A blog on a log

The little spider said to me,

What are the student blogs going to be?

When will they start and what will they do?
Will you and the teacher follow through?

Blogs are perhaps one of the easiest yet powerful Web 2.0 tools to engage in. Will Richardson suggests that:

"the true potential of blogs in schools come when students and teachers use them as publishing tools. . . the best way to fully understand the potential of Weblogs as a teaching and learning tool is to become a blogger" (p. 43).

Well, that is exactly what I have done with this blog. By putting myself "out there," I have opened up my writing and thoughts to the world. I think this is very similar to the experience my students would have in that I have had comments from my teacher and other students, but not from the outside world. Although I am not generally one comfortable to share with others in this way, I seem to have an awful lot of posts in my blog. I do like sharing my learning with others - perhaps that is why I am a teacher! This process has convinced me that blogging is something that students should be doing, as young as they can create the simplest posts.





Tom Whitby suggests that "blogging provides a real reason for kids to write.  The realization that an audience of more than one would be reading their work is a real incentive." As learning moves towards a collaborative and interactive experience, blogging plays a central role (Kist, 2010; Richardson, 2010)

So I am convinced! My goal is to get the Grade 3/4 class blogging after Spring Break. I sat down with the teacher a couple of weeks before the break and helped her set up her class blog in KidBlog. The teacher is somewhat uncomfortable about having kids putting things online and is worried about the responses of parents. I wrote a letter of introduction and permission letter to be sent to parents regarding the project that included some links about the value in blogging for kids.

Jenny Luca gives Six Reasons Why Kids Should Know How to Blog:

• creating positive digital footprints
• communicating with digital tools
• transparency for parents and family
• new ways of thinking about web tools
• effective digital citizenship
• pride in their work

20 reasons why students should blog are given by this teacher from Australia.

It is my hope that, with my guidance, this will be a successful and rewarding experience for the students, teacher and parents. By slowly taking steps to easy my school community into participation of the read/write web, we will be preparing our students for their futures.


Kist, W. (2010). The socially networked classroom: teaching in the new media age. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin.

Richardson, W. (2010). Blogs, wikis, podcasts and other powerful web tools for classrooms (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin.

Where am I?

I am still on my web, but where are you?

The spider asks as I wander through.

You've tried so many things on your great big web,

When will you be done? the spider said.

I feel like I need to check in with my progress for this class, and see how I am doing and if I am still on track.

I have been very consumed with creating a video at the moment with students from the environment club at the school. We are putting the final touches on our entry for the BC Green Games. It is created in iMovie, which is not technically Web 2.0, so I am not sure if I should include it as part of my project here.

Anyways . . . where am I?

Facebook

I have set up my Facebook account and have added a bunch of friends. I find it is mostly just something else to check each day for news. I am not interested in most of the items my friends post, but do enjoy seeing the occasional fun photo, etc. I have posted some general questions to my friends and a few pictures of my kids. I have also commented on other's posts.

The most useful part of Facebook for me, so far, is the group that I belong to for the climbing gym where my son trains. I like that the group shows up on my home page and I can immediately see if there is anything new posted by the little number that shows up. This was very useful when there was snow and the gym was cancelled.

I can see how the "group" function would be useful as a school to have for parent communication (elementary) or even for students (secondary).

Twitter or more importantly, Tweetdeck

Part of my inquiry was finding a better way to manage Twitter. I believe I have found that with Tweetdeck.

Integral to my use of Tweetdeck is my installation of Google Chrome. At one point last year, I had actually installed Tweetdeck, but didn't like the fact that it sat on the desktop of my computer. With Chrome, the Tweetdeck plug-in allows it to sit in the web browser on the start-up page. I like this much better.

Tweetdeck has allowed me to organize the information I gather from Twitter. I have also loaded my Facebook account into Tweetdeck, so I can also see my Facebook news feed. I am not sure why the Facebook posts I see are not the same in Tweetdeck as in Facebook. I also can't see the "groups" from Facebook, which means I need to open up Facebook separately as well.

But, overall, I like Tweetdeck. I currently have the following columns:

• Facebook news feed
• Home - which is all the people I follow on Twitter
• #edtech
• #tlchat
• #pbl - for Project Based Learning, but seems to be some sort of foot fetish thing as well
• #frimm - French immersion
• @me - for tweets where I am mentioned
• inbox - for direct messages to me

I can easily skim through the columns and click on things that interest me for more information. I am not feeling as overwhelmed with Twitter now.

Social Bookmarking

I continue to use Diigo personally for keeping track and organizing links, but after exploring the education side of it and finding no filters to the outside world, I don't think I would use it with students.

I have just begun using Pinterest and find it very appealing because it is so visual. I believe this would also appeal to students, so will explore a bit further and see how I might use Pinterest with students.

Blogging

I have explored Kidblog, which I like, and Blogmeister, which I don't. I am excited to have enticed a teacher to begin blogging with her Grade 3/4 class. Next week, I will help her set up Kidblogs for her class.

Still to come:

• Voki
• Glogster
• Voicethread

Stay tuned . . .

It's on! Kidblog vs. Blogmeister

Spider says "I love a good race!"

Which blog will be the winner, in this case?

Kidblog, BlogMeister which will it be?

Which is the best for the students and me?

