Class web pages are mandatory in our district. Each homeroom teacher must design and maintain a class web page. It is even monitored by our district and school principal. This year they have added the Fusion Tools to our web page. It allows us to add podcast, slideshows, and blogs to our web page. Many of my students do not have internet access at home so blogging is limited to school time. I have just added a blog discussion to my web page. My students have been using the student blog page on scholastic.com but class blog is new. They seem afraid to respond. We have also lost our classroom computers to a flood. Our old radiator heater burst the week before Christmas and destroyed my classroom library (over 800 books) and all four of my computers. Any way, my students have not been able to play with the blog options too much.
My question for you is how young is too young to blog? What about a blog for parents? Let me know what you think? Check out my class page and provide some input for blogging discussion ideas.
Lewis Class Web Page
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Program Outcome Essay
14 years ago
12 comments:
Interesting to read about your mandatory class pages. We have a small district, (two elementaries and middle/high school) but I think that my class page (www.mrwylie.com) is the only one in the district just now! As for blogging, I have read about teachers who micro blog with students as young as kindergarten with sites like Edmodo or Twitter. My fourth graders do a blogger of the week. We started individual blogs with Weebly, but at home internet access is only about 50% in my class. Maybe we will get back to those later in the year.
I am updating my web page to accept bloggers without email addresses. I just discovered that the students have usernames and passwords so we will begin to experiment next week.
Currently only 2 out of 18 students have internet access at home.
I am looking forward to blogging with you.
My blog page is dedicated to the younger students because I am currently looking for a job and I want to be prepared for whatever grade happens to come my way. I find it easier to think of good ideas on how to use blogging for older students so I now want to find ways to use it with the smaller kids. My own children love to use the computer so I'm thinking of things they might find interesting and easy to do. Ithink if you are creative enough and willing to help the students even our preschoolers could begin blogging.
This is the question that I have placed on my third grade blog section of my web page.
This is a follow up to our special speaker, who is deaf. We are also finishing Helen Keller.
Sound Board
Reading about Helen Keller's dark and quiet world brings many questions. What would you miss most? My mother is deaf and she said she misses hearing music. I cannot imagine not being able to hear my favorite song or band. I love to listen to music on my radio and listening to my favorite songs on my IPod. love a variety of music. I like to listen to jazz, blues and good Ole rock and roll and a little country. I like to watch Mary Poppins and Mama Mia and sing a long with the movie.
What is your favorite band or singer or song?
Waiting to hear from you today.
Mrs. Lewis
I love that you had a guest speaker who was deaf to allow the students a first hand account of what it might be like to be deaf. Your question that you put up for them is thought provoking. I would be very interested in seeing their responses. As a mother of six I sometimes wish I were deaf, but then again I would miss the sound of their laughter the most if I lost my hearing. You might also want to show them a website like http://deafnewspaper.com/news.html
where the news is given in sign language.
I am on the other side of the coin where the teachers in our district do not have their own web page and blogging by students is non- existent. Teachers do not even blog and I am brand new at it myself. The only challenge I can see with student blogging is how do you monitor their blogging? Are there blogging guidelines in place for the students? I think that blogging is a great way for students to fine tune various writing skills!
I know that my district requires high school teacher to post grade and homework on a program called school loop. This program is designed to keep parents and students informed.
I also know that not all the parents participate since they do not have internet access and this is a problem for all teachers who want to use the internet to keep parents up to date.
I think it can be expected for students to be required to blog on your website since you have computers available to them...but I don't know how effective it will be with the parents.
Connie,
I wish you and your classroom the best!! With regard to your question, I believe that kindergarten students are able to use a blog as a showcase for their achievements. It also functions as a great way to provide a two-way communicate with parents and teachers. I am also planning on using blogs to find materials that will augment lessons and communicate with other educators.
Your web page is very impressive. It seems like a very friendly content management system. In response to your flood, I am deeply sorry and hope that your school is receiving the support it needs from your local community. One of my favorite sites is http://www.digitalwish.com/dw/digitalwish/home . On this site, you can request different forms of technology. Users/parents/community members can go on the site and donate money. We were able to purchase 10 flip video cameras through this program.
In response to your question, it's never too young to model. Technology is just like anything else, there must be a gradual release of responsibility.
Let me know if you set up a wish list and I will be the first to donate.
I set up a separate blog for my students. I also ran into the problem of student not allowed to have an email address vie their parents. So I too set up the Anonymous function, but some of the students have forgotten to put their name at the end so I can know who to give the credit to.
Thank you for your great ideas and suggestions. I will definitely going to check out the web site for wish list.
My students loved our first class blog. I had several students continue the blog responses over the weekend.
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