Blogging Challenge

The Librarian at Schluter Elementary has challenged the entire 4th and 5th grade to become bloggers! She started the challenge out by having each class come to the Library. The classes brainstormed what a blog was and what they could blog about. The conversations naturally led to having passions, and that's when the spark was ignited! The second the students realized they had choice in what they were able to blog about, they suddenly got interested in this challenge. Each student had to brainstorm what they wanted to write about and the title. Then used Blogger to execute the challenge!

Mrs. Pospisil used her connections and reached out to people in the district to be mentors for the student blogs. She wanted their voices to be heard! 85 people jumped on board. Principals, Assistant Principals, Librarians, Instructional Coaches, and people at the Administration building all wanted to be a part of the challenge of mentoring students in a digital world. The mentors respond by leaving a comment on their assigned students blog once a week. This ongoing process encourages students to keep writing for their authentic audience, while building a relationship with their district mentor.

Blogging gives students a way to reflect, grow, and learn about themselves as a 21st century learner. We need to vary our methods of reflection and blogging is a great outlet for many people. It offers ongoing documentation and long-term reflection. 

Here are a few student blogs to check out:

An Addition To Math

All Elephants

Imagine.Dream.Think.Real

The More You Know 2018

Going from STAAR... to ROCK STAAR

Mr. Martin’s 4th grade ELA class were in final preparation mode for the STAAR Writing test. They played a revising and editing Kahoot game.  “I wanted them to be able to have a fun way of showing what they have learned throughout the year, while helping to relieve some stress for the upcoming assessment." After the game was finished, he charged the students with sharing their feelings about their level of preparedness for the upcoming state test.  

Mr. Martin's Blog

Earlier in the year, they set up individual student Blogs using Blogger to define a space where students could share what they have learned, showcase reading responses and writing tasks, and to simply be able to express their feelings with school.  His initial intentions with the blog were to allow for  students to communicate with one another using a different platform to challenge each other’s thinking.

The task was to have each student search for a meme, picture, or emoji to represent how they were feeling before the test.  From there, students had to justify why they chose the picture they did.  Mr. Martin pushed them further to then make a comment on another friend's blog.  The catch with this is they knew the commenting expectations were to a) share something you enjoyed with the blog, and b) pose a higher-order-thinking question to the original blogger. This is the fuel to the in-depth conversation fire.

Students immediately took to their Chromebooks.  Some students were not sure what a meme was by name, but when they researched what it is and saw some examples, they knew exactly what to do.  This process was a completely student-driven as Mr. Martin was able to simply listen to students helping others and was able to even join in the online conversations.  

Zion was one student who really made the most of this experience. The thoughts that came out of her mind were completely mind-blowing.  She was a pivotal force when it came to driving the conversations.  Every blog I would read, she had already been to and commented with some fascinating questions.  For those students that were struggling with part B of the commenting criteria, she directed them to the wall of questions.  

Mr. Martin has taken the Bloom’s leveled planning question stems and adapted them to become a resource to enhance the level of discourse in his classroom.  Students were able to truly reflect on their peers thoughts by using this resource to their advantage.

"Through blogging, I have seen an increase of student participation, especially with the usually timid students.  With the ones who typically don’t like to respond in front of others, they feel completely open to sharing their thoughts from behind their screen.  In order to make this such a success, we had to build the culture of respecting other’s opinions and really embracing our online character through our digital citizenship lessons.  It is really powerful to see that this avenue of discussion has really allowed me to reach ALL students as it enables those who don’t feel like they have a voice, to shine." -Jeremy Martin

Mucking Through Historical Blogs

Students in Mrs. Proudman's class have recently created blogs from the perspective of historical investigative journalists from the end of the 19th century.  These journalists looked into the dark side of the so called Gilded Age in American history, often dragging topics into the light for others to see, earning them the moniker of "muckrakers."  For this project, each student was assigned their own muckraker to research and learn about.  But instead of writing a report or a standard presentation about their subject, the students used Blogger to create blogs about the journalists.  "I really liked making the blog," said Carlos, a student in Mrs. Proudman's class.  "It made it more fun because we were able to use our imagination more and make it more of a story than a report."

Student working on the Blogger site

According to the project instructions on Mrs. Proudman's example blog, students had to imagine they were going on a "Ride-A-Long" with their journalist as they investigated an issue of the time. Students then created a blog with multiple posts to document that journey, including biographical information about the journalist, photos or pictures from the trip, and transcripts of what happened.  This allowed the students to explore the time period and the subjects in a more immersive way.  "The project was very interesting," said Carlos.  "It allowed us a chance to time-travel back and see their own views, how things looked like to them."  A good example is this blog on Samuel Hopkins Adams, which writes from a perspective of a third person traveling with Mr. Adams.   As the students wrote their blog posts, they took time to ask themselves "What does it feel like? What do you see? What do you smell?"  Some of the blog even took this a step further and wrote their posts from the first person view of the muckraker themselves, such as this blog on Nellie Bly.  The beauty of this project is that not only did it give students a chance to use their imagination to explore the time period, but it also allowed them the choice of how to present and relay that information.  They could write from different angles, include pictures, videos, or anything else they wanted on their blogs.  Students even took the time to comment on their peers' blog posts to leave both praise and constructive feedback.  Take a look at some of the blogs linked above or some more examples below, and enjoy your trip back in time!

