Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Why Let Students Blog in the Classroom

This video provides numerous reasons for letting students blog in your classroom. View it, and please take a moment to comment. Does the video spark your interest in using blogging in the classroom ? If so, how and why? If not, why not?

13 comments:

Liz R. said...

This video motivates me to use blogging in the classroom, because blogging provides students a forum to express their opinions and voices any time of day both in or out of the classroom, individually or collaboratively using reflection and critical thinking skills. I also like how it engages students to interact with the classroom content in a personalized manner. When students blog, they are also improving their typing/writing skills, reading comprhension and critical thinking skills, while preparing them for the digital age. What can be better motivators than these? What are we waiting for?

Bob said...

Like Liz, I agree that blogs have a place in the 21st century classroom. A room without walls as the video points out sounds intriguing. I also believe that blogs will give voice to those students who may not have one in the traditional classroom. I do have several concerns though; communication is much more that the written word and for students that struggle with interpersonal communication are we not missing a teaching/learning opportunity. Second, interaction is a good thing, but interaction beyond the classroom scares me. I cannot maintain 24 hour surveillance of a blog I set-up. Finally, how do students see a blog beyond the traditional classroom, is it just another homework assignment to blow-off, I wonder.

Judy said...

Bob, the teachers I know who use blogs have been quite successful with them. Monitoring the students is not as difficult as it sounds. The teacher merely needs to set aside a designated time, at the teacher's discretion, to confirm a posting. It does not take long. Furthermore, students find blogging engaging. Much depends upon on how the teacher sets up the situation. I know one high school English who integrates blogging into her teaching of literature, and she reports excellent results. The Raven done by the 6th graders (I posted about this one a few times in this blog) is an excellent example of a teacher using blogging with students. The teacher's success has been reported in several publications, including The New York Times, which did a feature story on the blog last year. Again, it depends upon how the teacher integrates the experience into the classroom and the curriculum. However, I did want to note that the monitoring is not tedious. It is perhaps no different than assessing student input in other ways. You just need to set up a system that works for you. Because you sound hesitant, you might initially want to set up a blog with information for students to read and links for students to use to access information. You can then expand blogging to include a structured assignment that requires students to use the blog or another format to respond, offering students choices. You would need to tell students the expectations and desired outcomes, but that does not seem much different than what you must do with other forms of teaching. Again, you can make the activity one of several options, and not require all students in a class to post comments. However, if you want all students to read the blog, you can have options for other ways to determine the learning outcomes. Just some thoughts. Let me know if these help out.

Gina said...

I see blogging as another type of learning tool - it will engage some but not others. The main draw for me about blogging is that I see more of an audience for a math topic on a blog, where we can sit and talk about a math concept, than in a circle in a classroom. I have seen literacy circles, for example, but would love to see a math literacy circle and I think that blogging could be a way to start one.

Meg said...

I'm not very crazy about blogging, especially for elementary school students because I'm just not sure what kids that young would take away from it. But the one phrase in this video that made me reconsider was "to give students a voice." I never thought about it before, but blogging could be incredibly useful for students who are too shy to speak in class, or if it is a topic that most of that class has a lot to say.

Scott Kossbiel said...

This video is inspiring. I will look into using a blog in the classroom. Simply for collaboration alone, in having students share ideas, projects, and even conversations with other students is well worth it!

KimDeMc said...

I also found the video to be thought provoking. I sometimes wonder if texting, instant messaging, constant ipod plugged in is creating an anti social environment in which people sit next to each other and never talk. But I agree with Meg, I never considered that it could give a shy, apprehensive student a voice. It could be much easier for this student to blog than raising his/her hand and speaking aloud in front of 20 classmates.

Tina said...

I do agree that blogging is another way to engage students to learn. Many of us older teachers are afraid of technology and it lends itself to so many unique experiences for our students. I do think that there is a place for it in our classrooms as long as it is used the right way. We need to remember to protect our students as well.

Kylie said...

I believe that technology has the power to hook students and motivate them to learn. I love the idea of a classroom blog. In my school students will choose to go to the computer lab over watching a movie. Technology is engaging and motivating, especially when it used meaningful ways. Lucy Calkins has said that students write better when they use pens versus pencils. I wonder what kind of thinking and writing would develop when students interact and collaborate through a blog. I would like to see how a teacher uses blogs in the elementary school.

Liz H. said...

This video was especially meaningful to me because blogging in the classroom was just discussed at a recent staff meeting at my school. We share "promising practices" and the 3rd grade had tried blogging for the first time this year. They shared some of the same ideas as in the video and provided student examples. I would have never thought of all the values until they shared, and this movie gave me further ideas. It's true that blogging is different than other kinds of sharing. You can be shy about speaking in class but will blog. You may be shy about expressing your opinions verbally to the class, but not in the blog. Students love giving their opinions which we don't always have time for in class. In order to give their opinion they have have to use technology, read, generate an opinion and put it into writing. Wow all those literacy skills in one task that students will enjoy! Sounds worthwhile to me!

Christina said...

That's interesting that blogs were discussed at Liz's staff meeting recently. I can see them as being very useful. I especially like the fact that it might be a way for the shy student in your class to express his or her opinions. I was the "shy" student in school who never said a word. If I had the opportunity to post to a blog as part of my participation grade I would have loved the opportunity. I was always someone who needed to reflect after class discussions in order to form my own opinions; a blog would have been a great tool for me. It might be a great way to keep students informed about current events. For example, I might post current news relevant to science and have students react and give their opinions. Again this might be a nice option for students who don't like to participate in class. Students are constantly on the internet these days, they might like the option of posting to a blog. I think I will look into starting one in my own classroom. Of course I'd have to start small!

Nancy Dulz said...

This video was very informative to me as I am totally new to blogging and its use in the classroom. As a matter of fact this is the first time I have posted to a blog!! With that being said as I watched the video it was amazing how many positive aspects there are to blogging in the classroom, especially giving student a voice and a sense of ownership. This allows students to share their opinion without feeling self conscious about what people might think as if they had raised their hand in class. For some people it is also easier to type as thoughts come into their heads as opposed to how to say it in the classroom. The engagement level would appear to be high as most students are extremely computer literate and love to interact with other students and adults. A blog can also be read by people all over the world (extending the walls of the classroom); I know that our sixth grade social studies students have some type of correspondence with students in another part of the world - a blog would only enhance that experience.
The only downside would be that as we know it is always easy to write things that you would never say aloud especially when one is being critical. Guidelines would have to be set up with respect to the blog and teacher monitoring would be crucial.
Not only would a blog be great in individual classrooms, it could also be used by middle school teams to encourage student dialogue.
I would love to use a blog in my classroom and am looking forward to implementing one soon.

Jen said...

This short video does a nice job conveying the many reasons why blogging can be useful for students in the classroom. I believe students are the best teachers for other students. This can open to the doors to many classrooms all over the world. Just like the video depicted-blogging can be used as motivation and a means of discussion. I agree with Liz, "it also improves their typing,writing and reading..skills"....However, I wonder what type of "monitoring" programs are out there. Would it be more work for teachers to implement blogs while having to monitor them as well?

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