How to Blog
Meg's Blogagogy - This site is about how to use blogs in educational settings. The various modules:
* Blog basics
* Finding a suitable blog host
* The benefits of blogging in education
* Educational design
* Assesment rubrics for student blogs
Avoiding the 5 Most Common Mistakes in Using Blogs with Students
Blogging guide for beginners - Edublogs
Classroom uses of Blogs
• I blog, you blog, let’s ALL blog! – Reasons YOU should have a classroom blog!
Reflect on your teaching and learning experience
Write a description of a specific teaching unit
• Provide tips for parents to extend learning at home
• Post class-related information such as calendars, events, home work, and other important information
• Post assignments based on literature readings and have students respond in their own blogs, creating a portfolio of their work
• Post prompts for writing
• Post samples of class work
• Encourage students to post responses to your posts – maybe an online reading is suitable for your students to read and react to
• Post photos and comment on class activities
• Invite students to post comments to give them a writing voice
• Showcase student artwork, writing, poetry
• Create a dynamic teaching and learning site which contains discussions, pictures, ideas, activities, links to additional information
• Create online literature circles (groups of students read and discuss the same book)
• Build a class newsletter, using student written articles and photos they take
• Link your class with another class somewhere else in the world.
• Post results of surveys they have taken in class
• Have students create their own blogs to complete class writing assignments
• Create an ongoing portfolio sample of their work
• Pretend they are a character in a book you are reading and set up a blog as that character – reacting to the events in the story
• Students could respond to current events and daily news
• Discuss activities done in class and their opinion of them and the learning that took place
(List from “Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms” by Will Richardson)
Other suggestions from November Learning, Inc. include:
* Using a blog as an online filing cabinet - students and teachers can upload and store assignments, links, plans and handouts. Audio files (Podcasts) can also be uploaded and downloaded from some blogs
* Collaborative tools - Students can extend conversations outside the classroom, and collaborate with invited guests from around the world and from within the community.
* Literature Circles and Book Clubs
* Online Discussions
* Professional Development
* Writing tools