Blogging with Students

[Kevin Graham]

I am currently in the process of creating an in-service course in Moodle on the topic of blogging. I've done a lot of Internet research on the topic and have fleshed out the course pretty well so far. However, I'm currently lacking any good recommendations for student management. Good management techniques that I have so far include reviewing the student AUP and netiquette skills, disallowing anonymous replies, and forcing software moderation of all posts.

Does anyone have any other suggestions? In addition, I’m looking for some good examples of blogs, done by students, that I can use as part of the training.

[Jessica Fries-Gaither]

Hi Kevin,
This sounds like a great topic for an in-service course! We ran an article in the Beyond Penguins and Polar Bears magazine about educational blogging. I don't think we had many other management suggestions besides what you have described, but we did include some sites that provide some safety for student blogging. You might find something interesting on that.

If I find anything else, I'll let you know! Good luck with the course!

[Kevin Graham]

There's some great content there. I'll add the link to my resources. Thank you!

[Kim Lightle]

Kevin - I was reading the May 2009 issue of Learning & Leading with Technology from ISTE last night and found a really good article that speaks to your question. The article is called Giving Reluctant Students a Voice. The article includes Online Forum Standards and has a really neat way of trying to get all students to participate. Kim

[Jessica Fries-Gaither]

Another blog you might be interested in is Using Blogs in Science Education. The author is a high school biology teacher. Looks like she has her students blog - she might be a good source of management info!

[Kim Lightle]

I just read another interesting post on the student blogging question - Why Should Middle School Students Blog?

[Karolee Smiley]

How soon is your presentation?
I have not used blogs much with my students, but I work with a history teacher who uses them frequently with eighth grade students. He has some amazing examples, since he has been doing it for several years.
I believe he has done a presentation and has some general advice on incorporating blogs in the class.

I'll be seeing him in a couple of weeks. I can get some concrete advise from him for you.

[Michelle Hulse]

Kevin,
I am looking for ways to blog with my students. I would like the blog participants to be by invitation only, so that only my students would be using it. My school corporation is extremely paranoid about such things and would frown upon a public blog at this time. It would be nice to be able to put assignments for and receive feedback from my students. Do you know of any site where I can set up such a blog for free or little cost? Would 'Moodle' provide such a site, if I knew how to use it? I am really clueless. I have been in educational computing for 30 years, but this is the first blog that I have ever joined. My middle school is changing to a teaming structure in 3 weeks and at least one other teacher on my team has been asking me to help her set up some sort of program, like the one I described. Can anyone recomend some places I can go to help me get the information and training I need to get started. Like many others my financial resources are non-existent so free is good.

[Todd Williamson]

Kevin,
I recommend starting at a couple of the dedicated classroom blogging services like EduBlogs, 21Classes, and David Warlick's Class Blogmeister. Once there you can search for blogs by grade level/subject and find some in various stages of the progression of blogging. My number one recommendation for teachers considering blogging with their students is to spend time blogging on their own first. I have had my classroom blog for 2 years now and began blogging more about the teaching profession back in January. Until teachers understand the way to develop a community around a blog, there is little chance of them being able to transfer that literacy over to their students. Another recommendation is to comment 4 to 5 times for every post you create. This helps you engage with the larger blogging community and helps you build a reader-base. It is also the best way to begin to stretch your ideas about the teaching and blogging process. Hope that helps!

[Cindy Fallsen]

Blogging can be a rich and interactive way for kids to share on issues. Having them discuss recent issues with Medical insurance, the H1N1 pandemic, or politics can all be educational. Blogging is the way that kids do it these days.

[Kevin Graham]

All of these suggestions have been helpful. I did get a Wordpress MU server up and running for my teachers this summer. So far it's working out well. We still need to do some inservice on the benefits of blogging and get some folks excited about it though. I have a Moodle class set up for them to utilize and we'll also be doing some face to face training as well.

I went with Wordpress MU, rather than an external site, because it allows me the ability to keep out the rest of the world. It's just our kids and their teachers, or a completely open site, whichever we decide we want to do. Moodle will do the same thing but the blog tools, in my opinion, are just not as robust as Wordpress. I'm also using this as a platform for my tech support site. I think the dual role the software can play, as either a blog or a content management system, is an added bonus.