My First Hyperdoc: Engaging Interaction

By: Mary Kienstra on: February 6, 2017  in: Engagement, hyperdoc, reading

I’m not sure when I first saw a HyperDoc, but I knew right away that was something I wanted to try.  After reading the book with my PLC,  I was ready.  I created my first hyperdoc to use with my reading class for our historical fiction unit.  I know it will not be my last.

The first thing I did was read The HyperDoc Handbook by Lisa Highfill, Kelly Hilton, and Sarah Landis.   These authors explained their philosophy for creating the hyperdoc idea, as well as many practical tips for using hyperdocs in any classroom.  My PLC read this as a group and then we watched a video presentation by one of the authors that further explained the ideas.

I started by looking through the samples on the hyperdocs site.  They have included many examples as well as templates.  I chose one of their templates for a novel unit and made it work for us.  If you haven’t seen the site, stop and check it now.  They have everything you need to create a hyperdoc.

A template from the HyperDoc site at http://www.hyperdocs.co/samples

With this in mind, I created my first HyperDoc to go with our historical fiction unit.  I was very pleased with the way it went and the feedback from my students was totally positive (I surveyed them on a Google Form).   My students used the HyperDoc to respond as they read their book in a book club setting.  They collected quotes and explained why those were important to the story.  They noticed changes in the characters as they progressed through the book. All in all, the HyperDoc replaced their journals, but the quality of their work was so much better.

Of course there are things I’ll do differently next time, but I think the HyperDoc format engages students in a way that the paper and pencil journal does not.  My next HyperDoc will be more interactive and have more kinds of media besides reading and responding.  Now that I know how engaging the HyperDoc is for students, I’ll be creating more of these kinds of learning experiences.

Special Thanks to the HyperDoc authors who created @TsGiveTs as a place to share HyperDocs with each other.  What a fabulous idea!!