Email for Middle School Students

I would like to begin using more Web 2.0 tools in my Middle School Technology program. However, very few of my middle school students have email accounts. This is a problem because without e-mail there a very few resources for them to use such as blogs, wikis, twitter, etc. Is anyone supplying there middle school students with email accounts? Are there any hurdles in doing so? Are you using in house accounts or are using providers such as gmail.com or hotmail.com?

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Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on March 16, 2009 at 8:20am

If you are concerned you might try something like epals.com, you will then be able to monitor. Be sure you have parent and student sign AUP and tell your principal what you are doing and why.

Permalink Reply by Diana Pendleton on April 5, 2009 at 9:30am

We did issue passwords to two English language arts classes and they seem to be handling it well. After spring break we will be getting online with epals through eight teachers who volunteered to use it with 7th and 8th graders. We are really trying to plan for a full implementation of email, blogs, podcasts, and other tools for next school year. It is very exciting because all of our teachers (except 2 or 3) are enthusiastic about "moving into the 21st century". I am sure the last holdouts will eventually get on board!

Permalink Reply by Kathy Strathman on May 3, 2009 at 6:10pm

Nancy - have you used epals personally? I looked at the website and it looks interesting. Would you (or anyone else) know if epals allows the teacher to block the actual email inbox and just use the address to register for websites? Or maybe will it allow the teacher to preview all incoming mail (like comments on a blog) before it gets into the inbox? I have used the google subaccounts, but not every site allows that.

Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on May 3, 2009 at 6:43pm

Kathy, All my students have epals accounts but to tell you the truth we haven't used them enough this year to comment. I'll make a better effort next year.

Permalink Reply by Kathy Strathman on May 5, 2009 at 6:00pm

Thanks, Nancy. I think I may have to pick a class to try it with. I'll need to talk to our IT guy to pull it off! Wish me luck!

Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on May 5, 2009 at 6:15pm

Kathy, It is easy to set up, I mainly wanted it to allow students to recieve authorization codes for different site logins--but I have recently cooled to all the gadgets and gizmos out there and stick to real authentic and high level projects without all the flash. I'd love to do a penpals project (and have considerd it for 15 years) but get so hung up on whether projects are worth my students' time. I want it to be more than "Hi, I'm Natalie and my favorite band is and my favorite color is and my favorite Twilight character is...."

Maybe I'll do an authentic exchange experience before I retire!!

Permalink Reply by meL on March 17, 2009 at 6:22am

Both ePals and Gaggle offer "Safe" emails for students - but as Nancy said, keep everyone in the loop.
There are also email hacks for gmail you can use to create student accounts under your own gmail account - and all email to those are dumped into your email account. Basically, you add the student's name with a plus sign after your gmail name and before the @. For instance, techteacher@gmail.com would use techteacher+student1@gmail.com. I believe there may be a limit as to the number of these you can use with your account.
Again, make sure principals and parents are in the loop and know what you are doing and the purpose. Keep AUPs signed and up-to-date.

Permalink Reply by Diana Pendleton on March 22, 2009 at 1:26pm

We got new website software this year and with it each student got an email address. However, we have not shared this information with students yet. We are still trying to get teachers to use the website. Baby steps...

Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on March 22, 2009 at 5:34pm

Yikes and it's March! Find a few teachers who are ready and go for it, if you wait for everybody gets on board your students will have graduated from college.

Permalink Reply by Eric on March 23, 2009 at 2:29pm

Actually, I'm looking more towards next year than this year.

Permalink Reply by Nancy Bosch on March 23, 2009 at 3:29pm

Eric, I was commenting to Diana--should have mentioned her name.

Permalink Reply by Brian Mannix on May 6, 2009 at 10:37am

Do you have a link to your district's website so that we can see the wikis and blogs and email set-up. I want to integrate Google Apps for education into our school. Any thoughts on that?