Kim’s Ventures in Educational Technology

I recently came across a site called “Scriblink – Your Online Whiteboard“. This site allows you to invite people to participate via a long distance phone call, VOIP, or via a URL. I created a test session at http://www.scriblink.com/index.jsp?act=phome&roomid=5218&KEY=06F31C8729790 DD1CF8D347D14450E7E that you are welcome to click on to see the setup.

If you click on the ∏ (Pi) symbol you can access special math, symbols and characters. I tried to do this but could not get the special characters or symbols to embed in the whiteboard. You can upload images and have those embedded in the whiteboard as well.

The colors of the writing pen and pencil can be changed along with the thickness of each instrument. The background can also be changed and they have great choices to choose from. I couldn’t find a way to find a softer color as most of the colors for the background are very bright and wouldn’t be conducive in many collaboration sessions.

This has potential for classrooms that don’t have a whiteboard or if you wanted students to collaborate on one document/whiteboard area. You could also collaborate with colleagues online and use the URL for everyone to get together for a meeting. There are some exciting possibilities here despite the one bug that I encoutered. Overall, it is definitely worth checking out and giving it a trial run.

As I was reading the Twitter posts from people I follow, Justin Reeve, author of the “Insights into Educational Technology” blog, submitted a post about Dabbleboard. I decided to check it out and was so glad that I did! Often times I had said to myself that I wish there was a way to show someone on the internet how to do some type of process, demonstration, diagram or facilitate an activity on a virtual whiteboard. Dabbleboard is one such tool.

When drawing a diagram using Dabbleboard, you can use the mouse to draw a circle or rectangle and Dabbleboard automatically converts the object to a typical diagram object. Use can also use the freehand tools to draw objects as well. You can resize and move objects as well as add text anywhere in the diagram by clicking in the whitespace and typing. I created a very basic diagram to demo some of the features of Dabbleboard below.

Make sure you click on the diagram image. It will take you to the public link (hopefully since the link was associated with my email). While there, manipulate a few of the objects and try some of the the tools. I tried several images of the screenshot but haven’t been able to find one that doesn’t look blurry to me. Anway, the resolution of the actual Dabbleboard diagram is much better.

The main feature that I liked is the ability to share the diagram created. I haven’t played with the feature yet but from the video tour it appears that several people can collaborate, edit and view the same diagram. You can import objects into the workspace for additional collaboration.

One think I had to remember was to click on the object to activate the selection handles to move or resize. Overall, this is a great free tool that I will definitely use with students and when collaborating with colleagues. I see endless opportunities to use this tool. Thanks Justin for sharing!