How Could Blogging Help You?

I think first of all it is important to distinguish what age group you will be teaching. Because I am going into elementary education I will discuss this age group for the most part. I think that blogs can easily be used to involve students. It is an especially great tool because it is interesting for them to participate in. The following list is ideas in which blogging could be used in an upper elementary school setting. This is obviously not an exhaustive list and can easily be added to by others.

• A classroom newsletter - A lot of parents love to know what is going on in their child's classroom, but normal newsletters are not only time consuming, they can cost money to print and copy 30-40 sheets per class for every student's parents. A blog could be a great solution and can easily be updated every week
• A student blog site - To get the students more involved assign each student one week and have them keep a few notes to write on the blog at the end of the week. This allows the teacher individual time with students and will also help the students stay involved in the classroom.
• A calendar - If the classroom you are working in involves a lot of outside help, a calendar of everything for the week or the month could be a great way to keep everyone up to date.
• A group blog site - If you teach a special interest group or club, such as Drama or Art, setting up a group site with pictures of activities, an explanation of your group, any fees involved, and a calendar would be extremely helpful. This allows you the ability to keep in contact with parents and students participating in the group.
• A student journal - With parental permission, students could set up a private blog, on that is secure from search engines and one that people need to be invited to join. Students could use this as their daily or weekly journal. This would allow them to "take home" their journal without worrying if they will remember to bring it back. It also allows them more creative freedom because they will be able to add their favorite pictures and websites. Not only this, but it allows the teacher more freedom because you as a teacher no longer have to drag the journals around, all that is needed is a computer with internet access.

Blogging is a great tool to help students in their education. Children are becoming more and more technologically advanced, and teachers will need to be able to keep up with their students if they hope to relate to them and keep them interested in education and learning. I believe that keeping kids interested in school will be one of the biggest challenges faced by the upcoming generation of teachers.