After this assignment I have been starting to think of ways to use blogs in my classroom. I could so easily type a blog for the parents to use. That would be nice for both the parents and the students, but I want the students to use it. My thoughts are to:
1. Have a weekly question on the blog that the students can respond to by Friday as a homework assignment.
2. Have a weekly question that the students can respond to once a week in the class.
My problem with the second option is how do I get enough time for the students to each get a chance to respond during the school day? I am sure that I can set up a schedule to give the students 3 -5 min to respond by the end of the week.
While I was thinking of this I looked up sites about how to teach children to blog. I found these interesting. http://kidslearntoblog.com/ and http://kidblog.org/home.php
Brittany,
ReplyDeleteThese are great resources. I also think that your blogging idea is a great one. I think that a schedule would probably be your best bet. There must be time to squeeze a few students in for example, in the morning when they finish their routine. Some students also finish classwork more quickly than others. I think that you would be surprised how many small snippets of time you can come up with, and why not fill up that time with something educational. Granted, you may not have an extra 30-40 minutes in your week, but to accomplish something like this, you won't need that. Even if you found that you couldn't get everyone in, you could have groups and rotate them. Heidi suggested that she did a weekly podcast with her students, and although it is difficult to find time to make these things work, I think that you will be glad that you did. Good luck!
Brittany-
ReplyDeleteI think using blogs with your kids is a GREAT idea. Do your students work in centers during the day? If so, that could be one of the centers that the students go to each week. This would give them an opportunity to read others comments and respond to your question. However, I know how difficult it can be to squeeze time into your day. Does your community have the resources to give this as a homework assignment? The blog that I looked at during our first conference has a teacher in Kindergarten using kidblog- check out her site. I believe that she uses it solely with students outside of school. http://davisonkindergarten.blogspot.com/
I didn't think of centers. That would be a great time to blog. I also like the idea of when students finish early. Thanks for the suggestions!
ReplyDeleteBrittany,
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with the other comments. Your ideas about the students using blogging is wonderful. I think time is always going to be an issue for any type of extras we want to add in. Something I thought about was having the students blog during our workshop time. Since I have 3 group rotations every day for 15 mins per group, I thought about having one of the rotations being the blog. This way I am still seeing my reading groups, students are continuing to work on a independant activity, and can blog about some aspect of their lesson. It is just a thought. I'm not sure how it will work but it might work depending on how many student computers you have in your classroom.