Google sites and oral history projects: Connecting school to community

Abstract

Sitting in my College of Education’s faculty meeting at the end of a semester, an education technology colleague invited us all to consider how we could collaborate among and across departments. He encouraged us to create ways to connect our content areas to innovate research projects. I pondered this thought and remembered that I had recently agreed to partner with a local high school teacher on an oral history project. My university students and her high schools students would form groups and meet in an online space to (a) get to know one another and talk about high school/post high school plans, (b) discuss a common book they would all read and (c) share ideas about an oral history project in which they chose focus questions relating to the book to explore lived experiences of a community member through the stories they told. My technology skills were limited and I knew having another colleague to brainstorm ideas could enhance the project. He recommended I use Google Sites to foster interactions between university and high school students. I spoke with the high school teacher who recommended we be in contact with the school librarian and district offi ce about such an endeavor. And so the project commenced (First author journal notes).