Friday, July 19, 2013

E. Peterson - Impressions of Russell Street School

I checked out classroom 9. My initial reaction was "Whoa!" The involvement from students, parents, and teachers seems to be phenomenal. Like others have mentioned, there has to be a true dedication from the community for these blogs to be effective. It definitely seems like this is the case. The other part of the "Whoa!" comes from the fact that the blogs are a bit crazy. They have a lot of information on them and some sites are designed much better than others. Although I think this has to do with the fact that the gets get to customize their blogs. (I think)

My biggest question is, how is every student getting the opportunity to post on their blog? Do you they do it at home? or in the classroom? And what if someone doesn't have Internet or a computer at home? And how much time are they spending uploading projects to their blogs? I would love to learn more about this school and how they maintain their blogs. It seems like they rely on this blog to show the parents, as well as the community, their progress in class. I wonder how long they have been implementing this? It seems to be working great for them!

4 comments:

  1. Emily, certain classes do feature the blog as a more central than other classes. I do know that as the students get older, as well as specific rooms, are known for their additional blogging or additional focus on their blogging.

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  2. Emily,

    Your logistics questions is a good one. I have been thinking about doing something similar, but I don't have access to a mobile lab every day in my classroom. I would have to rely on the students having computers at home or making sure that I have a computer lab at least a few times a week for them to upload their work and view the online updates. If they have a computer for every child, this becomes less of an issue, but one computer per child is not an inexpensive venture.

    Jeremy

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  3. Emily,

    I had similar questions about how they maintain they're blogs. I am wondering if they get a set amount of time in a library period etc.

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  4. Emily, maintenance is an important consideration!

    My class used blogging last year(not NEARLY to this extent!)and we incorporated into our day as part of our reflections.

    We were very fortunate to have 1-to-1 Chromebooks in my classroom, so I was able to integrate these activities without having to book a lab. My students did do some blogging at home (not too much), and the one student that did not have internet access at home, took it upon herself to use the Public Library to go online to blog.

    I worried about time, until I looked at the outcomes blogging was actually addressing. Depending on how they are set up, they can be an investment in cross-curricular projects, meet technology outcomes and teach relevant communication skills.

    Thanks for the thought-provoking questions!





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