Meebo: What Every Virtual Classroom Needs
Sep 02 2008 
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For the past month I’ve been taking online classes through the University of Phoenix. So far, everything is great and I’ve just completed my first class with an A. During the tenure of my online class there was a group project that needed to be completed within 5 weeks. The project was due the last week of class and there were 5 of us working on a paper and PowerPoint presentation. Unfortunately, the tools that were provided to us in order to effectively communicate with one another just didn’t cut it. Thankfully, Meebo was readily available to fill the void.
Why Messageboards Don’t Always Work
During the course of the four weeks, we used the school’s messageboard to keep in contact and figure out how we were all going to do our parts for the project. Have you ever had to communicate and research with 5 people on one thread? If you have, you’re aware that this can become confusing very quickly. If you haven’t, imagine if FriendFeed had implemented threaded replies with only the subject instead of the messages inside. That’s a lot of clicking with no bookmarks or tags for specific messages. It’s hard to follow, sucks, and it’s the worst way to communicate within a virtual team.
Don’t Ask Me Why I Didn’t Do This Earlier
When the time came to wrap things up I suggested using Meebo to speed up the process. I couldn’t bare to try to complete the project via the school’s messageboard. None of my classmates had a clue as to what Meebo was. While trying to explain it, I was hit with the thought that I’ve become a tad out of touch with mainstream web users. At first they didn’t understand what Meebo was because I called it a social tool instead of a more mainstream term like group chat. Don’t worry, I realized my mistake soon enough. No one had a problem finding the accessing Meebo, though we did run into a problem or two when searching for the chatroom. However, we weren’t the only ones using Meebo. There were ton of chats starting with “Uop” or “Learning Team”, which made it harder to find our chatroom.
Eventually we got the paper and PowerPoint presentation done and our efforts were rewarded with 100% on both pieces. Still, my classmates thanked me for the introduction to Meebo and promised to use it for any future team projects. It definitely helped us speed things up. Instead of waiting for a reply and constantly refreshing a thread with no indication of whether or not the people you need to talk to are online, Meebo saved our day. I think it would’ve been a lot tougher to finish our project had we not used Meebo. Meebo also allowed us to see links and pass along revisions right from the chatroom. This eliminated the need to keep going back to the the original thread to update things.
Thanks Meebo!
All in all, I just want to say thanks to the Meebo team for building such a great product. Meebo is the epitome of one of the best and most effective communication tools that every every online class or school should have.
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i went to UoP for two years, during my time there they transitioned from classroom which were basically mailing lists, to the current online model. i found the group collaboration projects really quite tedious under both sets of technology.
after transferring to Ellis College, i found an online university that had some better tools in place. for one there is an entire social area where every student gets a blog, and you can 'friend' people and keep track of them when you no longer have class with them. plus inside the classrooms there is a chat mechanism called the coffeeshop that allows for chat tye interactions to take place.
What university was that?! Sounds like a ton of fun.
Ellis College, currently it is part of NYIT but it is becoming Ellis University
http://my.ellis.nyit.edu
I haven't spent a lot of time using Meebo, although I do have an account. Other than being cross-platform. are there features or reasons you chose Meebo versus another tool?
It was just the first thing that popped into my head. Plus, it's easier to explain and doesn't require anyone to download anything. Supports all browsers too. Otherwise, I might've gone with Skype.
I have a slew of whiteboarding and collab sites you can use too for other projects
Let me know for the next one, i have a slew of collab sites that allow working on the same document
I'm not so much into Online Education. I always have the feeling that if I'm rich enough, I could just pay some guy in India or the Philippines to study online and take the examination and pass with flying colors. I still prefer to study in campus.
I think kids nowadays prefer learning at their own pace and having their own privacy. That's why virtual classroom is gonna to be bigger.
Webex is kind of like the popular tool for 100 streaming. Haven't tried Meebo, will definitely try it now.
Meebo is much more cost effective for small companies and start-ups.
Distance learning is never easier than thought. However, with the development of more online communication tools, it is now slightly easier for us to communicate across borders.
Rif Chia
I've heard this interesting feedback from my friends in India. He told me that in India, all they need to do was to pay someone to take the exam as they normally have 1 invigilator to 4,000 students taking the exam.
With distance learning, you could pay someone to attend the lessons and take the exam online!
1 to 4000 is a scary ratio. No wonder there are so many graduates leaving India every year to look for greener pastures.
Distance learning is never easy compared to classroom learning. I have never thought of online university and a means to further my education.
Distance learning works for some people. Interacting online to study is too time consuming.
Well i agree with you girl. But some time i still use meebo, they currently improve their features.
Yes i agree with you, coz mostly meebo is just for fun.. :D
Yes i agree with you, it's more efficient.
Yes i agree with you, coz mostly meebo is just for fun.. :D
Yes i agree with you, it's more efficient.
Yes i agree with you, it's more efficient.