Blogging with my grade 8 students

I created a new blog to use with my grade 8 social studies classes.

Here's the post I used to explain how and why we will be using our blogs this year:

The purpose of your blog is to make your learning visible. This will include:

• improving your thinking and writing skills
• learning new things and re-thinking the things you already know
• sharing your blog with others so that others can learn from you and you can learn from others

Sometimes I will provide you with something to write about and other times you will choose the topic of your blog posts. Sometimes you will pick when to write a blog post and other times I will pick.

Sometimes we will use the school's computers and sometimes you will use your own devices. There are lots of apps you can download that will allow you to blog on your device, and if you want to, you can access your blogs from home.

Sometimes we won't have access to computers or the Internet, so sometimes we will first write our blog posts on paper and then later put them online.

Your blog posts will often include:

• thinking and writing
• pictures
• video
• links to other websites and blogs

Here's a blog post that I wrote that shows how I used a video, excerpts from books, links to other websites and a picture to help support my own thinking and writing.

9 Ways to share your blog

ReferralCandy - Refer-a-friend Programs for Ecommerce Stores

Tips for Better Blogging

Here are some random thoughts I might pass on to a teacher who wanted to start blogging:

• you have to make blogging enjoyable or you won't do it for long. 

• don't worry about being right -- make the purpose of your blog about learning and growing. If you end up changing your mind about something, be open and honest to others and yourself.

• decide how often you want to post. I might suggest starting with one post per week. Remember they don't have to be long. In fact, some of the best blog posts are rich on quality and relatively short of quantity.

• consider using Twitter to share your blog. Here's why.

• try your best to not care about how many visitors your blog gets. It takes a long time to get any kind of traffic. Paying attention to traffic too early and too often is likely to dissuade you from blogging. Remember that you are blogging mostly for yourself -- your learning. Blogging and sharing for others is ubiquitous.

• be sure to link to other people's stuff in your blog and then make them aware that you have linked to them. This is a great way of connecting with others via Twitter or e-mail.

• I would recommend not monetizing your blog. Keep advertisements and the desire to profit as far away from your blog as possible. Blogging is about learning and sharing. Try not to get distracted from these objectives with profits and popularity.

• consider bringing colleagues in on your blogging. Perhaps influence someone else to start their own blog and work together.

• when done well, blogging and tweeting can become one of the most powerful professional development tools because your learning shifts from something done by distant authorities to you to something you create for yourself.

Want to be a better teacher? Blog.

This was written by Dean Shareski who is a Digital Learning Consultant for Prairie South School Division in Saskatchewan, Canada. He also teaches pre-service teachers at the University of Regina. Dean works with teachers and students in understanding the power of the Read/Write Web. Dean tweets here and blogs here. This post first appeared here.

by Dean Shareski

Want to create better teachers? I know how. One word. Blogging.

Now before you roll your eyes or accuse me of oversimplifying the very complex issue of teacher evaluation and monitoring, hear me out.

I began teaching in 1988. It was a tough job and thinking about getting better was superseded by survival instincts. Early on in my career, there were several documents that the province produced in support of improved professional development. I didn't pay much attention to these but one phrase I saw in those documents some 20 years ago stuck with me. Reflective Practitioner. I sort of understood the concept but other than simply thinking about what you did in the classroom, I wasn't at all sure what to do with this term.

When I discovered blogs almost five years ago, I soon figured out what that term meant. Since that occasion I have sat down to write close to 1,000 pieces of reflection. While not all would be considered deep, most take me anywhere from 30 minutes to several hours to craft. It may not always look like it, these are generally borne out of the times I spent observing, thinking and working in classrooms. The reflective writing has been valuable but definitely the nearly 4,000 comments have been even more of a learning experience. This is the single best professional development experience I've had.

Dan Meyer, a Mathematics teacher in California writes:

... blogging was the cheapest, most risk-free investment I could have made of my personal time into my job. You start by writing down things that are interesting to you, practices you don't want to forget. And then you start trying new things just so you can blog about them later, picking them apart, and dialoging over them with strangers. Periods of stagnancy in your blogging start to correspond to periods of stagnancy in your teaching. You start to muse on your job when you're stuck in traffic, in line for groceries, that sort of thing. That transformation has been nothing but good for me and it all began on a free Blogspot blog.

Thousands of other blogging educators could echo similar words. In fact, I've yet to hear anyone who has stuck with blogging suggest it's been anything less than essential to their growth and improvement. I've no "data" to prove this but I'm willing to bet my golf clubs that teachers who blog are our best teachers. If you look at the promise of Professional Learning Communities that our schools have invested thousands, more likely millions to achieve, blogs accomplish much of the same things. The basic idea of the PLC is to have teachers share practice/data and work in teams to make improvements. A good blog does this and more. While the data may not be school specific, great bloggers know how to share data and experience that is both relevant and universal so any reader can contribute and create discussion.