Well, BlogMeister vs. Kidblog.  What an overwhelming win for Kidblog! Kidblog was so easy to get started and figure out. BlogMeister was quite a disappointment.  The fact that I couldn't even figure out how to get students added was frustrating. Because I only see classes once a week as teacher-librarian, I would like to get classroom teachers set up and in charge of blogs for their own classes. I need to have a platform that is easy for them to set up and work with.

Hey mister Blogmeister!

I think I get blogging, but why try another?

One for this class and one for its brother?

Kidblog is good, but what else can I find?

Perhaps this one's better, I'll keep an open mind!

Tonight, I decided to take a look at another blog platform created specifically for students tonight in order to compare it with Kidblog.  I went to the Class BlogMeister site to investigate.

My initial impression of the BlogMeister site is that it is very cluttered and busy looking.

But . . . I persevered.  It turns out that in order to create blogs on this site, you must have a "school pass code." Hmm - what is that all about? There are not any instructions about anything on the home page. I went to the "initial documentation," which is a PDF form with instructions on how to set up class blogs.

On the PDF, there is an email you can contact for your pass code if you don't have one from a workshop. OK - seems like a lot of work, but I fired off an email and kept reading. The instructions have a lot of reading but I made my way through and went back to fetch my email.

Ahhhh - the email bounced back with permanent fatal errors!

I now searched BlogMeister with Google and found a link to pass code.  Followed this, entered in the info about my school and, voila, I am in!

OK - so it just isn't that friendly and intuitive to use. Every time I try to upload a photo, the site boots me out and I need to log back in again.  It also isn't accepting the images. Well I got one image to show up. I figured how to add links to the side. However, I can not figure out how to add any students to my class so that they can have their own blogs - I enter class panel but do not see the box shown in the instructions. The whole thing is very ugly to look at as well!

BlogMeister, like Kidblog emails everything to the teacher for approval, including comments on blogs.  The teacher then has final say before something is posted. This is always a good thing as most of the teachers at my school are fairly skeptical about doing things online with their classes.

KidBlog podcast

Yesterday, I took some time to listen to a podcast about KidBlog.  The podcast, on TeacherCast can be found at TeacherCast Podcast 32. The creators of KidBlog go over the workings of their site and explain all of the nuances of it.

After all my reading and listening, I think I am going to try out KidBlog with the Grade 3/4 teacher at our school.  She does a lot of writing with her students, but is not that technologically adept.  I think this simple blogging platform will fit her needs well.

Stay tuned!

Netiquette, etiquette

As I continue to think about class blogging, I have looking at different class blogs.  I came across this great Prezi about netiquette, something that will need to be discussed before the blogging begins.  The Prezi is to the fun and to the point, yet clear.  The use of cartoons keeps it light.

Netiquette on Prezi

Mrs. Krebs. (2012). Netiquette [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://krebs.edublogs.org/netiquette/

Let's go for a blog!

A blog, questions spider, just what is it for?

Well, it is for writing but can be much more.

A place for your thoughts and ideas to share

Communicating with others is only fair.

I decided to begin investigating some blogging platforms that might be appropriate to use with students at my elementary school this morning.

I started with Kidblog.  The home page indicated it is fast and free - which is true!  In no time, I had set up a class.  I then had to do some more reading to figure out how to use it!

Some things I like about Kidblog:

• it is private by default
• can make it "semi-private" with "guest" accounts for parents, etc.
• no advertising
• I have administrative control and review posts before they are posted

Having said that "I like" the privacy details of Kidblog, I also have in the back of my mind the idea that some of real value and power in blogging comes from the ability to interact with other people (ie. outside of the school) (Kist, 2010; Richardson, 2010).  However, given that this will be our students' (and parents' and teachers') first foray into the online world and blogging, I think it is prudent to begin slowly. Therefore, I think beginning with a closed/private system is a good idea.

I found this great video on Wesley Fryer's blog that explains how to set up Kidblogs for a class.  I like the idea that he is setting the blogs to allow viewing and commenting by anyone, yet those still must be read by the teacher before they are posted.  This is a great option.

As I continue to research Kidblog a bit, I came across a heartwarming blog post from a teacher that is really about the value in blogging in general.  In "Write On!" Why I Love Kidblog! Oldschoolteach writes about how excited the students are about their blogs, even writing and editing them on the weekends. Having a blog really gives students ownership over their writing.

Here are some examples of Kidblogs:

Mr. Lane's Class

• settings are private
• shows use of tags

Powell 4th Grade 2011

• public viewing and commenting permitted

Gill-Ville 2011-2012

• public
• posts contain photos, embedded items, etc.

In general, Kidblog seems very plain looking.  You are unable to follow any other blogs or personalize the pages too much.

References:


Fryer, W. (2012, January 27). Configure KidBlog for safe, moderated, interactive student blogging & commenting [Web log message]. Retrieved from http://www.speedofcreativity.org/2012/01/27/configure-kidblog-for-safe-moderated-interactive-student-blogging-commenting/


Kist, W. (2010). The socially networked classroom: teaching in the new media age. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin.

Oldschoolteach. (2011, October 1). "Write On!" Why I love Kidblog [Web log message]. http://oldschoolteach.wordpress.com/2011/10/01/write-on-why-i-love-kidblog/

Richardson, W. (2010). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Corwin.