As our course comes
to an end, I would like you to now reflect on how you could use a blog in your
future classroom. Please discuss the positives and negatives of a
classroom blog. Would this be a formative or summative assessment?
Could it be adapted for both inclusion as well as gifted students?
At first I was very hesitant to the whole blog concept. But I have really enjoyed them. It forces you to talk to your fellow classmates about material you may not normally address. It always gave me lots of ideas for my future classroom some day. It is a nice space where students can share ideas without fearing that they will be judged since they know the teacher is monitoring them. The negatives are that I found myself answering them directly after class then forgetting what I wrote by the time class rolled around. I feel like students who put off the assignment may also be able to just read their classmates responses and base their answers off that instead of coming up with their own. I would probably use a blog as a formative assessment. But I can also see myself using them as a summative assessment. Blogs can also be used for inclusion or girted students. For example you could use blogs with inclusion students as a space where they could ask the teacher questions. You could also use this with gifted students to have them further develop ideas.
ReplyDeleteAnna,
DeleteI agree with you that by responding to the blog after class I too forget what I wrote by the time the next class rolls around. I would most likely require my students to respond twice a week. I would probably ask them to initially respond to the question on Monday and respond again on Friday, expanding upon their initial comment after gaining content knowledge throughout the week. I love your idea about using a blog as a tool for students who are learning disabled to ask the teacher questions. The students could post to the blog at any time and I could respond at any time. This option is much more favorable then students being embarrassed to ask questions in class in front of their peers. I feel that gifted students would also enjoy posting to a blog because they could challenge each other in addition to me challenging them.
Anna, I agree with the blog allowing an opportunity for students to discuss topics they wouldn’t normally discuss on a daily basis. Blogs are great for shy students who do not like to talk in front of their peers. I’m glad you mentioned about doing the blogs right after class because I found myself doing that as well. It was hard to remember what I wrote, and I rarely went back to see what other people wrote after I had already completed my assignment. Maybe a teacher could post a due date for reflections and then post an additional date for when students can begin responding to others. This way, students would be able to see everyone’s initial reflection and then be able to respond to more than just one student. I also found myself responding to the same person because she would always have hers completed first. As a result, I didn’t get to read other students’ reflections because I was already done with the assignment. I also really like your idea of using the blog to ask a teacher questions. That is a really neat idea and students might be more open to asking a question on a blog rather than in person.
DeleteI could use a blog in my classroom for a variety of assignments. This year our main initiative is to increase reading and writing across the curriculum so a blog would be a great tool. I could see posting weekly articles showing how the current chemistry topic we are learning connects to the real world and have students share their thoughts. For example, I was telling my students on Monday about how tin is used to seal their test tubes in the hospital lab after their tests have been completed. This led to a discussion about how metals are malleable and can be pounded into sheets. It would have been great to post an article or disucssion question regarding that topic and read students' comments. A blog would be a great way to encourage students who are afraid to speak up in class to interact with their classmates. A disadvantage of a blog would be that the teacher would have to monitor the blog for content being posted. I would use the blog as a formative assessment and adapt it for both inclusion and gifted students. A blog would be an excellently way to differentiate within the classroom.
ReplyDeleteRebecca I really like your idea! In my strategies class, our teacher keeps saying that as science teachers, we are also responsible for teaching reading and writing. This is a great way to work that into your classroom especially for students who don't enjoy formal writing projects. I also agree that it is a great tool for students too shy to participate in class discussion. It gives them a voice.
DeleteLike Anna mentioned, as science teachers it can be difficult to think of a creative way to incorporate reading and writing in science. A blog would definitely be a great way to incorporate this into any science curriculum. I also like the idea of using this for current events. Science constantly changes and it is too much for us as teachers to keep track of sometimes, so its great to have the students be able to do their own research and form their own opinions of ideas. And then having the ability to share their thoughts and ideas in a safe environment.
DeleteI think that the concept of a classroom blog could be very useful. It allows to students to post their ideas as well as read and reflect on their peers ideas. It was useful in this class because as future educators, or current ones, we were able to bounce ideas off of one another. I think that if I were to use a blog in my class it would be to further the discussion of a topic, similar to how we use it in our class. It would be a formative of assessment to see what student gained from a certain topic as opposed to a plethora of information.
ReplyDeleteSome negatives would be that if students don't have internet access at home they would need class time to do it. Also, I feel like this might be one more added thing to do for students. With many of them having jobs and apart of extra curriculars it might be difficult for them to keep up with this on a daily or weekly basis.
The blogs purpose can be useful for gifted or learning disabled, because students would be able to provide as much or as little information as they would like. As long as their answers show they have understanding of that topic they could get credit for it.
For the positives of a classroom blog, I would say that it keeps the students active in the classroom discussion. Also, as the teacher for the class, I would be able to drive the direction of the discussion. For the negative aspects of the blog, I would say that having it be worth points makes it a little bit of a hassle for the students as they have to respond to each other and the first person to post has to post twice. I would use a blog as an out of class way to communicate with both the students and myself rather than use it as an assignment. The blog, if I had decided that it would be worth points, would most likely be a formative assessment due to the fact that formative assessments are defined as "all those activities undertaken by teachers, and/or by students, which provide information to be used as feedback to modify the teaching and learning activities in which they are engaged." Again if the blog was going to be used as an assignment, then I would have adaptations for inclusion and gifted students. The adaptations may be small, such as changing the rubric to allow for more spelling and grammar errors, or might be larger, like assigning specific questions in the blog to answer rather than the whole thing.
ReplyDeleteAfter using a blog for our course, I believe it would be beneficial to try it in my own classroom. Blogs, just like anything else, have positive and negative aspects. A blog is a great tool for teachers to use in order to formatively assess their students on content learned in the classroom. It can be used as immediate feedback after a lesson. I’m thinking that a teacher could even use it as an exit-ticket before the class ends. Then, the teacher could review the blog posts and use it to drive instruction for the following day. Also, it provides students who do not feel comfortable talking in front of their peers to voice their opinions about a topic and still be heard. Another advantage of using a blog is it allows students to practice responding to a prompt. Students are expected to respond to various questions and prompts on the Keystone exams. Therefore, I believe this is a perfect opportunity for students to practice this essential skill. Lastly, blogs are a great way for students to collaborate with each other and respond to each other’s ideas and comments. To the contrary, blogs also have disadvantages. The teacher would constantly need to monitor the blogs to make sure inappropriate comments are not being posted. Also, valuable class time would need to be used to address “blog etiquette” in order for students to understand how to use the blog appropriately. Sometimes, teachers do not have the extra time to do this because of all the content that needs to be covered. In addition, if students do not have Internet access at home, they would not be able to complete the blog assignments. Special arrangements would need to be made with the student to come in early to school or stay after to complete the blog if time is not given during class.
ReplyDeleteAs far as using it in my classroom, I would use the blog as a way to bring in science articles or current events into the classroom. One student would be assigned to find an article each week and post a summary and the link to the article. The other students would have to comment on their summary with their own thoughts about the article. Once again, this would be a great way for student collaboration.
A blog could most definitely be adapted for inclusion as well as gifted students. The content would be the same; however the expectations may be a little different. For example, an inclusion student could be given an article to focus on by the teacher and may have highlighted areas that he or she is supposed to include in their summary. For the gifted students, they could not only post a summary of the article, but also think of a question to pose for the rest of the class to comment on as well.