Blog Training – NW ECS meeting

The goal of today’s training is to leave you with a basic knowledge of how edublogs.org works and the technology integration possibilities that blogging opens up to you and your teachers. Also, with an idea of how to go about implementing blogging with your teachers. Most of the session will be hands on, so I will post more information than what is covered and some other tidbits here for you to look at later and refer your admin and staff to.

Getting your teachers to ‘buy into blogging’:

1 No papers to grade. The teacher reads the comment and assigns the grade.
2 Discussions that could never be completed during class can be done with a blog.
3 A blog gives the students a voice. It is escpecially powerful for the students who are too shy to share during class. You will see these kids come out of their shells online.

Getting your admin to ‘buy into blogging:

1 No money needs to be spent, the only investment needed is time for professional development.
2 The communication lines between home and school widen.
3 Blogging extends the school day…the discussion doesn’t have to end when the bell rings.

Next Steps:

*Once your admin is on board, get a core group of teachers that are willing to jump in and get blogging with their classes.
*The teachers need to determine how blogging will enhance their curriculum when deciding how to use it. It has to be authentic.
*After you get your core group of teachers blogging, start touching base with someone in their department. Show them what their colleagues are doing.
*You now have a small group of teachers who can now help train others.

Your job: once you have teachers blogging, you will need to check their blogs periodically to see how they are utilizing them. If a teacher is not posting regularly, help them find a way to integrate their current concepts/standards into a new post.

Videos/Presentations promoting online collaboration:
A vision of K-12 students today
A Brave New World Wide Web

Escobedo Classroom Blogs:
Joanna Martino – Algebra
Meredith Allard – US History
Sonja Wooten – Life Science
Susan Dain – English

Other Classroom Blogs:
http://integratingtechnology.edublogs.org/
http://lgeslibrary.edublogs.org/
http://mr-fisher.edublogs.org/
http://africacolony.wordpress.com/ 

Helpful Blogs/Blog Posts:
Blogging with a Purpose
David Truss
Weblogg-ed

Books to read:
Blogs. Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Tools for Classrooms

Online Edublogs Resource:
Edublogs.org
Getting Started Guide
The Edublogger
Video Tutorials