Although this class was short and quite open, I learned a lot more than I anticipated. For starters, as most have already mentioned, I learned that starting a blog is extremely easy and painless! I also learned that although it seems quite chaotic and frustrating, managing blogs is very doable especially with RSS feeds and readers. It is a great way to keep organized and up-dated! Until this course, I never thought about promoting a blog either. I was opened to many interesting strategies to do just that. There are so many things you can do that aren't difficult at all! The little things are perfect for my use especially since I do not intend on sharing my blog with a lot of people.
As my earlier post mentioned, I plan on using blogs for student activities as way for them to reflect and for me to assess. However, I am sure as time goes on and I gain more experience, I could use blogging for other things such as a means of communicating with parents via discussion posts, posting assignments and other information students need to know, personal reflections on different lesson plans or activities that other educators can take from, and even more collaborative work for students. I am sure that I will encourage students to use their blogs for brainstorming ideas and collaborating with others on educational topics. I also can see blogging as a means for students to build an online portfolio for themselves.....using their blogs they can post and save all their best works that they intend to keep to show or refer to later on in their schooling. Most importantly, I am going to use blogs as a way to teach students proper netiquette! Being safe online is extremely important and something most kids don't really think about. I hope my lessons using blogs help them become responsible online users.
All in all, I truly appreciated this course. In such a short amount of time I was able to learn a lot as well as become familiar with many resources and references about blogging that I otherwise never would have come across. I truly had a blast and I am really interested to see how I really end up using blogs in the classroom, that is if I end up doing so! Wishing everyone else the best of luck in their blogging future! :)
