Learning & Leading Through Technology

Backchanneling with Middle Schoolers

Apparently, some of the middle school students I’ve been working with think zombies would make Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Pedestrian” much more interesting. That’s OK—it’s all part of a larger discussion we’ve been having, and I’m thrilled they’re trying to find elements of the text to support their interpretations.

As an assistant professor who focuses on K– 12 tech integration, I’ve been working with seventh grade language arts teacher Jessica Herring at Benton Middle School in Benton, Arkansas, for more than two years.

I designed a backchannel activity for a lesson in critical reading that requires students to share questions about and insights into plot, character development, and alternate endings during a read-aloud. It was made possible by a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) pilot initiative that allowed students to bring internet-enabled personal technology to supplement the classroom set of iPads, which is available for those who couldn’t bring their own personal technology.

A backchannel is a streaming conversation—public or private—that you and your students can have while another activity is going on. You could choose to have a backchannel during a read-aloud or film viewing, or while the teacher delivers a standard lecture.

The point is to encourage a constant flow of discussion.

Because students were using all sorts of devices, the challenge was to find a discussion/collaboration tool that everybody could access regardless of the technology they brought. I decided that TodaysMeet (todaysmeet. com) would best serve the needs of our students.

Student-Friendly Technology

TodaysMeet is simple to use. To set up a class discussion area, just select a name for your room (that name becomes part of the URL for your chat area) and how long you want your backchannel stream to exist. TodaysMeet is free, contains no ads, and is secure because it’s open only to those with the URL.

We chose a complicated URL so it would be difficult for anyone to find unless they had the link, which we shared using a QR code. Students accessed TodaysMeet through a browser on their internet-enabled device and entered an assigned pseudonym or group name so we, but not other students, could track who was making what contributions.

When we first started the activity, I made it clear to the students that they had 30 seconds to send anything, but it had to be appropriate. I explained that posting on the backchannel was like saying something out loud in the classroom. Giving students this trial run allowed them to get the “wazzups” and “w00ts” out of their systems.

Discussions Move to the Backchannel Then it was time to get focused. After our orientation, we did a short read-aloud and watched a video adaptation of the story. During these activities, students offered their thoughts about what motivated the characters in “The Pedestrian.”