What does working in a school-based social network like http://youthvoices.net have to do with getting ready for college? Chris Sloan had a great idea. “Why don’t we invite former students who used Youth Voices and who are now in college to Skype in with their thoughts about what college is like these days … and if Youth Voices maybe does or doesn’t fit with what they are doing now?”

Two of Chris’s former students joined us on this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers. Here’s Chris’s more detailed introduction to this week’s podcast:

It’s that time of year again when the seniors I teach are in that bittersweet time; they’re happy to be moving on but sad to leave some things behind.  They’re distracted by plans for the future but also trying to live up to their many commitments.  As their teacher I often wonder whether the things we do in my classes has value, if I’ve prepared them enough for “life after high school.”  So I thought it might be an interesting idea to catch up with some of our former students to see how their first year is wrapping up.  Was college all they dreamed it would be?  Is it better than they imagined? not quite as good?  Did the kind of work they did on Youth Voices, the digital compositions and the collaborative writing, prepare them for the kinds of things they’ve been asked to do this year in college? Judging by the 2010 Horizon Report, I think we’re on the right track, but there’s only one way to find out. 

Here are a couple of Youth Voices alumni who join us on this podcast: Last year Katie appeared a couple of times on TTT, first as part of a discussion about the seniors’ plans for college, TTT 134, Four Young Bloggers Apply to College where she said things like: “I don’t think that as an 18-year old in college, it’s a life or death situation about whether you’ll be successful or not.  The college application process is a stressful thing, but you have to keep it in perspective.”  Katie also appeared on TTT 130, which was an extension of the Youth Voices discussion, “YES WE CAN: my experience in Grant Park on election day.”

We were also joined by Jimin who blogs regularly at Crunchgear in addition to being a student at NYU.  Last year Jimin wrote posts like  All Your Intellectual Property Are Belong to Us, It’s Not Fair, It’s Laissez-Faire!, and used Youth Voices as another way to promote his band Illegal Beagle.

Click Read more to see a copy of the chat that was happening during the webcast.

On this episode of Teachers Teaching Teachers, we talk about important changes (improvements, we hope) that we’ve been making to our Drupal site for students, Youth Voices.  We invited teachers who are using Youth Voices this year. Listen to find out what how they are planning to use this social networking site with their students this coming year.

Youth Voices is much more than a web site. It is a community of teachers, working together to concoct a collaborative curriculum that supports our students in peer-to-peer online discussion. Chris Sloan, Paul Allison, and Susan Ettenheim started working together on this project in 2003. As we begin the 2009-2010 school year, we are excited to invite you and many more teachers into this work.

We are in the process of making several important changes to Youth Voices. Here are a couple:

• Collaborative Curriculum: http://youthvoices.net/curriculum — We’re building it now. Join us!
• The guides http://youthvoices.net/guides have been updated, organized… and there is more work needed here.
• There are now three main ways for students to add Discussions to the site - See under Add a Discussion.

There is more! But that’s probably enough for now. Please enjoy this podcast. It's one of our "staff meeting" podcasts where we make public the planning that used to be done in private. If you are interested, we would love to work with you and your students this year. Just join the site, and let us know.

Click Read more to see a transcript of a chat that was happening during the webcast.

Susan Ettenheim and Paul Allison welcome colleagues Ron Link (NYC Writing Project), Gail Desler (Area 3 Writing Project in California), and Fred Hass (Boston Writing Project) for a conversation about collaboration, publishing, and building a responsive community of students, mainly within our work together on Youth Voices.

Please listen to how we talk to each other, then plan to join us in the future.

Click Read more to see a transcript of a chat that was happening during the webcast.