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Blogging is an essential tool for teachers to be using in the classroom because it is something that the students will be using for the rest of their lives. Will Richardson explains in his book, Blogs, Wikis, Podcast, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classroom, that by using weblogs in schools, "they (students) are building relationships with peers, teachers, mentors, and professionals within the Weblog environment," (2009, pg. 20).In my fifth grade social studies class the students will be doing a project called Historical Action Figures. The students task is to take a historical figure from the civil war, create the figure and the box in which the action figure would be sold in, and write a persuasive essay as to why children should buy this historical action figure. The tagline for this project is, "They may be old, but with your help we can get them sold!"
Instead of having the students write the persuasive essay out I could have the students create a weblog in which they are "selling" their action figure and blogging their persuasive speech. Students can respond to each others persuasive blogs and ask question, offer suggestions or idea, as well as leaving overall comments on the actual historical action figure. Instead of just having the students listen to the presentations, they will read why they should buy this particular product (historical action figure) and learn more about these important historical figure in the Civil War. When the students give their presentations in front of the class to show their actual product, the other students will already have background knowledge on the figure from reading and responding to the blogs. It will establish ways for students to interact with one another based on their projects as well as showcase their work.
Furthermore, my third grade class loves writing in their morning journals. What if once or twice a week the students wrote their morning journals using a weblog! They could then respond to other classmates blog. This would be a great way to teach the students how to properly respond to blogs, especially when other people will be reading it.
Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.
I love your enthusiasm about this new type of technology! A potential problem I could see arising is the amount of time you have for your students to write in their morning journals. I do not know how quickly your third graders type but I know that I had mine type a how to paragraph during writing class. On average it took my kids 30-40 minutes! Personally I do not have that kind of time to have them write in their journals. I like that you suggested them only writing on the blog once or twice a week which could help get rid of the long period of time being spent typing. Another suggestion I have would be to have the students start off by writing their morning journal information in school and then during their "free" time allow them to type up their thoughts. I have found that when students have the information already written down it takes them less time to type the information up. If your district does not allow much free time (I understand becauase this is little to non-existent in my district) then try having students type up their morning journal information at home later on that afternoon. By getting students into the habit of using the blog at home. This would encourage students to type their morning journals even before they come to school. This would also get them more involved with the discussion because they would be able to access the information more frequently. I love that you want to get your third graders involved in blogging! I hear so many teachers talk about how third graders are to young. Keep up your enthusiasm!
ReplyDeleteMeghan,
ReplyDeleteWow, you teach 5th and 3rd grade! I absolutely love the idea about "selling" a historical action figure. What a great way for students to begin to "author" their persuasive essays. Comments from other students would, I'm sure, enhance their essay. Also, readiing the essays and comments and then hearing the presenations read aloud would, as you suggested, reinforce content knowledge about the historical figure.
Anticipated Challenge: Would you consider having students post links on their blogs that pertain to their historical characters? If so, how would you manage the links (i.e. would you give extra credit for links. Would you feel you have to monitor the link sites?)_
Kristin,
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree it takes the students a long time to write in their morning journals let alone type on the computer. Perhaps one option would be to assign a topic on Monday and have the students actually write their response in their journal. Tuesday the students can type their response on the blog, and then the rest of the week they can respond to one another. I am not sure that I would do this every week but perhaps this would be a good activity to do once a month. Thanks for your suggestions!
Hi Cristina,
ReplyDeleteI want to give my students a list of approved sites that they can use when they are researching their historical figures. This would allow the students to visit sites that they will be able to get information from and won't be misdirected.
What are your thoughts? Do you think fifth graders can surf the web for information? I am up in the air!
Hi Meghan-
ReplyDeleteYour action figure idea is terrific. How about using the digital still and movie cameras? That could create some great content to share on a blog. A scanner could come in handy,too.
Let the students think outside the "box" literally and figuratively. Maybe their action figure will be packaged in another way?
Just some ideas to get the creative juices going.