I feel like I am getting a better understanding on how to use blogs in my classroom. Truthfully, I keep this blog (because I have to) and we are doing a 6th grade events blog at school, but neither one of them feel like effective blogs to me. I am hoping to change that as the weeks go on. I do think blogs are a great way to get kids writing and collaborating, but I do feel like my kids still need lots of guidance when it comes to blogging.
Now when it comes to Wikis.... I am lost. We do have a staff Wiki at school where people can share things they find interesting. We have had it for 2 years and there are maybe 8 things on the wiki. 3 of which I have added. I understand that Wikis are used to share information, but I never thought of using them with my students. I liked a lot of the ideas in the book on how to use wikis an I enjoyed looking at some of the sample wikis available, but I don't think I would use both blogs and wikis in my classroom. If I had to choose I would rather have my students blog, but maybe the more I learn about wikis and if I actually tried it with my students I would change my mind.
Overall, I love all of these new ideas, but I don't have the time to implement them all. I see my students for 30 minutes in technology every other day and 50 for reading. We have so many things to cover in that short time frame as it is. I have noticed this year with the blog we needed a few class periods just to figure out how to use it let alone the class time we need to contribute to the blog. I wish I could do everything we learn about because I do think they are effective for students, but there is never enough time in the day!
You are right, there is never enough time to get it all in. So I have chosen to pick and chose things that I feel I can introduce and maintain. A blog for me would be much easier to maintain than a wiki. When it comes down to it ask yourself if you would rather focus on the Wiki with the staff or working out a blog with the students. It may take some time to get your blog started, but as a routine is learned and practice.....it will only take a few minutes for the students to maintain and blog. Could be easy after some practice!
ReplyDeleteI agree that the blog is much easier to keep track of and use compared to a wiki. I don't know that my students have the writing ability, nor do we have the lab/computer time, for them to be updating it as they should. I could see using it as a classroom resource place since we don't have textbooks for some areas or somewhat older books in others. If I would think about doing one, it wouldn't be for quite some time, and definitely not until our curriculum gets all worked out with all the new Common Core and essential outcomes.
ReplyDeleteSome of the people I am following on Twitter are:
Jane Lowe @janelowe
Lisa Johnson @ComputerExplore
Elizabeth Armenio @LizArmenio
Alison Anderson @tedrosececi
Valerie Ruckes @valruckes
Silvia Tolisano @langwitches (I really like her blog)
We Are Teachers @WeAreTeachers
Cathy Mere @CathyMere
edutopia @edutopia
Vicki Davis @coolcatteacher
These are all pretty good. I don't do much but check their tweets over for new resources. I have actually come across a few nice blogs that address some of the things we have been talking about in class. I usually "retweet" their posts if I find them useful, but that is the extent of my "tweeting". I spend a few seconds on it at a time to just skim the new tweets. I definitely want to keep my list short so that I don't miss anything worthwhile because I am overwhelmed with nonsense.