TITANPAD
Overall Rating
3/5
TitanPad is a free web 2.0 tool that enables users to work collaboratively in a single document. Similar to Google Documents, this online tool allows many people to work simultaneously on the document. Users can chat while working on the document, can import existing documents to work on and also export documents from TitanPad. It also provides the option to view previous versions of the document and includes a time slider to view the entire history of the document.
Other Tool Types
View All Tools
TitanPad Interface
Time Slider feature in TitanPad
1 of 3
Rating: 3/5
Reviewed by: Karen Schneider on 05/10/2013
Description
TitanPad is a Web 2.0 tool that lets a group of people (limited to 8) come together to create and edit documents. The groups can access the document at the same time or individually at anytime; all you need is the URL to the pad . When you are on at the same time you can see the changes that others are making. Each person is color-coded so you know who is making what changes and contributing what to the document. TitanPad will automatically save, but you also have the ability to save changes whenever you like and you can revert to older versions if necessary. It contains a time slider feature that lets users slide the button back to anytime in the creating/editing process and bring up the document as it was at any of those times. You can import other text documents into your pad and export the work product into a word document. A chat feature lets you communicate with others in the groups. It is a simple way to create and edit documents (manuscripts, essays, reports, etc.) for a group of people.
A group of individuals (no limit) can also save a sub-domain as a private space to work on documents, instead of the public domain. The user will need to have an account in the sub-domain and create a password for access. The administrator can set up the level of the collaboration by the users.
Things to know before using TitanPad
Basic computer and internet accessing and surfing skills are needed. It working on a current document it would be helpful to know which document needs to be imported to TitanPad to work on.
Resources required for using TitanPad
A decent computer with a good internet connection is required. Additionally, email accounts will be needed to create a private space and also to share the link to other group members if needed.
How to use TitanPad in a teaching environment
You are teaching a class for third year medical students on contraception and would like to create a study guide that can be used as a review for students to improve their scores on the written board exam. The class is divided into work groups of 6 students as specified by the course administrator to facilitate a team-based approach to learning. The plan is to publish a student study guide on contraception that can be used by them to better prepare for their written exam. Each group is asked to create a chapter on a specific category of contraceptive methods. The groups are asked to answer a set of questions regarding the methods and to work together to finalize the chapter on their method. You ask them to utilize TitanPad (public domain) to create the document. Each student will join the pad and the group will also invite you as the instructor. By being invited to the groups pad, you will be able to monitor the contributions of each student to the document. Using the chat feature you can give them feedback on the content to ensure that they including the important concepts so that the finished product will be a functional study tool for the entire class. They will submit the complete document as a group for a grade that will be used as a portion of their final grade and you will give a group participation grade (also part of the final grade) for each student based on their contributions to the TitanPad document.
Advantages of using TitanPad
Its very easy to use just type, create and collaborate . It provides a quick way for multiple users to work together on documents.
Disadvantages of using TitanPad
It is simple to use, but the function of the features such as saved revisions and time slider arent intuitive. I had to go to another site to get an explanation of all the functionality of the features. Its text only, you cant create spreadsheets, charts or tables in TitanPad. These could be added once youve exported it to a more powerful word-processing document.
©2011- The University of Houston. All rights reserved.
4800 Calhoun Road, Houston, Texas 77204 (713) 743-2255