This PowerPoint is an educational slideshow on how Skype is currently used in the classroom to help hospitalized children keep up with their schoolwork. It also has tips on how you can help hospitalized children stay in their classroom, virtually.
2. Why I Chose this Topic
The reason I chose this project is because during the second week of
school, I went to the hospital due to my inability to eat food. I stayed there
for 4 days, was kept on an IV for 3 of those days, and went home in the
same condition as when I came there. During my four days there, I was
extremely bored and worried due to the fact that I could not do my
homework or keep up with the class. That meant that when I got back
from the hospital on Sunday night, I had to do all of my homework that I
had, including the homework from the days I had missed, all without
knowing how to do it due to missing the class. About 3 million kids are
hospitalized every year, and I don’t want them to face the same
problems I did.
3. What’s Currently Being Done
Currently, there are only a few options for children in the hospital to keep
up with schoolwork.
They can stay in the hospital and wait to catch up on their work when they get
back to school
They can pick up work from the school and try to do what they can
They can try to work something out with the school so that they can Skype into
class
They can go to a hospital room where you can get tutoring and classes right
from the hospital.
4. What is the Problem with these Solutions?
The problem with these solutions is that the student
might get taught the wrong way, they have to use their own devices
may not understand the concept properly
might have to catch up on 5 days of work in one night
Currently, most students are working something out with their schools, and participating in their
classes via Skype. Also, in case a student is at home, but is not allowed to go to school due to a
sickness and does not have a way to Skype their classrooms, there is a company called
HopeCam that provides Wi-Fi and devices for students with sicknesses unable to go to school
to contact their school and keep up with their education.
5. What I Found
I found that
using Skype to participate in classes from far away is not an uncommon idea.
Teachers use it as a learning tool very often.
Dallas is one of the top 10 US cities using Skype in the classroom.
Many teachers who use Skype in the classroom agree that using Skype to allow sick
students to participate in class is one of the main reasons they use Skype in their classroom.
I was surprised by the fact that many patients/students who spent a lot of time in the
hospital Skyped their class in order to keep up. One example of this is Paige Lento, a 3rd
grader and Juenes Syndrome patient who went to the hospital for a month at a time, twice
a year, who Skyped her classmates whenever she was at the hospital to see what they
were doing in class and to make sure she was on top of things at school.
Another thing that shocked me was how great Skype is for this type of usage. It has a video
chat feature to talk to the class, an instant messaging feature to ask the teacher questions
with, a file share option so that the teacher and patient can transport homework, and a
user-friendly interface so that almost anyone can use it.
6.
7. Asynchronous BlackBerry Technology
One of many resources I found was a study about Asynchronous
BlackBerry Technology connecting sick kids to school. This source gave me
a lot of information about asynchronous tech, like the fact that not all kids
are capable of using technology, but this technique is very effective.
http://www.ryerson.ca/pebbles/publications/asynchronousblackberry.pdf
8. Conclusion/Recommendation
Overall, there are not currently very good ways for hospitalized students to
participate in their classes. The hospital needs to allow for the
communication to take place, the family needs to provide a device and
contact the school to make sure that this can be done, and the
organization is a huge difficulty for everyone.
My recommendations to solve this problem are to
1. Inform nearby hospitals of this idea (allowing patients to Skype their classes)
2. Donate used technology to hospitals to make this idea possible
3. Upon their return, help out the absent student in case they need help