Blog on John Spargo
Blog on Lincoln Steffner

Student Blog Develops Better Writers

Student blogs are not uncommon; having students interact with each other and with the world is a valuable learning experience. This blog project is unique in that it is a student-run class blog which spans the entire school year and incorporates multiple skills needed to be successful writers. Each class period manages their own blog, where students all contribute.

Project Driving Questions: 

• How can we make blogs interesting and relevant? 
• How can sustained, interactive writing, published over time improve author voice and style?

Goals for students during the project: 

• Develop personal writing voice 
• Grow as a writer 
• Become more comfortable sharing writing 
• Considering tone and purpose in writing 
• Brainstorming, drafting, facilitating peer review and feedback 
• Craft a professional and safe online presence 

The overall process:

Students choose one journalist whose work they will follow throughout the year to (1) become familiar with both current events and pop culture, and (2) analyze and assess author style and voice. For each post, students pick a current topic that their journalist wrote about. Students then qualify, refute, or defend their journalist’s stance on the issue, providing evidence from personal experiences or text-to-text/text-to-world connections. By engaging with an author’s existing work, students enter into a rhetorical dialogue, and by posting that dialogue on a blog, they invite others to participate in that conversation. 

In Ms. Lloyd's 8th period class, students created their STEM Journalism Review blog (http://stemapenglish8.weebly.com) and have already begun posting and commenting. The topics about which students write include politics, economics, education, medical, race & culture, science, and technology. 

Kira, the Blog Master for 8th period, oversees all posts from other students. There are four blog teams, each with a team leader. Team leaders submit each blog post from their team members to Kira for evaluation and feedback. Once the post is approved by Kira, she sends the blog post to the teacher for final approval. After the posts have been published online, students go into the blog and comment on each other's blog posts. According to Kira, this process helps students develop their own writing style and helps them understand writing styles, grammar, and organize thoughts. 

For example, Garrett writes a response to an article by Frank Bruni, describing a new way of thinking about the value and effectiveness of the college experience. 

The blog is still in its beginning stages; as this is a year-long project, readers are encouraged to revisit the blog to watch it grow. 

#rhetoricislife 

Blogging Your Passion

Sixth, seventh and eighth graders at Chisholm Trail Middle School are expressing themselves differently these days. Under their newly formed aliases, they have identified topics they are passionate about and have begun publishing posts to their very own blogs. Their teacher, Ms. Brown, began blogging over the summer and instantly knew she wanted to share this outlet with her students. You can follow Ms. Brown's blog HERE.

Before beginning their blogs, classes created a Blogging 101 poster. It was discussed how blogs are used for a variety of purposes. Some bloggers even get paid! As a class, they generated ideas to blog about: cooking, fashion, sports, video gaming, etc...Total buy in for this endeavor came when Ms. Brown made two promises: 1. she would never grade their blog and 2. she would never tell them what to blog about. It was for their own personal interest as they explored their passion and shared it with others. 

Each class period begins with "independent interest" time. That time is designated for students to read or write. More and more students are choosing to use that time for blogging and publishing a new post. Students are begging for blog time each day. They are engaged and motivated to publish something new for their readers. 

Additionally, blogging lessons are integrated into their lessons each Friday. Students have learned how to view statistics from the traffic their blog receives, as well as, identify where their readers are located globally. It has been exciting for them to gain followers and see that some blogs have even been visited by readers outside the country. Ms. Brown has also taught mini lessons on the various design elements available through Blogger. Because students have created their blogs through their Google accounts, it's a true work in progress that can follow them indefinitely.

Kat (a.k.a. Glitter Girl) is the author of a fashion blog, The "Kat" Walk. She says, "Blogging is fun because I get to choose what I want to blog about. I'm really into fashion and I feel like if I can share a piece of fashion advice, I may be able to save someone from a fashion catastrophe". She goes on to say that blogging is trendy and that more and more blogs are becoming popular because of today's social media craze. 

Bailey (a.k.a. Frenchie) blogs with a true passion for writing. Her blog, And They Say Writing Got You Nowhere, is a collection of her writing she is most proud of. She says, "My blog is a collection of poetry and fiction work. I like people to see what I've done and what my best is. I like for others to see my strengths. I like to write, and the fact that we get to blog makes me feel special. Ms. Brown has non say about what goes on our blog, so I feel I can be as create and descriptive as I know I can be without fear of someone saying I can't."

Be sure to check out these blogs! Glitter Girl and Frenchie would love some new followers.

Life's a Journey, Blog It

For the first twenty minutes of class on Thursdays and Fridays, Mrs. Thompson's 7th grade language arts students at Chisholm Trail Middle School begin their day by journaling. Their journals are kept online in a blog created by them, for them. Although most students write about personal experiences, they have the choice to choose their topic. "They may blog about anything, from what is going on in their life, what's on their mind to world news and hot topics."

The requirements are that their journal entries are complete, thorough, show bits and pieces of who they are, use great voice, and of course, use correct spelling and grammar. "Some journal entries take a serious tone while others are more lighthearted and whimsical. These journal entries are something they can look back at later and serve as a source of pride. This outlet also gives the students a global audience and provides a platform to make connections outside of the classroom."

Click HERE to view Jenna's Blog