These projects are offered in many of the core subjects along with others such as Environmentalism, Social Justice, and Current Events (PenPal Schools, 2020). They involve “self-guided, differentiated and mixed media” lessons based on a chosen topic (Wilson, 2018). In the lessons, learners read and analyze texts, watch videos, share ideas in a forum space, and collaborate all while “[building] empathy, curiosity, and respect” (PenPal Schools, 2020). The team at PenPal Schools curates each lesson to align with different international educational standards in the areas of “reading, writing, digital citizenship, and social-emotional skills” (PenPal Schools, 2020). Teachers sign up for PenPal Schools and receive their first topic for free (more topics can be obtained through referrals, fees, or scholarships) (PenPal Schools, 2020). In regards to safety, students can only join through a teacher invitation and the only personal information required is the student’s first names, last initials, and country. Every post is moderated and student safety is the application’s number one concern. Click here to dive deeper into the key features, safety, and cost of this multimedia app. Through the integration of PjBL, global citizenship, and multimedia, PenPal Schools provides students with the ability to connect with similar aged children around the world thus enhancing their cross-cultural respect, sensitivities, tolerance, and worldview.

In 2015, President Barack Obama said PenPal Schools was one of the world’s leading social enterprises (Wilson, 2018)! The program also received a “Top Pick for Learning” award in 2018 from Common Sense Education (PenPal Schools, 2020).

Multimedia Principles

PenPal Schools expertly crafts a multimedia learning environment that fosters the growth of knowledge on a global scale. Since each topic includes videos and readings that incorporate a mix of visual and auditory components, the Multimedia Principle is present (Mayer, 2014, p.8). Each forum section provides potential information to be used in the writing prompts along with worked examples to help students create a resource on a given topic (Mayer, 2014, p.9). Helpful hints and worked examples guide students (Guided Discovery Principle) towards certain learning outcomes, allowing each topic to expand learners’ worldviews while teaching them critical literacy skills (Mayer, 2014, p.9). The website is designed for learners of varying abilities, evidenced by the different difficulty levels within each topic. These levelled resources establish the Coherence Principle as extraneous information and resources are left out of a students’ dashboard (Mayer, 2014, p.8). All of this creates a user-friendly learning platform that allows learners to feel confident enough to explore new topics and share their ideas with their penpal. Each pairing works through a topic at their own pace (Segmenting Principle): watching videos, doing readings, responding to prompts, and creating an end project (Mayer, 2014, p.8). PenPal Schools is a useful multimedia-based, learner-centred tool, that integrates technology organically and authentically.

Collaboration

PenPal Schools works to create a collaborative learning experience that is safe, interactive, and engaging. Through the lessons, students can “[build] on” their own existing knowledge by learning from the provided videos, readings, and experiences of their penpal (Van Den Bossche et al., 2006, p.494). Van Den Bossche et al. states that collaborative learning “…offers possibilities to learn from other viewpoints” by understanding that while another person’s views may differ from one’s own, those views are still legitimate and worthy (2006, p.496). PenPal Schools offers an opportunity to listen and share with friends across the globe and develop those conversations into collaborative projects involving both students’ new learning and their pre-existing viewpoints. A teacher, Jillian W., supports this by stating that “students [connect] globally on PenPal Schools to collaborate and learn together” (Common Sense Education, 2019).

Project-Based Learning

An important facet of PenPal Schools is its foundation in project-based learning (PjBL), a “type of inquiry-based learning” that emphasizes student choice, autonomy, and self-reliance (Kokotsaki et al., 2016, p.268-269). PjBL leads to meaningful learning experiences through its basis in the following constructivist ideas: “learning is context-specific,” “learners are involved actively in the learning process” and goals are achieved “through social interactions and the sharing of knowledge and understanding” (Kokotsaki et al., 2016, p.267-268). Key aspects of PjBL are “time management”, encouraging thoughtful learning, “establishing a culture that stresses student self-management”, connecting with community members, using technological resources effectively, and using varied assessment methods (Kokotsaki et al., 2016, p.273-274).

Tying digital multimedia tools into PjBL allows students to “comfortably engage with the process of designing and developing their project” and being able to easily share and document their creations in “a digital format” (Kokotsaki et al., 2016, p.272). For elementary ages, PjBL improves “experiential reasoning and comprehension of relations,” content knowledge and group work skills, motivation, positivity in the classroom, and literacy (Kokotsaki et al., 2016, p.269-270). PenPal Schools is an effective tool for the implementation of PjBL into any classroom.

Global Citizenship

PenPal Schools promotes global citizenship by connecting students around the world through the exploration of various topics that build a “global awareness…[and] interconnectedness with others” (Katzarska-Miller & Reysen, 2019, p.26). While traditional classrooms may overlook current or social justice events, PenPal Schools provides educators with opportunities to tackle global issues that “[are] simply too important to be dominated by other curricular imperatives” (Schweisfurth, 2006, p.47).

