Classroom SalonClassroom Salon is one of a kind learning tool. Designed around the concept of a salon, it elegantly combines the groups, documents, videos and users into a vibrant learning community. Salon is the most complete deep discussion developed. Salon is built on the principles of social cognitive theory that we learn best by observing what others do and not do. It is the only tool that taps into the collective intelligence of a group like no other. Salon provides number of management tools to instructors such as activity graphs, assignment controls etc. Salon is also the best tool for implementing flipped classrooms Salon Facts
Salon Use CasesEncourage Social Reading:Perhaps the simplest use of Salon. Post documents, assign reading, control when students see others annotations. Measure student participation. Lead class discussions based on "hotspots". Listen to how several teachers discuss the use of classroom salon. Flipped Classrooms: One of the best tools to implement a flipped classroom. Post youtube or vimeo videos. Embed your own comments and questions (optional). Track where students are commenting and prepare your presentations based on analytics. Listen to Aaron Sams, the founder of Flipped Learning Network talk about Flipped Classrooms at TRETC. Writing Classrooms: Students can post writings to salon and teachers or other students can provide location based comments to improve writings. Listen to Prof. David Kaufer discuss Classroom Salon. Reading Classrooms: Listen how Prof. Miles McCrimmon used Salon for his reading classes. QuickstartIt is easy to get started with Salon. Few quick steps.Student InstructionsJoining your class salon is a 2-step processSTEP 1 - Create a classroom salon account using the code: popcity: Click Here to create an account. STEP 2 - Join the salon i. use the salon URL sent by your instructor OR ii. search for the salon using this link. Use the name or partial name to find the salon Validating instructor accountsSTEP 1 - Create an Account:Classroom Salon is free to non-profit education community. If you are NOT a teacher or student please DO NOT USE the following information. Please send email to: classroom-salon AT andrew.cmu.edu with your request and we will create a special account for you. It is a violation of our user policy to illegally create accounts. ----- If you are an instructor create a teacher account using the registration code: cmu Send email to classroom-salon AT andrew.cmu.edu to validate your account and identify your school affiliation. ---- Students can use the code popcity to create their own account and you can share salon URL so they can join your salon. . Instructor accounts receive access to student analytics and can also create salon accounts and enroll students into their salons. Instructors will also receive the latest updates to Salon. If you already have a salon account, Send email to : classroom-salon@andrew.cmu.edu to change your account to instructor(optional). Watch the short video on how to create an account Click Here to View the Video STEP 2 - Create or Join a Salon: If you are an instructor/salon moderator, you may want to create a new salon. Otherwise, your instructor/salon moderator may have shared a salon link with you. Simply click on the link and join. If the salon is private, you will have to wait for the approval. If the salon is public you will be immediately enrolled into Salon. Watch the short video. Click Here to View the Video STEP 3 - Invite Students - The best way for your students to join salon is, ask them to create their salon account with registration code: popcity Then share the salon link with them so they can join your salon. Click Here to View the Video STEP 4 - Add Documents or videos to Salon - Salon is all about conversation around documents and videos. Add documents or Add Videos to Salon. STEP 5 - Participating in a Salon: Salon is about community participation through annotations. You participate in Salons through documents or videos that are posted to your salon. You highlight documents, comment on specific sections, respond to other comments, join a discussion etc. You comment on videos as you watch them. Video comments are tied to exact location of the video so each comment can be interpreted easily. You can also respond to global questions and "like" someone's answer to a question. No matter how big or how small your contribution is, it is *important* for each person to participate and create knowledge. Then we all will benefit from the collective intelligence of our salon and its users. Watch the short video. Click Here to View the Video STEP 6 - Viewing Comments: Salon is about transparency. If we all do our part (say 10 minutes of commenting) then collectively we have accomplished a lot. Viewing document hotspots (where most people pay attention) and reading comments from specific users is a novel aspect in salon. We learn a lot by observing what others do and do not do. You can also filter comments by user or tags to isolate specific comments(for example tag that says "I dont understand this part"). Salon view mode allows filtering and viewing document and user analytics like no other. This is the promise of Salon view mode. Watch the short video. Click Here to View the Video STEP 7 - Using the Dashboard: Salon dashboard is unique. It is one place you can see a summary of all annotations, most active users in salon, the timeline of comments and views, who got the most helpful votes etc. Dashboard allows you to find others you may find knowledgable. "following" the people you respect intellectually can help you grow. Watch the short video. Click Here to View the Video STEP 8 - Using Discussion Navigator: Salon sends a 2-hour digest to when comments are made by salon users. With the digest you can access discussion navigator(DN). Discussion navigator is carefully designed to support "deep" discussions in the context of the document. STEP 9 - Activity Graphs: Use Salon page to see all activities in your class. Export activity reports and filter activities by users and documents to see more finer analytics. You can grade participation now. There is no need to wonder if the students did the work or not. It is all there and will inform you about how students think like no other. Frequently Asked Questions
Salon vs other platformsThere are many platforms that are effectively used by educators. Course management systems, google docs, and voice thread are some examples. Classroom Salon has some things common with these platforms and some things that are very different. The main strength of salon is its "context-centric" annotation system and its ability to generate analytics from "hot spots". Salon can generate user and document hotspots (semantic and spatial) like no other platform. Salon uses user and document hotspots to streamline communication and deepen the understanding of content. With its discussion navigator, salon allows a discussion to continue in the "context" for many levels to bring semantics to the document. Salon video annotation tool allow users to focus on exactly the locations that other users find interesting. In other words a 1-hour video can be successfully compressed to 15-min highlight video. Salon also allows exporting all annotation data so educators can do more analysis.
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