Show and Tell for Parents
Search Site: 
Parents Teachers
By Susan Darst Williams
Parental Involvement
Ages & Stages
Coaching Your Child
Discipline & Safety
Health, Nutrition & Fitness
Homework Helpers
Reading
Writing
Math
Curriculum & Instruction
Teachers & Teaching
Other School Staff
Testing
Technology
Special Learners
School Management
Finance & Taxation
Government & Politics
Preschool
Private Schools
Homeschooling
Choice & Charters
Learning on the Go
Community Involvement
Controversies
Education Heroes
Bright Ideas for Change
Site Map
Mini-Grants

Parental Involvement Lite

Parents, Kids & Books

Great Books for Kids

Character Education

Writing Tips

Inspiration

Wacky Protests

School Humor
Home | Purpose | Ask A Question | Subscribe | Forward | Bio | Contact | Print

Technology        < Previous        Next >

 

 

Using Voicemail As a Teaching Tool

 

Q. What are some examples of creative and cost-effective uses of technology that teachers have developed?

 

Voicemail has been an increasingly important communication tool for schools, useful in emergency contacts such as school closing alerts, digital messaging, homework notification, and student and teacher absenteeism purposes.

 

But a small, private K-12 school in Baton Rouge, La., has found a unique, educational use for voicemail as well, that has helped in more ways than one.

 

Teachers at the Episcopal School there still do not have telephones in their classrooms. But the administration wanted to give them immediate access to their voicemail messages throughout the school day.

 

Previously, they had to wait in line in the teacher's lounge to check their phone messages, or a parent would have to go through the school secretary to get a message to a teacher. That wasn't the best communication procedure, especially since it interrupted the secretary throughout the day, and annoyed parents and others if there were urgent messages from parents or co-workers waiting for so many hours in the voice mailbox.

 

But having access to a telephone in the classroom could be disruptive.

 

Instead, the school used a unified messaging system called CallXpress, that allows any kind of messages - voice, email and fax - to be available, silently, on the teacher's classroom computer.

 

Now, a teacher can send homework immediately via fax or email to a parent who has just called in on behalf of a sick child, instead of waiting until the child returns to school or making the parent drive to the school to pick up the homework.

 

And the teacher can confirm a parent's messages throughout the day, such as authorization for their child to go home after school with another child.

 

Best of all, the school's foreign language teachers have found a unique application for CallXpress. Each language teacher is assigned 10 message boxes to record dialogue or vocabulary words for the students. The students can call the number, listen to the messages, and then respond with their answers by voicemail.

 

Since listening to words in a foreign language is a crucial way to learn that language, the use of voicemail is an intelligent innovation.

 

Homework: Read the whole story on:

 

www.avst.com/case_study/Episcopal_School_Reduces_Strain_on_Voice_Mail_with_AVST_CallXpress.asp

 

 

By Susan Darst Williams www.ShowandTellforParents.com Technology 06 © 2010

Technology        < Previous        Next >
^ return to top ^
Individuals: read and share these features freely!

Publications: please contact ShowandTellforParents.com to arrange for reprint rights to these copyrighted news stories and features.

Mini-Grants


 Links to Learn More 

 Enrichment Ideas 

 Nebraska Schooling 
DailySusan
 Humor Blog 
DailySusan
 Glimpses of God 
Copyright © 2024 ShowandTellforParents.com
Website created by Web Solutions Omaha