Learning about different countries around the world allows students to gain a better understanding of humanity and appreciate the similarities and differences between one another. The goal of globalized education, and PenPal Schools, is to form “a greater understanding of interconnectedness between self and world, skills and values” (Katzarska-Miller & Reysen, 2019, p.31). By connecting with other cultures, students can learn to empathize with others and work towards “sustainable development and peaceful societies” (Schweisfurth, 2006, p.42). PenPal Schools makes it easy for teachers to integrate global awareness into their classrooms by increasing their “global content,” “[supporting] the idea of student-perceived awareness,” and “[encouraging] student connections” (Katzarska-Miller & Reysen, 2019, p.28). While global citizenship may not be a concrete part of the BC Curriculum, teachers must integrate PenPal Schools or other similar multimedia technologies to work towards a more inclusive world.

Alicia M. from Saraland Elementary School says PenPal Schools “creates an understanding of culture differences!”

PenPal Schools provides opportunities to connect with other learners around the world, share experiences, and explore project-based learning collaboratively, all of which are “key to becoming an educated global and digital citizen” (Bjelde, 2020).

– Ms. Bjelde, Ms. L. McLean, Ms. A. McLean, Ms. Gustavsson

References

Katzarska-Miller, I., & Reysen, S. (2019). Educating for global citizenship: Lessons from psychology. Childhood Education, 95(6), 24-33. doi:10.1080/00094056.2019.1689055

Kokotsaki, D., Menzies, V., & Wiggins, A. (2016). Project-based learning: A review of the literature. Improving Schools, 19(3), 267-277. doi:10.1177/1365480216659733

Mayer, R. E. (Ed.). (2014). The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning(2nd ed.). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139547369

PenPal Schools. 2020. A Global Project Based Learning Community. (n.d.). Retrieved June 13, 2020, from https://www.penpalschools.com/index.html

Schweisfurth, M. (2006). Education for global citizenship: Teacher agency and curricular structure in ontario schools. Educational Review: Global Citizenship Education, 58(1), 41-50. doi:10.1080/00131910500352648

Van den Bossche, P., Gijselaers, W. H., Segers, M., & Kirschner, P. A. (2006). Social and Cognitive Factors Driving Teamwork in Collaborative Learning Environments: Team Learning Beliefs and Behaviors. Small Group Research, 37(5), 490–521.

Wilson, L. (2018, May 03). Everything You Need To Know To Get Started With PenPal Schools. Retrieved June 13, 2020, from https://hundred.org/en/articles/everything-you-need-to-know-to-get-started-with-penpal-schools

Out of the four apps that each of our group members researched, “PenPal Schools” “Peekapak”, “Padlet”, and “Canva”, we have come to the consensus that for our final evaluation we will be diving deeper into PenPal Schools. As a group, we are all looking forward to learning more about the web application and how it incorporates many different Multimedia learning principles.

Photo by Kelsey Knight on Unsplash

“PenPal Schools is a website and Multimedia program that is used by thousands of educators in over 150 countries (PenPal Schools, 2020)… It allows students (8 and older) to connect with other similar aged learners from different countries and cultures through “thoughtfully designed, collaborative projects” on a variety of subjects including Literacy, Social Studies, English/Language Arts, Science, Math, Music, Art, Spanish, Environmentalism, Social Justice, Current Events, Cultures, Civilizations, Virtual Reality and much more (Wilson, 2018; PenPal Schools, 2020). The lessons that learners participate in are “self guided, differentiated and mixed media” which motivates [them] to stay engaged (Wilson, 2018).”  (Bjelde, 2020).

This app utilizes a variety of multimedia principles such as collaboration, modality, segmenting, personalization, and many more that will be further explained in our full evaluation.

Photo by Luis Cortes on Unsplash

One of our main concerns with the other three applications was how their information was stored and used. The privacy settings in Penpal Schools allows students to remain protected and relatively anonymous throughout their use of the webpage and application. Each student is linked to a class code (set up by their teacher) and their only personal information given is their first name, last initial, and country.  We had concerns with our other apps’ privacy policy because there were varying degrees of third-party data storage.

In addition to the fewer safety concerns, PenPal Schools feels relevant and authentic to 21st-century learners and modern-day global citizens. By fostering connections to others around the world, promoting digital literacy, and hearing different worldviews, students become more culturally-sensitive, aware, and understanding. With the plethora of learning opportunities present in this app, each of us found it to be a dynamic and inspiring multimedia application for students.

