Web 2.0 in Early Childhood Education

Top 10 Web 2.0 Tools for Young Learners
by Chris Riedel, 02/02/09


In this article, Riedel reports the findings of Gail Lovely, an education technology consultant.  She lists the top ten most useful Web 2.0 tools for children to be used in the classroom.  This list was primarily composed of communication tools including Wikis, Skype, Voicethread, Yack Pack, Voki, Blogs, etc.  There were also animation sites like Kerproof, Create-a-Graph, Animoto and Glogster.  For use in early childhood education classrooms,   I love the idea of using Kerproof and Animoto for class discussion to incorporate movies, create class characters, or show pictures to aid the lesson.  Create-a-graph would also be a great tool if the class were to do surveys of classmate's or family's favorite color and report findings.  I believe that creating a visual aid could really help students see similarities and patterns or understand the concept of percents.  There are so many possibilities to incorporate these tools for children who are just being introduced to technology and help them be comfortable around using the tools at an early age.  They could even use Voki to begin to associate letters with sounds and learn to read or spell.  To keep families in the loop and encourage that children practice  using technology with their family at home as much as possible, it would be incredibly useful to have a class Wiki or Blog where parents could get information, contact the teacher, and contribute/respond to class discussions.  There are endless possibilities to incorporate these tools into lessons, as well as connecting to the families of the class and creating a community of involvement.