Utilizing Blogs in the Classroom

Last year I taught 7th Grade Career Discovery in the Corinth School District in Mississippi. Integrating technology was a must, considering how much technology is used in the workplace. One of the biggest complaints of local businesses in our area is that students entering the workforce are not properly equipped to use the technology available to them in the workplace. A technology tool that was very beneficial to me, my students, and our learning community was the use of blogs.

One way that I used blogs in the classroom last year was as a student portfolio. Upon completing a project students would post what they learned, any insights or interesting findings from their project, and what they liked most about the project. The students would attach or insert their technology projects into their blogs. This enabled students to share their projects with others (parents, grandparents, and peers).

Students became more conscientious about the quality of their work, knowing that it would be posted on the Internet and also knowing that their peers would be "checking out their work". This was also a great way to encourage writing and reflection for each student. Students began blogging about issues outside of the classroom, happenings in our school, community, and/or casual journalism. I was very impressed at the level of writing the students grew into. They felt empowered to be creative and express themselves in a way they typically would not in a typical classroom setting.

One thing that I would love to incorporate is the ability to have RSS capability. Our district was apprehensive about allowing feedback to students work. This would encourage student and parent interaction with the classroom community.

Richardson, W. (2010). Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms (Third Edition ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Need Help!

Here is a useful website that my school subscribes to. They offer free tutorials too.

www.lynda.com

This site has any tutorial related to computers and technology, it has been very useful to me and my colleagues in our district.

Emily

Welcome To My Blog

My name is Emily J. McGrath and I currently live in MS with my family. Until recently I taught 7th grade Career Discovery, a required tech-prep course, for the Corinth School District. I recently became the Project Director for the MS Tobacco-Free Coalition, a grant funded by the MS State Department of Health. Now I am traveling to schools, K-12, and community events educating students and adults about the dangers of tobacco.

In the past my students and I have created web pages and blogs to use as an electronic portfolio. This was an excellent way for parents and community members to monitor what was happening in the classroom. We actively integrated other core classes into our projects and our blogging. The students relished the fact that their work was being published onto the web for all to see.

By using blogs our students were encouraged to be creative and write to the best of their ability. By using the blogs, students were unaware that they were actually becoming better writers and growing in their writing skills. Because the students did not see blogging as "writing", they unknowingly were using their writing skills and techniques they learning in Language Arts. As many of you know, in MS a 7th grade writing test is administered and I am excited that their scores were much improved.