Photo by Chris Lawton on Unsplash

We can all definitely envision ourselves using this app in our own future classrooms as it can be used in many different ways for a number of different grades. The accessibility of the application and the excitement of having a pen pal creates a very engaging and motivating learning environment. 

References

Bjelde, S. 2020. EDCI 337: Evaluating an Interactive Multimedia Learning Web Application. Retrieved from https://sarahbjelde.opened.ca/2020/06/17/edci-337-evaluating-an-interactive-multimedia-learning-web-application/.

App Overview – PenPal Schools

Photo by Andrew Stutesman on Unsplash

PenPal Schools is a website and Multimedia application that is used by thousands of educators in over 150 countries (PenPal Schools, 2020). It is a tool that enables creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, and discussion through global-citizenship centred project-based learning (PenPal Schools, 2020). It allows students (8 and older) to connect with other similar aged learners from different countries and cultures through “thoughtfully designed, collaborative projects” on a variety of subjects including Literacy, Social Studies, English/Language Arts, Science, Math, Music, Art, Spanish, Environmentalism, Social Justice, Current Events, Cultures, Civilizations, Virtual Reality and much more (Wilson, 2018; PenPal Schools, 2020). In 2015, President Barack Obama said PenPal Schools was one of the world’s leading social enterprises (Wilson, 2018)!  The program also received a “Top Pick for Learning” award in 2018 from Common Sense Education (PenPal Schools, 2020). 

How It Works

Learners participate in “self-guided, differentiated and mixed media” lessons based on the topic of their or their teacher’s choosing which are “fun and dynamic” and motivate students to stay engaged (Wilson, 2018). Students are tasked with reading and analyzing non-fiction texts, watching videos, sharing ideas to an audience of peers, collaborating using technology, and building empathy, curiosity, and respect (PenPal Schools, 2020). This is motivating for students as there is an obvious and relevant meaning to all of the lessons on PenPal Schools: being able to connect with new people in different places and hear about their experiences/worldview is key to becoming an educated global and digital citizen. I really love the global citizenship emphasis of this web app. The lessons present opportunities for learning and practicing essential skills within the areas of reading, writing, digital citizenship, and social-emotional skills while aligning with “Common Core, TEKS and IB international standards” (PenPal Schools, 2020). While these are American standards, the personalizable nature of the BC Curriculum allows for many connections between the curriculum and the website content to be made.

Photo by Vladislav Klapin on Unsplash

Steps To Create A PenPal Schools Classroom (PenPal Schools, 2020)

1. The teacher creates the online classroom on the PenPal Schools website.
2. Students are invited through a unique classroom code.
3. Students go to PenPal Schools website through that code to create a profile. 
4. Students choose (or are guided by their teacher in choosing) a project topic and style. Styles include research, exploring careers, service projects, and connecting with community groups and businesses.
5. After choosing their project topic, students collaborate with other penpals from around the world on module lessons that include a discussion question, a video, and informative text (all offered at beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels for different learners). They get to share ideas with a global audience. Students include evidence from lessons and from personal experience. There is always a “great answer” shown as an example so students know what an effective discussion post looks like.
6. Next, students can read and respond to their penpals (all posts are in English unless the teacher sets a different language for the class). Students can provide feedback for other comments they like by giving badges such as “awesome answer,” “funny,” “inspiring,” “personal,” and many more. This gives them an opportunity to reflect on their own writing and practice digital citizenship skills like reviewing and reading opinions that may be different than their own. Answers with the most positive reviews rise to the top of the discussion board so more people will see them (motivating).
7. There is also an option to create an “original project” that uses videos, visuals, and/or animations charts. Students can share these projects with peers around the world in Penpal Project Showcases. 
8. Teachers can preview lessons from a student perspective to vet them, reset student passwords, monitor student progress, and provide private feedback. Reading, writing digital citizenship, social/emotional skills and more can be assessed on the website itself.

Photo by Thomas Russell on Unsplash

The App’s Connection to the Principles of Multimedia Learning (Mayer, 2005, p. 8-9)

• Collaboration principle: People can learn better with collaborative online learning activities
  • Using PenPal Schools, students collaborate and share their own ideas with their peers across the world.
• Modality principle: People learn better from graphics and narration than from graphics and printed text
  • The use of videos in the PenPal Schools program helps students learn from graphics and narration.
• Segmenting principle:  People learn better when a multimedia message is presented in learner-paced segments rather than as a continuous unit
  • The lessons in PenPal Schools are learner-paced and self-guided as they are project-based.
• Personalization principle: People learn better when the words of a multimedia presentation are in conversational style rather than formal style
  • Students discuss important topics in a conversational and anecdotal style; this helps anchor their learning to authentic experiences.
• Guided discovery principle: People learn better when guidance is incorporated into discovery-based multimedia environments
  • Teachers can guide their students towards a project but then allow them to discover ideas within that topic.
• Worked examples principle: People learn better when they receive worked examples in initial skill learning
  • Each discussion question is accompanied by an example of “excellent student work” to guide the learners. 
• Self-explanation principle: People learn better when they are encouraged to generate self-explanations during learning
  • Students relate the topics to their own experiences while summarizing the topics in their own way.
• Feedback principle: People learn better from multimedia lessons when they receive explanative feedback on their performance
  • Teachers are able to give feedback to their learners on each part of their project. Additionally, peers can provide each other with feedback.
• Coherence principle: People learn better when extraneous material is excluded rather than included
  • Depending on the topic that a learner is guided to or chooses, any extraneous information will not be present. PenPal Schools lets them focus on the topic at hand.