There's a natural transparency that emerges. The teachers who blog as professionals in this reflective manner in my district invite anyone to look into their classrooms and you can get a picture of what happens on a daily basis. This goes a long way in addressing accountability concerns.

Teachers have for years had to fill in a plethora of reports and forms which in essence are accountability papers. For the most part they are of no use to teachers and in most cases aren't very valuable for administration either. Busy work.

So here's my plan. Hire a teacher, give them a blog. Get them to subscribe to at least five other teachers in the district as well as five other great teachers from around the globe. Have their principal and a few central office people to subscribe to the blog and five other teachers as well. Require them to write at least once a week on their practice. Get conversations going right from the get go. Watch teachers get better.

Try that. If it doesn't work after a year, you get my golf clubs.

PS. The only people allowed to criticize or challenge this idea are people who have blogged for at least one year and written at least 50 posts. The rest of you can ask questions but you can't dismiss it.

My three years of blogging and tweeting

For three years, I have made blogging and tweeting the core of my learning. Without a doubt, blogging and tweeting has become the heart and soul of my professional development.

Blogging and tweeting has allowed me to shift my learning from an event done to me to a process that I actively own and engage in almost every single day. My professional development is something I create for myself.

Twitter provides me with an opportunity to share with others that time and distance would normally not allow me to share with. Blogging provides me the opportunity to put my thoughts, questions and beliefs into words.

For the last three years, I've dedicated myself to blogging one piece of content almost everyday. This requires intense reflection.

Once I've shared something with others, they are kind enough to engage me with a comment or a tweet, which allows me to reflect and reconsider my thinking even more. This is invaluable.

In three years, my blog has:

• over 1300 posts
• almost 4000 comments
• over 1 million pageviews

In three years, my Twitter has:

• almost 10,000 followers
• I follow 270 of the coolest people on Twitter
• over 25 000 tweets

Blogging and tweeting has provided me with opportunities to further my learning that without blogging and tweeting wouldn't have likely happened:

• I interact and learn with many people form around the world who share a passion for teaching and learning.
• I co-edited a book on De-Testing and De-Grading Schools: Authentic Alternatives to Accountability and Standardization with Paul Thomas.
• I interact and learn with some of my favorite education authors and speakers.
• I read and write more about education in the last 3 years than I did in my previous 10 years of teaching.
• I receive numerous emails from educators and parents who want to engage in a conversation about how we can change school.
• I keynoted a conference in St. Paul, Minnesota.
• My blog acts as a curator for all the cool stuff I learn. My learning is always at my fingertips.
• I receive invitations to write articles for education magazines and to do radio interviews.
• I hosted a series of professional development events on Skype where I presented through a translator for teachers from Estonia.
• I was appointed to the Alberta Teachers' Associations Strategic Planning Committee.

But most of all, I have developed a network of people that I trust and respect. These connections fuel my learning. I can't overstate how important it is to my learning that I have these connections.

While I can see how all of these connections have influenced my learning, I've come to understand that I will never really know what kind of an impact my sharing will have on others. Sharing is funny that way.

And so this concludes my third year of blogging. I'm going to go off-line over the holidays. That means no Twitter and no blogging.

Happy Holidays!

Why should students blog?

This was written by Pernille Ripp who teacher fifth graders in Madison, Wisonsin. She blogs here and tweets here. This post first appeared here.

by Pernille Ripp

As a proponent of student blogging I am often asked what it "does" for my students. The thing is, it does quite a bit.

Provides them with a voice. Education cannot be done to students anymore, they have to have a voice since it is their lives it effects the most; blogging gives them that.

Gives them an authentic writing audience. The product doesn't end with me and a grade, it is out for the world to see and to continue to be developed. 

 
Puts their place in the world in context. We think our students know how much in common they have with kids their age around the world, but they don't usually. Blogging with those kids and connecting through projects such as the Global Read Aloud brings the world in.

Increases their global knowledge. Again, when you connect with others through your work and words, friendships develop and as does a mutual interest in the lives of one another This is the modern version of penpals.

Instills them with tech saviness and confidence. Blogging teaches my students yet another tool to use and we also use it to showcase other tools we have played around with. They feel confident in their skills as bloggers and it carries into their overall tech approach.

Instills safety rules and measures to be taken whilst online. We drill safety all year and the kids know the lessons by heart. It is our job to teach them how to be safe and the best way to do that is to work with them in situations that could be unsafe if treated the wrong way.

Teaches them how to give constructive feedback. We comment on each others posts but they have to be constructive comments. Blogging is a natural extension of the peer edit.

