Looking for Partners
13 10 2008I recently introduced some of my fifth grade teachers to blogging and got the and their classes set up with Wordpress blogs that are hosted here on our server. Welcome Steve Hanlin, Noreen Croyle, and Timber Monteith to the blogosphere. No biggie right? Right. But this one little statement by Noreen Croyle was enought to realize that I had done something. I had gotten through. Her comment,
“When you started talking about the conversations, the comments students could leave for one another and how they would probably, without much prompting for me, start dialogging about school got me. That is where you hooked me”
I couldn’t help but think of the scene in Jerry McGuire, you know where he is standing there at the end and Renee Zellweger says , “You had me at hello.” I have been really been trying to cover two main topics when I introduce kids to their blogs for the first time. First, the need to be safe online. We adhere here more or less to the COPPA standards for internet safety at SAS so that means using good common sense when posting. The usual rules apply here much they do for any of you out there reading who deal with students k-12-No full names, no home directions or anything close, pictures need to be checked first to see if parents have decided that their child’s image should no get posted online, etc. etc. Secondly, I stress the difference between quality and quantity. Hell, this is something I struggle with when it comes to blogging myself. What makes a good blog post? What makes a good comment? What types of comments are appropriate? The kids in 5th grade love to get comments and to leave them too but I have to warn them that it is not about competition. You might have 120 comments telling you “You Rock!” but is this the conversation we want to have? Is this the image of your intelligence you want to put forth? These questions usually get some good dialog going with the classes and I feel 5th grade is a great time to start these types of conversations if not sooner.
As always, I digress (quantity vs. quality). Back to the title of this post. So I have three classes in different stages of using their blogs, all three would love comments from you but moreover, your students if you are in the classroom. They don’t mind if your class wants to connect with them but are in a different grade level.
