Are They Paying Attention?

Remember that scene in the movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" where the economics teacher, played by Ben Stein, is asking his students questions followed by the line, "Anyone?...Anyone?..." It's the classic image of students that are NOT engaged. Hopefully your students are not as bored as his seem to be. (Side note: Boredom might actually be bad for your health.)

In "standard lecture mode" a teacher asks a question. One student responds while the others wait their turn. Some may be listening, but it's a sure bet that others are not. How do you get 100% of your class engaged and participating in the discussion?

Here's one way - WallWisher.com. With this tool, you can post a question or discussion item on a wall and all students can participate by adding a sticky note to the wall. Comments are limited to 160 characters. If you're in a computer lab or your kids have computers, you can do this in class and students can see their responses right away. You can also assign it to be done outside of class on their home computer. Walls can be shared between classes, schools, cities, states, countries. It's the Internet so this thing could even go global if you want.

How does it work? Watch the video below.