Utilizing Blogs in My Classroom

The purpose of using a blog in my classroom is to give the students another platform for showcasing their ideas and opinions about financial concepts we cover in class.  Blogs serves to enhance as well as deepen learning. (Richardson, 2010). It can also can help advance student’s reading by more clearly, being critical and analytical. In addition, it would allow me to do something I do not, and that is provide my students with a wider audience for their writing and expanding their audience also creates an opportunity to develop a stronger relationship with their peers and perhaps other teachers, parents and community members. (Richardson, 2010). A blog is free your students to use and has a pasting permanence without the fear of getting lost.

I teach personal finance, SAT prep. Adding blogging to my educational teaching arsenal is very worthwhile because I feel my students are being exposed to financial concepts that they will not need at the young age of 15 or 16. I believe that the most important people in their life at this point are their parents, who are fully engaged with saving and investing their money and all the caveats for being financially responsible.  One of ways I want to enhance what I do is involve their parents in what they are learning during the day. Blogging will allow parents to subscribe to their blogs, read what their child has written in real time, and most importantly offer comments and insight making our classroom a collaborative space with valuable input from outside our four walls. (Richardson, 2010). One recommendation that I want to adopt is having student create infographics through Piktochart for example, to support, enhance and highlight the ideas expressed in their writing combining new and motivating reasons for students to write (Rogers, 2015).

Lastly, incorporating blogging in our classroom will meet two distinct ISTE Standards for Teachers, facilitating and inspiring student learning and creativity as well as model digital age work and learning (Standards for teachers. (n.d.)). If students are given more choice as to what to write about they will become more inspired. Blogging could be a part of what they will do in the workforce.  For the students, two standards will be achieved, students will feel empowered, having more say on what to write about and having their responses be read by others as well as be knowledge conductors, producing creative artifacts to enhance their learning (Standards for students. (n.d.)).

References:

Richardson, W. (2010).  Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and other powerful web tools for classrooms (3rd ed.).  Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.

Rogers, J. rogers. jonathan@iowacityschools. or. (2015). Five Easy Ways to Bring Blogging to Your Classroom. English in Texas, 45(2), 38–40. Retrieved from https://ezp.waldenulibrary.org/login?url=https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eue&AN=111954149&site=eds-live&scope=site

Standards for Students. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2019, from http://www.iste.org/standards/standards/standards-for-teachers

Standards for Teachers. (n.d.). Retrieved January 16, 2019, from http://www.iste.org/standards/standards/standards-for-teachers

Welcome to my first post ever!

Well, here I go and I ain't taking any hostages except you, the readers!

I am not new to education and education is nothing new to me. I began my teaching career as some of the latest and greatest technologies were about to be relegated to the Smithsonian. Does anyone remember you could make copies by simply turning a hand-crank? The crank was attached to a spirit duplicator. I remember it was as much fun as my mom's old fashion ice cream machine but instead of a frozen dessert you would end up with beautifully blue inked copies. I also remember breathing in the lovely smell of a freshly minted page, it would take me back to my days as a third grader, when after lunching our wonderful teacher passed out worksheets for us to complete. We would all settle down into our chairs, taking deep breaths of the aroma wafting off the paper. I am not sure what was in that spirit, but it did the trick, calming us down so we could refocus and start into our afternoon writing assignment.  Smelling it for the first time after all those years as I began my new teaching career was like a rite of passage for me. Like my 3rd grade teacher, I now had the privilege of making the dittos and it was me who was handing them out to a room full of rambunctious kids transitioning from lunchtime recess.

After 12 years of teaching, I left the classroom to pursue life outside of a school building. I wanted to live in the world that we busily try to prepare our students for. For the next 10 years, I had very little to do with education. Instead of using my creative talents to educate, I used them to renovate old houses and in turn, sell them to renovate my bank account. Things went splendidly well for me but after a while, I started thinking about what real impact I was making in the world. All my home renovations would one day be tired and someone new would be coming along to demolish and replace all that I have done, just like I did to the worker before me. I wanted to begin making lasting change again, you know, like that time I was a teacher . . .

Someone said to me that I belong in the classroom and three years after jumping back into teaching, I have to say I agree. Every day for me feel monumental. Everyday seems feels like I have written a new symphony. It is exhausting work. Gone are the 2x4s whose only communication with me were the occasional splinters. Now I have the privilege of working with young human beings who enter my classroom and, in this classroom, you will not find one lightly scented blue inked ditto, not a one! Instead, my students are greeted with a blueish glow of the new ditto master, a computer monitor, from which they can access endless content that could never be replaced with dittos no matter how fast I cranked!