Today’s debaters are highly technical in their approach to research, reading, and writing. A part of the success of the Duval UDL stems from engaging coaches, students, judges, and parents in an eLearning experience to reinforce speech and build independent study outside of the classroom. League administrators spend several hours online throughout the week and on weekends using technology to share files, speech and debate techniques. Virtual learning creates new methods of discovery that enhance elements of historical research, ethics, art, self-reflection, writing, speaking, and collaboration.
ONLINE CLASSROOMS REINFORCE DEBATE
Thanks to an innovative collaboration between Duval UDL sponsors young debaters are engaging in “virtual debates” by building group conversations around images, documents, and video. This unprecedented approach to learning speech and debate, critical thinking, and peer-to-peer engagement is a first time model worth replication at debate programs throughout the world.
At DUDL we help youth elevate their voice by providing a secure collaborative platform designed for the K-12 academic environment. Using one simple tool, educators and students can collaborate around almost any type of media via voice, text, webcam and drawing commentary, all within a secure environment. Access to the network is restricted to k-12 educators, students and administrators, ensuring safe and secure classroom collaboration.
The virtual eLearning system is excellent to engage students and teachers for collaboration and sharing ideas with classrooms anywhere in the world. Students are encouraged to record their observations and responses to art, history, language arts and self-published literary works.
Only students, educators and people automatically “invited” by educators can share in the experience to protect the experience of the end users. Students can work autonomously in school and out. They can create their own voice threads, maintain their own portfolio of content, create their own identities, build their own contact list of fellow students and send out safe invitations to engage comments.
