Chapter 3: Weblogs

I have to admit that I was actually thrown into the whole “blogging world” without having a chance to really know what I was getting into.  There was a push in my school for teachers to find ways to communicate with parents and students through various forms of technology.  My classroom blog was actually set up initially by one of my colleagues who had been blogging for three years.  I never took a course or had professional development on how to use my blog.  My only resource has been and continues to be one of my first grade colleagues, who is very tech savvy and patient!  Of course I was hesitant at first but the incoming first graders were familiar with blogs since each Kindergarten class had their own blog.  Parents were almost expecting the blogs to continue and I knew that it would be a great tool to use in the classroom.  In the beginning, I would basically use my blog as a way to inform the parents about what the students were learning about and to provide educational links.  The parents appreciated the information and said it helped them to initiate conversations at home.  As I have become more comfortable with using my blog I have started to add videos and slideshows.  Most of the videos are from YouTube and are directly related to the curriculum.  For example in mathematics we were learning about shapes and I found a great video about polygons which was created by a third grade class.  The students absolutely loved the video and I posted it on my blog. I have also started to create slideshows of student work, classroom activities and field trips.  The site I use is Kizoa, very user friendly and the free slideshow templates are great! I love my blog but I still find the most difficult part is finding the time to post and to explore all of the amazing things you can do with a blog.