Padlet & Google Docs as a Way to Go Public with Writing

I didn't mean to write two posts about ways to use Padlet in a row, but with the first 6th grade writing celebration of the year, Mrs. Dougherty wanted to find a way for students to share their writing with each other, and padlet.com it was.

Mrs. Dougherty's runs her English classes in Writing Workshop style, and there's a lot of research on the impact of audience on students' writing. So, launching an online space for students to share, comment, inspire, and generally cheer each other on made a lot of sense.

Here's how we set it up so that the wall is both public and private:
From Mrs. Dougherty's end, she created a wall on padlet.com. For settings, she selected:

• Password Protected (so the audience is limited).
• People with the password can write comments (which means that students can post, but can't accidentally delete others' posts)

She also selected the Grid layout so that students didn't accidentally cover up other students' work.

Here's how she asked students to post on the wall:

1. Make a copy of your document (that way, you'll have a 'clean' version that no one has commented on).
   
2. Set the sharing parameters so 'anyone with the link can comment' (that way, people can comment, but no one accidentally changes your writing). 
   
3. Share the link on the padlet wall, putting your name in the top of your comment box.
   

What it means is that all of the grade's writing can be collected in one place, but each individual keeps control over his/her writing. They look like this after inserting the link:

As with the cat photos that I mentioned in another post, this is an internetty activity that requires talking to students about community and community values during launch (i.e. what kind of comments do you want on your writing? What kind of comments are appropriate in this forum? What kind are inappropriate?).