Blogging with the Little Ones

Now that I've started to become familiar with the technical aspects of blogging, it's time to get to some content!

I work in a primary school with students in grades K-2.  So many of the great resources and ideas out there are for upper elementary, middle, and high school students.  At first, I though it would not be possible for my young learners to fully incorporate blogs.  I thought I would have to begin with more basic skills (i.e. having students comment on another blog).

Then I found Mrs. Wideen's Blogging Maniacs.  Here, Mrs. Wideen has set up a class blog with her 1st and 2nd grade students through a resource called KidBlog.  One of my students recently told me about KidBlog, so I decided to look it up myself.  It's a great kid-friendly blogging tool, and best of all, it's FREE!  Just looking at some of the individual posts gives the reader a great idea of how blogs are used in the classroom.  There are a cluster of student posts about deserts, so I'm assuming that was a prompt students answered.  However, there are other posts as well.  One student posted about a bracelet she made in a rainbow loom.  Another posted about something he had done in MineCraft.  My favorite post, however, can be found here.  This student dictated his plan to stay calm at recess, and the response was posted to his blog.  While he has no comments, it can be assumed that everyone in his class has access to this post.  What a great idea to get students involved in supporting this student!  Now, when he has a great day at recess (which at this point is probably not the norm), students can celebrate with him and congratulate him on the use of his strategy.  This is SO much more reinforcing than other strategies.  The classroom teacher also has her own blog and a class twitter account.  According to her blog, Mrs. Wideen is proud of having a classroom without walls, and this is evidenced by the fact that I have access to her blog and feel like I am getting to know her students.

Mrs. Wideen was mentioned in another blog post on Edutopia that I found through a google search (Introducing Social Media to Elementary Students).  This post summed up many of the struggles with implementing blogging with our youngest learners.  I especially liked the point the author made about "social media" in our time.  She writes:

If we honestly think about it, we were all taught the "social media" of our time in early elementary school. Remember the friendly letter? How about thank you notes? Telephone etiquette? In early grades, none of us were expected to master these skills independently, but they were integrated into our curriculum so that effective social behavior could be modeled at a young age.

This is a GREAT point about social media.  While few of us were actually writing letters in elementary school, we all learned how to do so.  Students still learn to write friendly letters in primary grades, but what are they more likely to need to know how to do?  Write a letter?  Or read and write to a blog?

There's a great deal to be discussed with respect to this particular blog post.  I might even continue discussing it in my next post.  If you have the chance, skim through it and let me know what you think in the comments below!  Got additional ideas for blogging with the little ones?  Share it with a comment!

The Biggest Blog Challenge

I've set up my blog.  I've created an account and used a custom template.  I set  up my RSS feed and gadgets on the side.  So what was the hardest part?


I think many (including my sister, Sarah) would agree: the hardest of setting up a blog is creating the title.  It needs to be both clever and genuine, fun and intelligent.  The title of a blog needs to hook potential viewers in with promises of what is to come.  How do you accomplish this feat with a few words or a short phrase?  More importantly, how do you find a name for your domain that hasn't yet been claimed?  And what's worse - websites like blogger require you to name your blog before you have done anything with design or posts, and this title is difficult to edit once it is set!

Last night, Sarah sat with me for two hours trying to think of the perfect name.  She tested out everything, from the boring (A Day in the Life...), to the very silly (The Woof Pack), to what she finally decided on, (Diary of a Wet Nose).  Now, as I sit here typing this post, she is over here agonizing over the tagline for her blog (she's using WordPress - they require not only a title, but a tagline before you can even set up your blog).

Originally, I named my blog Ms. Eaton's Resource Room.  It was a name I had used in the past for websites and projects for grad school.  I liked it because it had a dual-meaning.  As a special educator, I work in a pullout resource room with students.  However, I had intended my blog to be a collection of resources and information for parents, students, and teachers alike.  Then, I realized I was working with the wrong audience in mind.  This blog is intended for colleagues in a class, as well as anyone else who wants to read it, and it's about learning to blog, with the end goal of using blogs in the classroom to help my students learn.  And so, with much deliberation, I came up with my current title.

What about you?  Did you find naming your own blog to be difficult?  How did you finally decide?  Leave me a comment and let me know!

Weblogging to Learn

As Will Richardson (2010) states, "Just as writing teachers should write, and literature teachers should read, teachers who use blogs should, well, use blogs" (p. 43).

To me, this is a profound thought!  I have often thought about ways to incorporate blogs into my teaching, but I was always missing this key step.  I have limited blogging experience, with the exception of my teenage online journal.  But if I want to use blogs in my classroom, I need to have experience with my own blogs first!  So here goes.  My first attempt at a regularly maintained weblog.

I am fortunate enough to have my fiance and my sister joining me in this learning experience.  Oddly enough, right before I started this class, my sister decided to start a blog of her own based on her passion; dogs.  So, while I am working on this blog, she is in the process of setting up her own.  Stay tuned for photos! :)

With that introduction, I am pleased to announce the opening of my blog, where I will be learning to blog, and blogging to learn!

For further reading, check out the following!

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