Help out a Rookie?

I am a special education teacher and currently teach a 4/5 grade class of anywhere from 6-9 students with emotional disabilities. I would love to incorporate more technology into my classroom. I have 3 computers, an ELMO and a projector. I have been reading some posts and it seems like blogging is a good place to begin, however how do I incorporate a blog into my lesson if my students do not have internet access at home- do I just give them time during class to blog? Will this take away from the experience? Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

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Permalink Reply by John Sowash on June 27, 2010 at 8:29pm

There are a couple of ways to blog in your classroom.

The simplest is for you to setup, manage, and write the blog posts and simply have the students view and comment on them. They can access them from school or from home, if they have web access.

A second way is to setup and manage the blog, but choose students to write posts based on what you do in class. Keep in mind that blogs are no longer just written journals. You can include video, audio, and pictures. Perhaps you can interview some of your students for a post or scan in their artwork to post. This gets everyone involved, but in an orderly, manageable fashion. With only three computers in your classroom, this is probably your best option.

The third and most labor intensive method of classroom blogging is to give each student a blog and incorporate blogging as a regular part of your instruction. No more written assignments, everything goes on the blog! You need access to computers for everyone on a regular basis and a strong commitment to the project if you want to take this on!

I would recommend option #2 above. Check out the classroom blog of Karen Bosch who is also a 5th grade teacher. You might be inspired!

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Permalink Reply by Neroli Gilmour on June 27, 2010 at 9:04pm

Hi Trish,

Firstly I admire your skill, talent and patience in being a special education teacher. I take my hat off to you. I agree blogging is great especially for the teacher. You can gather a lot of ideas and suggestions from people who have trialled various ideas it in their classrooms. Make sure you find some great bloggers out there who have taken a lot of the research hassels away from you.

Blogging in a classroom must have a real sense of purpose for the students. It is a lot of work that can reap many rewards, but can easily fade fast if the students can not see the reason why. You need to keep this in mind. I found that students who did not have the internet at home did not connect well with the blogging exercises. They did not see the relevance or purpose in completing the tasks.

On a positive note having a "cluster map" inserted on my blog or a counter really helped the kids in seeing that their work was worthwhile and useful around the world. They loved seeing the numbers going up.

Might I suggest that you look at some other Web 2.0 tools also. Please feel free to check out my school ICT blog for some ideas of some web 2.0 tools that you start off with to gain interest with the kids.

Hope this helps in a small way. I wish you luck in your teaching.

Neroli