All four rooms are now up and blogging and I have had a chance to reflect about why I am getting them to use the blog. It is amazing how keen most of the students are when they first start to blog. The novelty of the tool makes them want to participate more in class activities. I am confident that scribe and growing posts will keep the activity hopping at the blog. In years past this is all that the students have used the blog for. I think it is time to shake things up. I will allow students to post blogs about math or their other subjects this year. If a student wants to publish work for Language Arts or Social Studies and Science the blog will be available for them. I want them to interact frequently. I will also promote the use of the blog to be a space where students can post self help posts about the concepts taught in class.
My Nintendo experience is about to take off. I am going to allow the student to use the DS units over the lunch hour to start with. The only stipulation will be that we will create a cheat for students. I want them to think about how to put into words what is needed to win the levels on the games. When the think this process through they should be better problem solvers. I do not want to kill the fun of the game so the ratio of play to write will heavily favour the playing.
I am looking for classrooms to collaborate with if any readers are interested?
I am also looking forward to K12 online. It is nice this year to be a learner instead of a presenter. I am really excited to get the rest of my Grade 8 team to be involved learning in the lab with me. This might be the start of something terrific.
Thanks for reading.
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