Blogging with Students Using Kidblog

Last week I talked about the Edublog Nominees for 2011. Looking at the list of nominees is a great way to see how teachers are using blogs. There are a few teachers in our district who have classroom blogs and use them as a "window into the classroom" to keep parents informed. They post about new learning, units of study, field trips, school events, etc. Several teachers have taken blogging a step further and are blogging with their students. Many students are using their blogs to post about their reading, similar to a reading response journal. Students then comment on each other's posts to encourage further thinking and provide positive feedback.

Kidblog (our preferred student blogging tool) is a popular site designed for elementary and middle school teachers. It is kid friendly and can be set to private. Here is a link to a LiveBinder about Blogging with Students. (Visit Kimberly's Secondary Learn and Earn Blog to learn more about LiveBinder.) Under the Setting Up a Blog tab there is a sub tab with a tutorial to get you started with Kidblog. Also, there is a sub tab called Learning to Blog Using Paper. If you are planning to start blogging with your students, I recommend that you do this lesson with them first. It will give your students a better understanding of blogging. I also recommend visiting the Leaving Comments tab. This will allow you to have a conversation with your students about how to write a quality comment.

If you would like to start blogging with your students, please take a look at these helpful hints, guidelines and other policies through Sharepoint (Intranet, Teaching and Learning, Technology, Teacher Technology Resources, Blogging) and contact Christine for support. You will want to send home the AUG for Student Blogging (Kidblog version) as well as a Parent Letter.  

This week, tell us how you might use Kidblog with your students. Tell us how your colleagues are using it with their students. Who would you connect with to plan the management and use of Kidblog?

The Best Blogs-2011 Edublog Nominees

Hello Bloggers!

Some of you may be wondering either a) what are the benefits of setting up a classroom blog or b) how you can improve the classroom blog you already have in place. Edublogs.com is a website designed specifically for educators who are interested in using technology as a tool to communicate with students and parents. Each year they choose the top blogs for several different categories such as Best Student Blog, Best Teacher Blog, and Best Class Blog.

For those wanting to know more about the benefits of blogging, you should check out the Top 10 Ways to Use Blogs to Teach. Technically, this link will lead you to the top reasons to use “edublogs” to teach, but they are applicable to any blog you may create from any site. Many of our staff members use Blogger. (This is our prefered bloging tool.) After looking over these reasons, check out the Nominees for the 2011 Edublog Awards by clicking on the various categories and scrolling down to see all the nominees.

By the way, you don't have to search far and wide to find good blogs; just take a look at what our very own Melissa Morlock has created for her fourth grade class at Lake Wilderness! You can also view my classroom blog from 2009 to see a first grade example. (Click through the Blog Archive on the right to view older posts.)

For the post this week, please tell us about which blog you found to be your favorite and why. In your post, please include the link to that blog.

Although the discussion for this class takes place on a blog, the primary focus for this class, ironically, is not blogging; we are merely using this blog to foster discussion and unearth new technologies that may be useful in your classroom. If you currently have or are planning to create a classroom blog, please take a look at these helpful hints, guidelines and other policies through Sharepoint (Intranet, Teaching and Learning, Technology, Teacher Technology Resources, Blogging) and contact Christine for support. 

iPod/Cell Phone Flash Cards

One day Kimberly and I were talking and somehow the idea of creating flash cards came up. She suggested creating flash cards for students to access using their iPods. While searching online she came across Mr. Coley's website. (Unfortunately Mr. Coley moved into an administrative position and will no longer be updating his website. But lucky for us all his wonderful work and ideas will live online forever!) Mr. Coley has been kind enough to give us directions on how to create flash cards for our students using PowerPoint. It's so easy that you could have your students create them! He also has a library of flash cards that he has created. I was eager to try it myself and realized that in addition to parents/students putting the flash cards on an iPod, I could e-mail the PowerPoint presentation or JPEGs to parents and they could then open the attachments on their cell phone and allow their child to practice their vocabulary, math facts, and/or spelling words in the car or grocery store. They could also access them on their home computer. There are so many ways to help our students succeed!

For this weeks post:

Explain how you could see yourself using/creating flash cards for your students. How would you provide access to your cards for parents/students? Give it a try using his directions/tutorials and let us know your successes and challenges.