Photo by Tatiana on Unsplash

Evaluation, Safety, and Cost

Click here to see my own annotated evaluation of PenPal Schools based on the University of Western Ontario Evaluation Rubric for an eLearning tool (Anstey & Watson, 2018). Serious concerns for PenPal Schools that are elaborated on in my rubric include “mobile access,” “mobile and desktop functionality differences,” and “offline access.”

Photo by Sergey Zolkin on Unsplash

PenPal Schools requires only the student’s first name and last initial and they must be invited by a teacher to join. No email address is needed and the location is never shared (other than the student’s country). The PenPal Schools team moderates every post sent in the community and parents can create an account to monitor all messages as well as the teacher. There are no private/direct messages and students can only see posts from peers within 2 years of their age. If personal or inappropriate information is shared, it is usually flagged by other students within minutes and then the teacher and PenPal Schools team can take it down. In addition to these safety measures, teachers are provided with the “21st Century Toolkit” lessons/training on “protecting personal information, cyberbullying, empathy and international mindedness, healthy discussion habits, safe searching skills, digital reputation management and more” to teach their students how to contribute to the community forum respectfully (PenPal Schools, 2020). 

Here is an infographic from PenPal Schools that explains their emphasis on safety. Despite these rigorous safety measures, the website is hosted in America so I do not know if/how much that changes the sharing rules and policies.

After reading a rundown on FIPPA from the University of Western Ontario, I believe PenPal Schools is FIPPA compliant (University of Western Ontario, 2006). However, if I were wanting to use this tool in my own classroom with real learners, I would definitely go to my admin or district tech coordinators as recommended by SD 61 District Vice-Principal Jon Hamlin and SD 79 District Instructional Technology Coordinator Lisa Read, for peace of mind in regards to FIPPA compliance and informed consent as I am not an expert in any legal matter (McCue, 2020a&b, June 10). 

Photo by Christine Roy on Unsplash

Finally, the cost. Any educator can join PenPal Schools for free and upon joining they receive some classroom credits which can be used to enroll their class in a topic (eg/ social justice, math, art). If you refer another teacher to PenPal Schools, you can receive more credits. In order to have unlimited access to the plethora of PenPal Schools topics, “schools can purchase annual site licenses to provide their teachers with unlimited access from $2900-$4900 per year depending on the size of the school, with discounts available for multi-year or multi-school licenses” (PenPal Schools, 2020). For lower-income communities or schools with greater needs, scholarships are available from the company upon successful application. 

References

Anstey, L. M. & Watson, G. P.L. Rubric for eLearning Tool Evaluation copyright 2018 Centre for Teaching and Learning, Western University http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Mayer, R. E. (2005). Introduction to Multimedia Learning. In R. E. Mayer (Author), The Cambridge Handbook of Multimedia Learning (p. 8-9). New York, NY: University of Cambridge.

McCue, R. (2020a, June 10). Jon Hamlin SD 61: Evaluating Educational Technologies [Mp3]. https://soundcloud.com/rich-mccue/edci-337-jon-hamlin-sd-61-interview-v2

McCue, R. (2020b, June 10). Lisa Read SD 79: Evaluating Educational Technologies [Mp3]. https://soundcloud.com/rich-mccue/interview-with-lisa-read-district-instructional-technology-coordinator-sd-79

PenPal Schools. 2020. A Global Project Based Learning Community. (n.d.). Retrieved June 13, 2020, from https://www.penpalschools.com/index.html

Troyen, J. 2020. How much does PenPal Schools cost? Retrieved from https://support.penpalschools.com/en/articles/2143008-how-much-does-penpal-schools-cost

University of Western Ontario. (June 2006). FIPPA Basics, Reviewed November 2018. https://www.uwo.ca/univsec/privacy/fippa_basics.html

Wilson, L. (2018, May 03). Everything You Need To Know To Get Started With PenPal Schools. Retrieved June 13, 2020, from https://hundred.org/en/articles/everything-you-need-to-know-to-get-started-with-penpal-schools