Change My World

This blog has been sadly neglected over the last few weeks, but I haven't been idle. I have been busy writing a 'how to blog' blog for the teachers of my ICT Cluster.

You may find it interesting and in some cases helpful - take a look at
Cogs for Blogs

and feel free to ask questions or leave comments.

I am passionate about learning.

My love affair with ICT is because I truly believe it really does enhance learning and allows students different learning styles to experience success, which hopefully will lead on to higher self esteem, empowerment and a love for learning knowing that they will succeed.

I have been thinking about how this relates to student blogs and blogging in the classroom. For some time now I have been looking for examples of blogging in the classroom, especially looking for those with real and full evidence of classroom learning. As I read student and class blogs and I have to say that in many cases I have difficulty identifying the learning involved. I always ask myself what is the learning here, and often I am stumped.

I believe class blogs should have real purpose and that the owner of the blog (usually the teacher) is quite clear as to the purpose. I can really only think of 2 purposes - 1. to celebrate learning and 2. to show process, progress and achievement of learning.

It is easy to find blogs in the first group - to celebrate learning. These are the blogs serve the purpose of a digital newsletter to that show what has been happening in the school or classroom during a particular period.

However, to find blogs that show process, progress and achievement of learning is a little more difficult. An adult is able to make links between posts and to develop an issue across several posts. I'm not saying that a child cannot do this, but in many cases the blogs deteriorate as the child is unable to focus on the clear purpose of the blog.

In order to help students focus on the learning, the blog should have a clear and defined purpose and once this purpose is no longer needed (the unit of work is finished, the learning has moved on to a different area) then the blog should also finish. An example would be a student who was investigating a topic for science fair or conducting a novel study. The blog will show the process of the investigation, the progress of the learner and the outcomes of the learning, but when that investigation finishes and reflection is complete then the blog sits idle.

It's all about purpose for writing - a very important deliberate act of teaching.

• I hope that this inspires other grown ups and kids to make a difference in their communities too, by doing little things. For this reason, I am challenging everyone who reads this blog to TRY to do something every single day during the holiday season to make a difference in his or her world. Even if you can’t do something every day, you can do one small thing to help make your world a better place.

All power to you Laura.

It's been a while since I last posted - I have got seriously caught up in the end of year panic - milestones, variations, reports, annual reviews, etc, etc, etc.

I wanted to share this video on 'Blogs in Plain English' by Lee Lefever. It is great for pd with beginners. I used it with a group recently and and it really set the scene.

I have been investigating the learning behind the blogging experience, and using blogging to support learning. In the course of this study, I have been trying to find excellent examples of student blogs, especially with younger students. Many examples I found were really chat sessions and often not containing very good examples of excellence in English.
We decided to try our hand at creating our own, and came up with the idea of blogs to support our reading programme.
The students are working in Literature Circles and these are published to a blog for a real worldwide audience. Much excitement buzzes around the classroom whenever anyone receives a comment and the clustr map is eagerly checked every morning.
The children do publish all the blogs to a secure site first, and then the teacher loads them onto a blogspot site. (We are still a little nervous about privacy and net safety).
If you are interested take a look at our current blog listed below - and many more to come soon.
I would love your feedback, and thanks to all those who have given feedback - you have really made a child's day!!!

The Diary Of Anne Frank

After this positive experience with this group of students, I was thrilled to discover that some had taken on blogging into other realms of their learning.
Just take a look at Cheyenne's Science Fair blog. Here is a young lady of 11 years old who is recording her progress and process of her science fair investigation in a blog. She has done this completely on her own, at home, without the assistance of (but of course with great encouragement from) her teacher.
Please take the time to leave her some feedback.

Now the challenge is to find blogging ways to support learning in other areas.
I would love to hear your ideas.

For some time now I have been looking at how blogging can support and enhance learning.

I have started a blog for a group of Y7 (10 year olds) who are studying The Diary of Anne Frank in their class.
They are using literature circles to read The Diary of Anne Frank.
During the course of this literature circle, students will take on the roles of:

Discussion Director
Summariser
Character Mapper
Creative Connector
Word Wizard
Illustrator
Correspondent
Travel Tracer

They meet regularly to discuss and debate issues and understandings from their set reading. They will take a different role after each literature circle meeting.

This is very new to them and they need a lot of support and scaffolding, but hopefully by the middle of the year they will be able to produce their own blogs in an authentic classroom context.

You can find their work on thediaryofannefrank.blogspot.com

They would love to get your feedback.

I was reading Will Richardson's blog entitled Technology is the Devil in which he referred to a Time magazine article on Web 2.0. This article gives data on the low participation in Web 2.0 websites such as YouTube and Wikipedia as compared with visitors who are passively reading those sites. I'm not concerned with numbers of people who upload. I don't think you need to be an active uploader to participate and collaborate. If you are reading blogs or wikis, or are viewing videos YouTube you are part of the collaborative community. Not everyone needs to post their thoughts and ideas on the internet. Reading a blog has lead to many animated and intense discussions in the staffroom and therefore is making an impact and facilitating change in the way people think and act.
I don't think that reading has to be a passive activity. The thoughts and ideas formed from reading can lead to action and big changes.
I don't think it is imperative that we write blogs - but it do think it is important to read them.