Dear Families,
We will be piloting a new way to ameliorate our writing program by sharing our interests and sharing our writing with a real audience, you! We will be posting their writing to our weblog.
A weblog, or blog as they are commonly called, is a special type of web page that can be created and easily updated using a web browser. Each new entry has its own date stamp. Each entry has a comments section where visitors to the blog may leave comments to the author.
When we teach a writing lesson, students will have an opportunity to make a entry for the blog. Please read the parent letter for more information about the unit of study. The students usually choose the topic, but they need to make use of the skills taught in our lesson to help craft their writing. The emphasis is on the quality, not the quantity of what they write.
When a student is ready for publishing, students will use the computers in our rooms to word process their work. Students may also work from home! We, the teachers, will then post the blog entry.
Having a real audience is one of the key components to this pilot program. In addition to receiving comments from the teachers, they are also able to receive comments from parents, grandparents, family, friends and classmates. Parents are encouraged to visit the blog and respond to the writing. Potentially, anyone on the internet could respond to our blogs, however, it is not likely that the world at large will stumble across the blog.
This blogging project is designed to minimize any security risk to your child. The only personally identifying information included in the blog will be their first names. There will be no mention of our school name or our location. Students are allowed to post their interests and opinions, but not their age, e-mail addresses photographs of themselves, or other sensitive information.
Resources:
Blogs created by fifth grade students in the USA
http://itc.blogs.com/macros/
BBC News article about blogging in a school in the UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3804773.stm
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1 comment:
Thanks for introducing blogs to the students. I have maintained a blog for several months now, mostly for photographic reasons, and I think it is a great tool. I'm excited to see what the students produce.
Kirk Johnson
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