A teacher’s thoughts on Windows Live SkyDrive (video)

Kelvin Dueck, a physics and math teacher at Pitt Meadows Secondary School, wanted a way to share his math answer keys and physics notes with his students. That way his students could access help and extend their learning outside of traditional classroom walls. He needed a virtual hard drive.

Kelvin wanted to organize his files by class, so he needed a solution that would let him create multiple folders, and folders inside of folders. He also wanted the files to be sortable by date, so that his students could easily find the most recently uploaded materials.

Originally Kelvin used a paid product, but he wanted a model that other teachers could use. And that meant it needed to be free. When Kelvin discovered Windows Live SkyDrive, a free online document storage and file sharing service, he found what he was looking for.

I first heard Kelvin’s story this past spring when a colleague forwarded me a letter that Kelvin wrote to John Guin of the OneNote Test team blog. In his email, Kelvin shared his personal account of using OneNote and a tablet PC in the classroom. It was just the kind of story that needed to be shared. So I convinced my friend and co-worker, Michael C. Oldenburg, to drive up to Pitt Meadows and meet Kelvin. It didn’t take much convincing really. Michael is the Microsoft OneNote writer for Office.com and he loves hearing about how folks are using the product.

We spent one May day observing Kelvin’s teaching style and tools. We even learned a thing or two about magnetic fields. See Teaching with OneNote: How students benefit to read Kelvin's story and to watch our video and learn more about how Kelvin uses OneNote with a Tablet PC every day.

But that’s just one side of Kelvin’s story. While we were there we saw something we weren’t expecting—Kelvin is also a Windows Live SkyDrive enthusiast. And who can blame him? It's simple and free to use. You get 25 GB of storage space, which Kelvin says he hasn't even come close to filling. And he's uploaded a lot of files!

Kelvin has done the research. And he's found the solution that works for him. Now he's sharing that knowledge with you. Can Windows Live SkyDrive help you extend your classroom walls? Sign up for Windows Live SkyDrive and try it out for yourself. Like I said, it's free!

I’d like to give a special thanks to Kelvin for reaching out to us and inviting us into his classroom.  I hope that, in some part, we help spread his vision for a future where students have options and can find the teacher that speaks to their learning style. 

Do you have any questions for Kelvin? If so, leave a comment and let us know what you’re wondering about.

--Jennifer Bost