Blogs can be useful to both the media center and the classroom fitting virtually any curriculum area within a school.
Within the media center, blogs can serve as a tool to collaborate with other education professionals as well as with students. The article “Mattering in the School Blogosphere” explains that librarian blogs can appear different for the school librarian versus other types of librarians. Participating in professional librarian blogs beyond the school community blog supports professional development of the librarian as well as developing networking that can help with day to day media center operations.
The article also differentiates between the school “librarian” blog and the school “library” blog. The former is a forum for all those in the educational community (administrators, technicians, teachers and parents, etc.) thus allowing the librarian to communicate far beyond the walls of the library. I see this as a valuable means of opening up the lines of communication amongst many partners with the same vested interests.
The school “library” blog allows the students to have a voice and gives them an opportunity to have valuable discussions about literature and other media with their own peers and adults. Adults could include librarians, assistants, teachers, other school community leaders, and even parents. The Witte article tells the story of one student whose father stationed in Iraq actually participated in his son’s literature circle through the blog. This specific instance shows how blogs can reinforce relationships and initiate new ones; some that might not exist outside of the blogging atmosphere. Another example of this can be found in the “Collaborative Literacy: Blogs and Internet Projects” where a group of fourth grade readers shares their blogging with a group of more advanced readers who live more than 100 miles away, and another classroom that communicates with students living in the Philippines. Blogging can be a vehicle for students to communicate with others who have the same interests, but live many miles apart. The potential for learning explodes in this type of environment. Students have available to them a host of new viewpoints; viewpoints that they must synthesize, analyze and evaluate leading to higher cognitive learning. As Johns mentions in the “Mattering in the School Blogosphere” article, blogging is a means to teaching “social networking” skills, and that has become an essential piece of learning in today’s mobile world.
As described in the latter paragraph, blogging can easily transcend into the language arts classroom. However, it need not stop there as it can fit into almost any classroom in the K-12 setting. For instance, I created a blog for my 8th grade Earth Science students where they will go to discuss environmental issues with myself, fellow classmates and others out there in the world wide web. The social studies curriculum has an almost limitless supply of topics for blogging via current events. The upcoming election would be an ideal candidate for this venue. Online, math blogs exist for topics such as homework help, puzzles, problems, etc.
After this first experience with blogging, I can definitely say that I can and will use it both professionally and in my classroom. Professionally, the blogspots out there offer a number of useful resources that I can apply in my classroom. There are a number of educators out there who have posted many fantastic and useable curriculum materials that fit almost any topic area. Recently, our school took on the informational reading standard as one of our goals for improvement. I was able to locate one particular blog that gave a number of strategies for reading in the content areas. (
http://mabryonline.org/blogs/abrams/archives/reading_in_the_content_areas/index.html)
Having my students blog allows them the opportunity to read others responses, synthesize their own, and reflect on their own and those of others. There is nothing like putting your thoughts out there for everyone to read; it really makes one take a hard look at their work. As well, as mentioned in the Siegle article and the “Mattering in the School Blogosphere” article, this newer multimedia generation is attracted to the use of any/all technology. They know it better than most teachers in many cases and feel entirely capable and comfortable when using it.
On the negative side, I see a number of technology related problems with incorporating blogging into the classroom. First and foremost is the availability or lack thereof of computers. The competition for computer time within the school day and schedule would be a significant constraint at my current school. One could assign it as homework, however, not every home has a computer and that would mean accommodations and/or limitations for some bloggers. As well, as mentioned in some of the articles, there are safety precautions that must be addressed and perhaps even restraints that may be enforced by the school board and/or administration.
Overall, I think the benefits outweigh the roadblocks. Giving blogging a try is a must if we are to support our students in the 21st century. It is our responsibility to provide them with the opportunities needed to build the Web 2.0 skills needed for success in today’s world.