Teaches them how to have a meaningful written dialogue. When students don't get comments on their posts, we often go back to see why not. Usually they realize it was not written in a manner that invited others to participate in their writing. Revision and reformulating follows.

Cements proofreading and spell check. We don't want the world to see us as a poor spellers or grammatical buffoons.

Expands their geographical knowledge. We pushpin maps with the location of our connections, this sparks more questions, which lead to a deeper relationship between the students and those we connect with. 

 
Furthers their empathy, as well as interest in others. Blogging should not be a solitary experience, but rather one that invites discussion. To have meaningful discussions one must care about others, which is shown through their questions.

Encourages them to view their own writing through a more critical lens. Because we have a portfolio of their writing from the beginning of the year to now, we can go back and see their development. Are they developing as a writer or what do they need to focus on? The stakes are raised because it is not just the teacher that sees their work.

Creates reflective students. Because students are given a mouthpiece to the world, I see them take more chances to reflect on themselves and their choices. It is remarkable to see a student reflect on what grades has taught them or what it means to be a student.

It creates opportunities for us to have fun.

Anonymity

Not all anonymity is born equal.

For the longest time I left my blog open to anonymous comments because I found many of them were from what appeared to be educators who wanted to speak up in an effort to challenge the status quo in favor of progressive education but fearful of reprimand.

Unfortunately, due to multiple unfortunate circumstances and grossly inappropriate comments from unhealthy individuals (cowards) who chose to use anonymity as a cloak of immunity, I can no longer afford to allow anonymous comments.

I've also found my small share of trolls on Twitter. I don't use the block function often because I'm all for disagreement and cognitive dissonance, but when name calling and personal attacks become the standard, you no longer get to clutter my inbox and timeline.

Anonymity can be used to be courageous in the face of oppressive rule but it can also be used to be an asshole.

You know what I mean?

The more you say "you know what I mean" the less you know what you mean.

For me blogging has provided me with a medium to deeply synthesize all of the scientific research and anecdotal evidence that I come across.

It's pleasantly frustrating work that all professionals need to engage in so that they can both act and speak competently about their craft.

Transparency of Tweeting & Blogging

Chris Smeaton is the Superintendent of Holy Spirit Catholic Schools in southwest Alberta. He is one of the few superintendents in Alberta that I know actively Tweets and blogs.
I wish more Superintendents and School Board Trustees would blog and Tweet so that we would all better understand what is on their minds. Ultimately, I want more transparency and more sharing.
Check out this post by Chris Smeaton on Provincial Achievement Tests. Here's an excerpt that got my attention:

So why don’t parents just excuse their children from writing these exams as they legally have the ability to do so? Simple- it impacts the results for the school and system as excused writers count as zero in the calculations. This can be extremely significant and potentially damaging, especially if a small cohort is writing. Those students excused automatically bring down the “rating” without recourse. The focus on those external sources is also why teachers and/or schools use the PAT result for part or all of the final grade. Some students may not necessarily be as motivated to study for a test that means nothing for their own mark. It is a vicious circle!

Ultimately it takes courage to put yourself out their for real on Twitter or blogging. It's a hell of a lot easier to say nothing and wait for others to lead the way. It's infinitely more safe to defend the status quo and wait for someone else to tell you that it's okay to innovate or improve.
It's safer to wait for the memo that gives you permission to change than it is to write your own blog post that demands it of yourself & others.

Twittering and Blogging

Do you blog? Are you thinking of starting a blog?

If you answered yes to either of these questions, then you also need to get to know Twitter.

Here's why.

Unless you are someone like Seth Godin and people already know you and know why they should care about what you have to say, then you have to attract traffic.

Blogging is like hitchhiking. You can stick your thumb out and hope for a ride, but if you're standing in the middle of Siberia, you're likely to stand there for a long time before anyone knows you even exist.

As a blogger, you can have some earthshattering things to say that people should think long and hard about, but if you simply make a blog and wait for the traffic to come, don't be surprised if you are left waiting. The odds of people coming to you because you have something to say are very small. Instead, you have to go to the people with what you have to say.

Twitter allows you to find like-minded people who want to interact on a weekly or daily (or even hourly - but those people have their own set of issues) basis.

Because most teachers are so knee deep in teaching, they don't typically have the time to blog regularly. That means that their blog posts may be released sparadically which can reak havoc on your readers because they aren't likely to visit your blog regulary just to find out that you have no new content. Granted, Google Reader and other RSS feeders can help solve this problem.

By posting on Twitter that you have a new blog post with a link, your followers will know that they can go and check it out. If you don't have many followers, then you need to make sure you send your tweet to a hashtag. For educators, I suggest you use #edchat. And if there are conferences going on like ASCD or a TEDTalk, you can use the hashtags from those events to get your ideas to a far greater audience.

If you are looking to expand your blog's readership, I would strongly suggest you check out Twitter.