Thursday, July 22, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
What is a blog?
Blogs are short for Web logs. These are online journals or diaries. Blogs can be public or private, entertaining or educational. Students can use blogs to practise writing and communication skills; teachers can use them to post assignments, share thoughts, stimulate classroom discussion, and more
10 reasons why teachers should have a class blog.
1. It is an effective parent/teacher communication tool.
2. Provides an organization resource for students to access.
3. Provides students and teachers to reflect on learning.
4. Showcases the amazing things teachers and students do on a daily basis.
5. Motivates, excites and engages students to produce, perform and participate.
6. Allows students to collaborate with others.
7. Exposes students to using technology in the classroom.
8. Promotes reading.
9. Promotes writing.
10. Students are digital natives (blogging is a natural element of this.)
Bonus: It's fun!
Using classroom blogs meet most of the language curriculum expectations here are just a few:
Extending Understanding
1.6 extend understanding of texts, including increasingly complex or difficult texts, by
connecting the ideas in them to their own knowledge, experience, and insights, to other familiar texts, and to the world around them.
Purpose and Audience
1.1 identify the topic, purpose, and audience for more complex writing forms
Voice
2.2 establish a distinctive voice in their writing appropriate to the subject and audience
Preparing for Revision
2.6 identify elements in their writing that need improvement, selectively using feedback from the teacher and peers.
Producing Media Texts
3.4 produce a variety of media texts of some technical complexity for specific purposes and audiences, using appropriate forms, conventions, and techniques.
Here are some sites with more information on blogs:
http://edublognology.wordpress.com/2009/03/31/to-blog-or-not-to-blog-in-the-classroom/
http://thejournal.com/articles/2004/02/01/content-delivery-in-the-blogosphere.aspx
http://web.mit.edu/itpartners/conf/spring2006/blogs.pdf
The following are two screencasts for teachers to use to create their own classroom blogs:
Blogs are short for Web logs. These are online journals or diaries. Blogs can be public or private, entertaining or educational. Students can use blogs to practise writing and communication skills; teachers can use them to post assignments, share thoughts, stimulate classroom discussion, and more
10 reasons why teachers should have a class blog.
1. It is an effective parent/teacher communication tool.
2. Provides an organization resource for students to access.
3. Provides students and teachers to reflect on learning.
4. Showcases the amazing things teachers and students do on a daily basis.
5. Motivates, excites and engages students to produce, perform and participate.
6. Allows students to collaborate with others.
7. Exposes students to using technology in the classroom.
8. Promotes reading.
9. Promotes writing.
10. Students are digital natives (blogging is a natural element of this.)
Bonus: It's fun!
Using classroom blogs meet most of the language curriculum expectations here are just a few:
Extending Understanding
1.6 extend understanding of texts, including increasingly complex or difficult texts, by
connecting the ideas in them to their own knowledge, experience, and insights, to other familiar texts, and to the world around them.
Purpose and Audience
1.1 identify the topic, purpose, and audience for more complex writing forms
Voice
2.2 establish a distinctive voice in their writing appropriate to the subject and audience
Preparing for Revision
2.6 identify elements in their writing that need improvement, selectively using feedback from the teacher and peers.
Producing Media Texts
3.4 produce a variety of media texts of some technical complexity for specific purposes and audiences, using appropriate forms, conventions, and techniques.
Here are some sites with more information on blogs:
http://edublognology.wordpress.com/2009/03/31/to-blog-or-not-to-blog-in-the-classroom/
http://thejournal.com/articles/2004/02/01/content-delivery-in-the-blogosphere.aspx
http://web.mit.edu/itpartners/conf/spring2006/blogs.pdf
The following are two screencasts for teachers to use to create their own classroom blogs:
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