Wednesday, March 10, 2010
The Use of Blogs in the Classroom
While it would definitely be challenging for me to incorporate weblogs into my classroom, I could definitely see the benefit of using it. Since most of the lessons that I teach are movement oriented (Physical Education), I could create a Class Portal as described in Will Richardson's book "Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms." In his book, he explained how "weblogs can be created to communicate information about the class and archive course material...at a much lesser cost than systems such as Blackboard." I figure that I could easily incorporate this into my classroom setting, considering that I teach grades K-5. Students and parents could use this weblog to find out current classwork assignments, homework assignments, rubrics, course curriculum, class syllabus, class rules, and handouts about upcoming events. I often find it difficult to find time to communicate with parents about their students progress and answer any questions that they may have, so this would be a possible solution...maybe setting up a FAQ section would help (a.k.a. frequently asked questions).
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David, I think you have come up with a really useful way to incorporate blogs in your Physical Education discipline. I think many parents do not have a good understanding of what comprises a PE curriculum: which standards are covered, which concepts of health and nutrition are incorporated, or the rationale behind the activities in which the students engage. Having this on a blog would allow parents and students to learn more about PE, while being able to view any announcements, assignments, and events.
ReplyDeleteOne extra challenge you might consider is adding links to your blog of websites that offer parents and students further information on fitness and nutrition. The links could include insight on how to encourage children to get more exercise or ideas for healthy activities they can do together.
Web links on fitness and nutrition on a classroom blog would be great. So many of our kids are over weight and out of shape. Kids don't play games outside like when I was coming up. They don't even have recess anymore. Schoolyards are now parking lots. I would love to see gym teachers encouraging children on a blog to do more exercise at home and students blogging what activity they did.
ReplyDeleteI like Rodney's idea of having students blog about exercise and activities they do outside of school. By learning about your students' activities, you could tailor your links to their interests. For example, if some students like to ride bikes, you could post links to best bike rides or trails in your area. Maybe you could even set up a game, similar to geocaching, encouraging students to try different activities.
ReplyDeleteThe only problems I can forsee with having some of my students blog is that they are so young that they may not understand how to blog, or their parents may not let them blog. I guess those are problems that many of us would experience though.
ReplyDeleteDavid, It is a challenge to incorporate blogs in the classroom with very young students. However, you can start your blog as an informational blog for parents and students, and gradually increase opportunities for student interaction. Do you teach the same students year after year (Do you cover several grades of PE?)? As the students get older, they can begin interacting more with the blog.
ReplyDeleteI like Christina's idea of posting links to bike trails!
I think using a blog as a communication tool is very good especially for students of a younger age. Their parents can keep up with the happenings and goings on of class. I think that maybe the blog can be used to supplement extra information that you might not get time to cover in class. Special Opportunities, cool articles, extra stretches, interesting new games, etc. Could be cool
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