Blogging in Your Classroom

The talk about national standards in the United States’ Education community is real and it is here. If you have a chance to check out this article by Maria Glod at the Washington Post, it is worth a look.

If you get a chance to look it over, let us all know what you think.

The great ‘tips’ on your dashboard show some information that should not be ignored. This post explains exactly why we should not be writing our posts in another word processor (such as Microsoft Word or Open Office) first.

 Blogging is a unique way to open up your classroom to the rest of the school, the administration, parents, and the entire world. Although many may not yet be familiar with this technology, it is something that soon all people will be familiar with.

A reflective process and/ or journaling has long been proven to aid students in learning and recognition. Here is another teacher who has some ideas on the benefit of the reflective process, except she uses the old paper and folder method. Journaling often is unseen by anybody, but the one teacher. The thoughts in the journal may be insightful, but never showed to the world.

Blogging opens up the reflective process to not only other students, but also parents. Students now know that others will be viewing their comments and this significantly raises the level of concern.

As I have invited all parents, other teachers, administrators, and community members to openly view and comment on the blog, the dynamic of journaling has changed entirely.

In my classroom, I use a wireless projector connection from my computer to display the blog content as it comes through. Until recently, I used to approve comments via the same computer, and just flip back and forth between the  screens. Now I use my iPod touch’s wireless internet connection and monitor student computer usage at the same time. Although all parents are not reading the blogs everyday, many are checking in to see what is happening, and it makes a difference. 

The days of bringing home one printed report card every nine weeks are all but obsolete with parents, teachers, and students all accessing the internet and email. The parent portal on most school’s websites allows parents to see grades as soon as teachers post them.

Technology changes all of the above scenarios— for the better! Putting gradebooks online and, often times, having teachers and parents communicating via email on a daily basis allows parents to become more involved. Blogging is another way you can allow parents to come into your classroom, even with conflicting schedules. Parents can view the comments of the students, as well as see the questions posed by the teacher. Blogging allows parents to see their child’s ideas first-hand.

You can also invite parents or community members to comment on the question posed, if applicable. You are able to moderate the comments via security settings to ensure that content remains applicable to the conversation also.  

A blog is a webpage you can create to your design and with the content you choose. It allows for free discourse of comments in an open forum.

Also known as a web-log, online diary, or journal, a blog is putting your personal thoughts into cyberspace for all to see. A blog is instantly published to a website and hosted by a third party (edublogs, blogger, etc.). It is most often published in reverse chronological order, as so your most recent thoughts or comments are posted at the top of the screen. (This can be changed, if you so desire.)

The majority of students are using social networking sites on a daily basis. MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter are even accessible via cell phones, blackberries or iPods. Despite the possibility of harmful effects, these sites are connecting our students to the rest of the world.

Sites such as Facebook have a ‘Wall’ where users of the site are able to write their thoughts and feelings for the day. Friends are able to comment on these thoughts.

Blogs closely resemble this community of friends atmosphere. As the host of the blog, you will be able to post your thoughts, assignments, or objectives, and the readers (your students) will reply in a comment. You also are able to post links to other websites or blogs, post pages of information, post videos and photos of classroom activities.

If you choose, you can also have students set up their own blogs and post their own information to it.

Students are becoming more and more familiar with technology out of ‘teenage social necessity’, and the same concepts that they use to post photos from prom, videos from the bus, and comments about their day are all the same technology that you can use to connect with students by integrating a blog into your classroom.