Hi teachers!
This blog has been created as a forum for you all to reflect on your teaching and share ideas!
In tomorrow's workshop, I'll first demonstrate how to create a blog using blogger.com, then we'll discuss ways of using blogs to enhance your classes.
If you're interested in creating a blog for your class, but don't know where to start, here's a great website that shows how to create a blog step-by-step and goes through some of the features: http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/newBlogger/index.html.
Here's a great video that was produced by a group of high school students discussing why they enjoy using blogs and what the advantages of them are.
After watching the video, please respond with comments reflecting on ONE of these questions:
- Of the "top ten" reasons to use blogs in the classroom mentioned by the students in the video, which do you think are relevant to our classes and why?
- How do you think using blogs or wikis in our classes could improve the quality of instruction?
- What issues do you forsee in implementing a blog into your classes?
- Have you ever used a blog in an education setting, whether as a teacher or a student? What was your experience like?
I think it may be difficult to get the students to consistently use the blog. They might be interested in it at first, but then they might get bored and stop checking it.
ReplyDeleteMy first semester here I started blogs for all of my classes and it failed miserably :-/ i think it could be an excellent outlet for students to practice English and discuss cool topics with their classmates, but i don't think it would work with all classes or all students.
ReplyDeleteI think blogs would be a good idea for mini written homework assignments. I think it is a good way to get students to send in quick sentences on an idea you post for them for homework. I have never blogged for a class, but I knew teachers that did use them for peer editing purposes. The only issue with this was that some partners waited until the last minute to post something and so the other partner was basically left with nothing to edit, resulting in zeros for both of them.
ReplyDeleteI could see this being a very good tool for certain classes, especially those who are self-motivated and eager to learn. The comment in the video about not being able to pay attention in class brought up a concern, because I can see some of my students tuning out if they know they can just read it later online. Hence, I think I would use the blog more for extra links and information for those who are interested. One other quick comment: not all of my students have computers at home, which is another reason I would hesitate to make this a requirement.
ReplyDeleteI think Laura has a good point. The blog should be used for extra activities and aids for learning should the student want to take the extra effort. Making it mandatory would be difficult for some students to participate in and also putting the class material on there might give students insentive to not come to class as regularly. However I think it´s a great place to post questions and share info to improve outside the classroom
ReplyDeleteOne difficulty I think we'd have might be with a divide of the class between "technophiles" and "technophobes". It would certainly enhance the learning experience for many students - especially younger, Internet-friendly students - but I'm certain some of our mature students would reject the idea all together. I agree that it should only be used for supplementary material.
ReplyDelete