Skype Guest Speakers in K-12 Education

By:  JasonItec

Two major barriers that exist in bringing students together with people who can contribute to lesson discussions are distance and time. An online tool that can easily bring guest speakers into the classroom or distance learning environment is Skype. With Skype, the speaker can avoid the burden of missing work and traveling to a school building in order to share their knowledge and experience. Skype, a free online video conferencing platform, can bring people together with live audio and video anywhere a laptop with a webcam and microphone will go.

A class lesson on Roman engineering and architecture would really benefit from having a professional speaker dissect the talking points and share real world experience. With a program such as Skype, making that happen is much easier. The professional speaker, from anywhere in the world, would only need to log in, connect with the classroom, and share their experience and ideas. Skype’s website has tools and ideas for teachers to find and bring scientists, inventors, historians, and other professionals right into the classroom in real time.

This type of communication eliminates the need for travel time and makes scheduling possible, especially for busy professionals.

Also, Skype has partnered with museums and zoos to help teachers easily make connections and bring their students on virtual field trips without leaving the school. For schools, Skype offers and ad-free version, so classes can have a more streamlined educational experience. As Skype expands its educational front, these opportunities for teachers should also grow and basically put the world at the fingertips of classes all over the world.