Wakelet

Tell stories, organize or remix content via digital curation platform

Learning rating

Community rating

Based on 2 reviews

Privacy rating

Expert evaluation by Common Sense

Grades

6–12

Subjects & Skills

Communication & Collaboration, Creativity

Great for

Creating Media, Differentiation, Instructional Design, Media Literacy, Professional Learning

Price: Free
Platforms: Web

Pros: Easily curate and share media/content. Variety of layouts allows for creative displays.

Cons: Lacks two-way communication, tagging, and feedback features. Kids could stumble on or share inappropriate content.

Bottom Line: This tool offers an intuitive and useful way to curate media and make sense of topics, but it lacks some features for feedback and content moderation.

Since Wakelet is geared for curation and sharing, it's versatile enough to use for instructional design, research, story-based learning, and collaboration. Pair it with Flipgrid or Screencastify to design a lesson that lets students interact with content instead of just hearing a lecture or set of instructions. Use it for research: Students can save links to content, take notes, and upload videos from YouTube or Google Drive. Or use it to tell a story: Collect content from all over the web to tell a story about a current or historical event, and have students share collections with their peers and up-vote their favorite resources.

Looking for creative alternatives to traditional assignments? Ditch the busywork and let students use Wakelet as a digital journal where they post content, upload pre-recorded video explainers, add photos, and even add items from Twitter, Adobe Creative Cloud, and more. Instead of the traditional exam or essay, let students submit portfolios to show content mastery.

Finally, consider Wakelet for professional development (PD). Educators share the common frustration of trying to find a way not only to organize content, but to present it to colleagues in meaningful and engaging ways. Delivering PD as a story or series of items to explore can be a fresh way to share information (synchronously or asynchronously) and best practices with colleagues. For even more interaction, consider letting colleagues search for and add their own related content. 

Wakelet is a content curation and sharing platform where teachers and students can save and organize links, social media posts, videos, and images. These collections might tell a story, give directions, deliver lessons, gather research, or encourage collaboration. Collections come in various layouts, such as columns, grids, or mood boards on a scrollable page. These collections can be kept private or shared publicly. They can be viewed on the site, through the mobile app, or shared elsewhere, including on social media. The Media View allows teachers and students to view items without leaving the site.

Teachers can create classroom spaces and use them to share things just with their students, and/or have students create and share their own collections. It's important to check links before assigning a collection to make sure they work, keeping in mind that school filters might prevent students from accessing some material. Wakelet's classroom features are fairly simple. There's no two-way communication or ways to give or receive feedback other than through adding another resource, such as a note or feedback video, to the collection. Be wary that some students might share or come across content that's not school-appropriate, so you'll want to keep a close eye on the collections as they grow.

Since teachers and students can curate content from virtually anywhere, it's easy to design Wakelet collections that promote learning. It helps teachers change up lesson flow, integrating videos, images, notes, and social media posts from their own curricular stash or outside sources. Wakelet also makes it possible to differentiate instruction, providing students with choice and assortments of material that match their needs and abilities. Plus, students can refine their own collections, honing their research and organization skills. Teachers can gain valuable insight into student learning (while preventing plagiarism) by getting students to add descriptions or annotations to their curations. Students can also teach their peers about a topic by creating and sharing collections. 

Wakelet is a little too rooted in content consumption; as a result, it's tough to assess whether or not students are really learning. It'd be great to see Wakelet add some feedback and two-way communication tools to help make collections more dialogic. Massive collections might also be too much for students to process. Therefore, it'd likely be better to limit collections to four to six pieces of solid content at first, and give students a chance to learn about a concept or tell a story with some depth. Also, it's easy to get sidetracked by collections shared by classmates, especially if they're related to celebrities, pop culture, or other topics that stray from curricular objectives. Teachers will want to have a clear strategy to monitor collections, assess learning, and give feedback. 

Learning Rating

Overall Rating
Engagement

Wakelet has a simple, clean design that encourages design and exploration. A lot of engagement depends on the quality and excitement of the content selected by students and teachers.

Pedagogy

If content is effectively arranged to teach a lesson or tell a story clearly, these curated collections can do a lot to enhance student learning. More dialogue and feedback would help push student work forward.

Support

Content variety can help to avoid one-size-fits-all lessons and reach students through multiple modalities, but it's tough to differentiate teacher-created collections. The site has helpful articles and tutorials.

Common Sense reviewer
Marianne Rogowski
Marianne Rogowski Instructional Technology Facilitator

Community Rating

Wakelet, a free app that works on any device - and includes accessibility features - offers seamless options for teachers ( and students age 13+) to collect and curate online resources.

Wakelet allows teachers to gather, organize and share multimedia resources (text, images, videos, podcasts) with students, colleagues and learning communities. I love that it is free, works on all devices, and takes only minutes to demonstrate and bring users on board (“riding the wake”).

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Privacy Rating

Data Safety How safe is this product?

  • Users can interact with trusted users.
  • Personal information can be displayed publicly.
  • User-created content is filtered for personal information before being made publicly visible.

Data Rights What rights do I have to the data?

  • Users can create or upload content.
  • Processes to access or review user data are available.
  • Processes to modify data are available for authorized users.

Ads & Tracking Are there advertisements or tracking?

  • Personal information is not shared for third-party marketing.
  • Traditional or contextual advertisements are displayed.
  • Personalised advertising is displayed.

Continue reading about this tool's privacy practices, including data collection, sharing, and security.

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