Home from school sick? Use Skype to stay connected…

My technology integration friends and I have been using Skype to stay connected for the better part of 2 years now. We use the chat feature, the FREE calling, and on occasion even do video calls. At several conferences last year Mary Marotta and I showed teachers and other technology leaders how to use Skype in schools for virtual field trips in conjunction with Google Earth, interviews with “real world experts”, or to bring quality Professional Development to districts that can’t afford to bring in an expert. We’ve even talked about how Skype could be used to connect classrooms with students at home sick, or who are out of school on Educational 504 plans. But today for the first time I put it to the test for this very purpose – I used Skype to connect to my own graduate class because I was home sick. My graduate program schedule is a “blended delivery” format. That is, we meet face to face for class once a month and the rest of our interactions and work are done online either through email or our Moodle portal. After a few days of not feeling well I anticipated not being able to attend our 8:30-4:30 Saturday class being taught by Dr. Lee McCanne. His class on Developing Effective Policy & Management Strategies was going to cover information I could really use in my new role as Director of Technology for a non-profit. Also, iin our small cohort of 9 students – no one has missed a class yet and I certainly didn’t want to be first! So, I emailed my professor and asked about the possibility of “Skyping into” the class. Because all of the coursework was uploaded to the Moodle site, and not being passed out on paper, I could download the files, participate in the discussion, and when we turned on the webcam – even see what was going on in during the class. Below you can see a screen shot of my computer during our calls. In the background you can see the Moodle portal, in the foreground you can see my notes taken in Word and to the right you can see the Skype window.

We ended up dividing the day-long course into 3 long phonecalls with minimal interruptions once they gave Dr. McCanne a lapel mic, and I muted my end to minimize the noise generated from typing and saving my work.

Does Skyping into your class defeat the purpose of staying home sick? Maybe… I didn’t get much rest, had to lock myself in the bedroom to get the quiet I needed to be able to concentrate, and drank ~ 3 cups of Theraflu to stay awake and keep my head clear. But the benefits of not having to drive 100 miles, not having spread my germs on everyone else and still being able to get all of the great information I would have missed was a worthwhile compromise to me.

Thank you to Bob Tucker at MESPA and Dr. Lee McCanne and all of my classmates in the 2008 IT Cohort for making this possible. I think we all got to see Skype really being put to the test today… it makes me feel better to know first-hand that it can be used effectively as a tool to stay connected even when you’re home sick.