Wakelet - A curation tool with endless possibilities!

What is it?

Wakelet is a free content storage platform that allows users to save, organize, and share that same content across the Internet. You can save any content you find on the Internet: articles, videos, social media posts, podcasts, images, notes, any digital content, etc.

Wakelet also allows you to collaborate with others (e.g., your students) on group collections to share ideas, inspiration and knowledge.

How does it work?

The Rivière-du-Nord (Quebec) School Service Center has a page on its google teacher support site, EduTic Support, entirely dedicated to the Wakelet tool. It features a set of video tutorials by Alexandra Coutlée.

- Wakelet: presentation

- Creating a collection

In this video, Alexandra Coutlée discusses the options for customizing a collection, adding items, editing item descriptions and images, organizing items in a collection, and changing the layout of a collection.

- Collaborating with Wakelet

In this video, Alexandra Coutlée discusses different ways to collaborate with Wakelet such as : inviting colleagues or students to collaborate in a list; inviting through a link; inviting through a code or QR code (possible even if we don't have an account) and inviting directly through email.

- Collaborative Spaces

In this new video, Alexandra Coutlée discusses peer-to-peer or student-to-student collaborative spaces, classroom or student-to-student opportunities, and peer-to-peer sharing (and much more!).

N.B.: You can find, on EduTic Support, other videos such as Creating a Wakelet Account; Setting up and customizing your Wakelet profile; Organizing your public collections on your profile; Sharing your Wakelet collections; Wakelet and Screencastify; Wakelet Chrome Extension. You'll also find guides for teachers.

Goodie: Alexandra Coutlée's video "How to make a classroom podcast with Wakelet"

For what uses?

- Goh Kok Ming

Primary school teacher in Malaysia, Goh Kok Ming offers us, in a article from the Wakelet blog, some examples of using the platform to design lessons with Ruben Puentedura's SAMR model.

Example 1

Example 2

- Martha Bongiorno

Martha Bongiorno, Media Technology and Education teacher (Fulton County Schools, US), offers several ideas for using Wakelet. Here are a few.

• Student portfolios: use Wakelet as an alternative to Google Sites
Project-based learning: organize resources for your students for a specific project, as an introduction to a project, or have students organize their own resources and share them with you/peers.
• Hands-on math reviews: have students choose a math concept, gather how-to videos from Khan Academy or YouTube, and then rank them in order, with notes of explanation, based on which was easiest to hardest to understand.
• Parent Newsletters: create a collection of resources, homework help, links to web pages, etc.

My thoughts on Wakelet

In the end Wakelet proves to be more than just a curation tool, it's also a fantastic collaboration tool in a classroom. Students can organize their research and learning materials, create portfolios of their accomplishments, present their assignments and work, and most importantly, collaborate with their peers.

In fact, I invite you to put its use in perspective with Margarida Romero's (2015) Five Levels of ICT Use.

Another interesting point is the possibility offered to non-registered individuals to participate as "contributors" via the creation of a code. This will allow them to add content found on the Internet and will additionally have access to the additions of other contributors. However, they will not be able to delete or modify another person's additions.

- Gérald TIROT -

Sources