If you've surfed the Internet recently, you probably have not gone very far without coming across a blog. Whether you're looking for information about sports, music or the latest gossip, look hard enough and you are certain to find a blog about your subject. Like many other programs, blogs can serve as useful tools in the education field. Blogs can even help someone like me, a fifth grade teacher in a small low income area in Tennessee.
What I like most about blogs is they give you the ability to not just receive information, but to also give responses. I like the idea of using blogs to help my fifth-graders with their writing. Students could post work they have written in response to a prompt. Students can make comments, suggestions and recommend necessary corrections for other student's work. My students often have trouble seeing their own mistakes, but recognize the mistakes in their peer's writing.
Higher order thinking questions have been a huge emphasis at my school. Teachers are asked to challenge students to use their higher order thinking skills in preparation for more demanding achievement tests. Blogs could be used to facilitate such learning. I would use blogs to continue a discussion about a particular topic in Social Studies or Science. After a lesson in class I would post some of these higher order questions and ask students to respond with their thoughts. I would also ask them to respond to a select number of their peers providing some insight.
The possibilities seem endless. Blogs can be a great tool for educators if used appropriately!
Your ideas for using blogs in the classroom sound great! I especially like the idea of using them to facilitate peer-editing. I find that my high school students still struggle to edit their own work, so it is great to get them in the habit of asking someone else to review it for them.
ReplyDeleteOne suggestion I have for your second idea, using blogs to emphasize higher order thinking, is to provide rubrics for student responses. Richardson (2006) notes the importance of students knowing what is expected of them before they publish their posts. This will also make grading easier for you!
Richardson, W. (2006). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
Hi. I agree with Megan. Giving students a rubric to guide their responses will make it easier for them and for you. I also suggest doing a lot of practice about appropriate responses to someone's work. One way to help guide this is to arrange a format for responses, such as "two stars and a wish." The two "stars" are for two positive comments about the author's work. The "wish" is for something that the responder wishes the author would focus their attention on or give more information about.
ReplyDeleteGreat ideas Erin and Megan. I use rubrics quite a bit in my classroom but never considered them for a blog. I think they will work great there.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I know fifth graders sometimes can say harsh things. The idea for a rating system is excellent. This takes away any opportunity for rude comments in response to a student's work. Thanks!
Hello. I want to eventually use blogs for peer editing for my middle school students. We have a school and district literary fair coming up in March, and everyone must make a submission in my class, although only a few will actually make it to the fair. Blogging could be very valuable in this sense, but I want students to feel comfortable enough to critique each other's work online. They already know that their comments need to be both comlimentary and constructive, and I believe that working online may be more fun and more conducive than working on paper. There is one problem for some of my 8th graders, though, who are ELL - do you think that typing in English as opposed to writing by hand will be easier?
ReplyDeleteAs to the higher-order thinking skills part of your post, yes, I think rubrics are important, but for an initial post I think it may be alright just to ask students to write a draft. You can then check to see where they are in terms of typing (whether they are using texting language, for example) and in terms of how specific they are in responding. Sort of like an ungraded overview of what they know how to do on the computer.
Ms. Tanner,
ReplyDeleteI think typing in English should be about the same as writing by hand. I have only a small amount of experience with ELL students, but I don't see the computer being a huge obstacle. Students are very familiar with the computer, even ELL students.