Thursday, October 30, 2008

"Those crazy bloggers..."


Originally, I was totally opposed to blogging because I felt that people add too much personal information to an area that it is open for everyone to read. However, I am more open to it now after seeing presentations in our 504 Friday classes. Many of the guest speakers were very successful and used blogs to act as teaching aids for their students
I saw that students participate, and they are able to see their work in one location ( which is also nice for parents).

I was looking at a teaching blog called http://21classes.com/ and found it very interesting. I urge you to visit it and look at the teacher blogs. I was amazing that FOURTH graders blogging!! (I feel old…) Moreover, I looked at http://classroomblogging.wordpress.com/ and it talked about another topic we discussed in 504 - Making PowerPoint presentations more effective!! The blogger highlighted very similar ideas that were presented in class, and now I truly feel that I cannot create a PowerPoint presentation without thinking before I create ☺

One thing that I was disappointed about while researching teaching blogs was that I did not find while many sites created by language teachers. The lack of foreign language teaching blogs disappointed me because I was looking for teaching ideas. However, I will continue the search in hopes for an inspiring language blog!

5 comments:

Stephanie V said...

It's kind of sad you're not finding many blogs created by foreign language teachers! Do you think this could be because the curriculum might focus more on speaking? I know my HS Spanish class was all about listening and speaking. In that regard, you may have more success with Wikis and podcast stuff. Just a thought. Hope Pioneer is going well for you!

natasha said...

I definitely agree that this class has made me appreciate blogging and even begin thinking of ways to use it in the classroom. I think that there are so many ways we can use blogs with a foreign language class. Although it is important to be able to listen and speak in the target language, communication also includes reading and writing. I think this is a great way to incorporate the language outside of the classroom. BTW I love that picture! haha!

Jeff Stanzler said...

I had one heck of a time finding foreign language teaching edubloggers, Maria. This just be a niche that you will have to fill!
I did locate this one, which looks promising, The Langwitches

In any case, thanks for staying open to the possibilities--I'm glad that you're finding some teaching ideas that look promising...

Brenda said...

I also had concerns regarding posting personal information. I really like the student work that I see, but have reservations about posting pictures of students on line. I think I would prefer to do a podcast.

Liz Kolb, Ph.D. said...

Maria
One of my favorite Edubloggers is a language teacher. Miguel Guhlin at http://www.mguhlin.org/