How do you find partners? How do you communicate? Any ePals users here?
120+ Turkish teachers have submitted profiles in 2011! (All seek English speakers.)
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
COMMUNICATE
COLLABORATE
COMMUNICATE
Enterprise-grade, cloud email and communications specifically designed for K12. Robust policies set by the school govern all communications and manage access to third-party learning applications.
COLLABORATE
Social learning environment for community and collaboration. Designed for project-based learning and group collaboration in virtual workspaces across a full suite of safe social media tools.
LEARN
Curriculum-based literacy program matches students with e-mentors to enhance reading, writing and critical thinking skills. First in a series of learning applications built on the ePals platform.
CREATE
Provides partners with access to ePals education cloud platform capabilities, enabling them to rapidly build and deploy policy-managed, collaborative, next generation learning applications surfaced on the SchoolSafe desktop.
Connecting 700,000 classrooms in 200 countries & territories 2,500+ new schools/month Policy managed and Teacher supervised Trusted pipeline to the worlds classrooms TRUSTe certification
ePals Brings Next-Generation Solutions to Schools free -- students and their teachers locate, connect with and work collaboratively with another class free -- secure online communication for students, parents, teachers and administrators, instant translation in 58 languages. Problem word filter and ability to control how widely students can send/receive email.
Integrated with
students
state-wide portal
Opportunity of 850k
students
14
Partners
One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) (on all desktops, third world countries) Intel Classmate PC (designed for K-6 students, widely used in Portugal and other countries) * Ministry of Education, Kenya * LEAP, Thailand * Eduteka, Latin America, 75,000 teachers and Spanish-language content
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
Waterloo Junior High School in Waterloo, IL, USA is part of the Globally Connected World!
Your school can be also. It is just a Snap!
Bill Theobald
32 Years at Waterloo Junior High School in Waterloo, IL, USA 6th Grade Social Studies Boys Basketball (24 years) Girls Volleyball (30 years) Old Dog who learned some New Tricks! Im not a techie!
th 6
Grade Keypals
6th Grade Encore students have Keypals in Canada Ms. Pat Cone, Hafford School, Hafford, Saskatchewan, Canada
My wife and I visited the Degrassi family in Italy after several years of collaborating through ePals!
th 8
Grade Keypals
8th grade students have Keypals in Pointe a Pitre, Guadeloupe, French West Indies. Professors Lucienne Zecler and Lena Racon teach English as a Second Language, College Front de Mer, Pointe a Pitre, Guadeloupe, French West Indies
Teacher Forum: Post looking for more partners for Bangladesh schools
School: EMEIF "Terezinha do Menino Jesus Porto Wu" Town: Santa Branca State: Sao Paolo Country: Brazil
The School in Brazil -How does it look like ours? -How does it look different?
Our square is being rebuilt. See how our town is a hilly place!
Collaboration across the Digital Divide: New York Students and their ePals in Botswana
A story of global connections that transcend socioeconomic status, culture and place.
These teachers have worked together for eight years.some projects are just a few weeks or months!
Not one more thing -- but a new way of advancing learning goals
Spelling or vocabulary words homework
You assign to write in sentences Instead, include words in an email to a partner
Students get extra credit for posting a response to a question in the Student Forum Encourage students to read in the Student Forums on topics that interest them
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
Search by Map
Select a continent
Select a Country
Translation to 58 languages!
Most common languages listed first Less common languages listed second Both in alphabetical order This is an expansion as of late June 2009 from eight languages
Project Forums make it easier to find matches for ePals projects Teacher Forums for topics you generate Parent Forums to help parents learn from other parents Adults can post in adult forums; students in Student Forum
Student Forums
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
Multiple levels of filtering Teachers can get copies for alternative assessment Translation to 58 languages
SchoolMail usernames
Student: LindaS@maine.epals.com Teacher: LSanchez@maine.epals.com
No extra charge for custom subdomain as maine.epals.com in district with 10,000+ st.
Use existing names or we create them Roles and responsibilities assigned Batch upload from SIS (49K students in 2+ hours)
Filter Levels
Level 1 All messages must be approved by the monitor, whether they contain profanity or not. Messages containing profanity must be approved by the monitor, but unflagged messages will reach their recipients automatically. The monitor will also receive a copy of every unflagged message. Messages containing profanity must be approved by the monitor, but unflagged messages will reach their recipients automatically. The monitor will not see unflagged messages. All profanity filters are off.
Level 2
Level 3
Level 4
School
District
and.
Internet
Role-Based Permissions
Each user is assigned a role in their LearningSpace community (student, teacher, parent, administrator). Policies determine whether a role can create groups, view connections, and invite groups to collaborate. A policy can be set to manage student interaction with other members of your LearningSpace community. High school students may not be able to view profiles or request connections with K-5 students, unless they are in the same group.
Controlled Connections
Content Moderation Written content (blog and forum posts, comments) can be reviewed before publishing or removed afterward by a designated moderator. Inappropriate Language Filters Multiple spellings of inappropriate words written in a blog, comment or message are automatically flagged and removed. Questionable content in emails sent to designated moderator.
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
School-wide setup
We prefer to provision all teachers in your school with accounts, even though only a few may want to start right away. You provide a list of all teachers, and we can create teacher user names. We can upload student names with a batch upload tool and that can create student account names (unless you have names you want to use)
Goals
What is ePals? Stories of collaboration Finding a global partner How to use ePals SchoolMail What are my first steps? More resources and whats new!
http://www.epals.com
Sign up online
Jacky Little, Account Activation jlittle@corp.epals.com Julie Martin, Sales Administrator jmartin@corp.epals.com ePals Customer Fulfillment Team (General Delivery Mailbox) sales@corp.epals.com ePals Support Team (unlimited email support) smsupport@corp.epals.com
ePals
TM LearningSpace
Safely have multiple web 2.0 tools, a digital locker, email, blog, wiki, online portfolio, and much more. Its the next generation of web 2.0 for schools! (safer than Facebook, Ning or Google) 95% e-rate eligible. https://learningspace.epals.com
View 10-minute video Sign up for a webinar Sign up for a 30-day pilot
Open architecture: you can plug in other applications within the safe/secure settings. A school or district purchase. One district has purchased LS to effect a cost savings of $500,000 a year. Items formerly printed and shipped to schools will now be available in their LearningSpace.
Join us!
Twitter: @ePals @RitaOates
Rita Oates, PhD ROates@corp.epals.com www.epals.com