Ways to use blogs in the classroom

Ways to Use Blogs in the Classroom

By Amary Rivera

amaryrivera@gmail.com

Weekly Writing Prompts Post a Prompt

Post a weekly writing prompt on the blog and have your students respond to it by a certain day. 

Ask students to comment on one of their classmates ideas drawing a name from a hat or rotating to be sure that all students receive a comment from someone.

Foster process writing peer-editing by asking each student to make a suggestion for improvement to content and  mechanics (editing) of the other student’s submission. 

Weekly Calendar of Events and Assignments The week in Review

Appoint a weekly blog team to write the week’s blog entry describing the events of the week and the assignments.

By posting the weekly events students who are absent will know what assignments to complete and what they have missed.

Respond to Stories

Respond to reading Check for comprehension by asking students to

respond to the week’s readings by summarizing and reflecting on how it applies to their own real life experiences.

Post questions for students to discuss and ask them to respond to classmates.

Fact Finding Activities

Find the facts

Post a statement with no supporting facts. Ask students to find facts to support or refute the opinion using links to reliable web sites and their own persuasive explanations.

Use this activity to expand scientific knowledge and thinking.

Critique a Website

Critique a web site

Post a link to a web site related to a topic your are studying and invite students to give their personal evaluation:

Is the site biased? Does it seem well-researched? Is it a reliable source? What would you add to the website? Are the images appropriate? What would you change?

Current Events

Comment on current events

Post a link to a current events story and ask students to comment on its implications in your local community or their own lives.

Ask students to research the news story and post one new fact or update throughout the week.

Personal Experience Reports

Report on a vacation or long weekend

Encourage children to share a story about their weekend or vacation from someone else’s point of view and comment on a classmate’s story.

Field Trip Reports

Report on a field trip or virtual field trip

Students report about attending a field tip or special event and all photos to the blog. Students can also poll classmates to fond the most popular part of the trip.

Students can pretend they interviewed a person they met through a virtual field trip and can post photos found online related to the field trip.

Community Tour

Write a neighborhood or community tour with pictures

As a culmination of a unit on your community or local history  create a neighborhood or community tour blog. Each student (or pair) can take and upload a picture and tell about it.

Hot Topics

Bounce around a hot topic

Discuss topics such as :

Should rolling bookbags be allowed in class?

Should students wear uniforms?

Should gum chewing be allowed in class?

Should there be school around school?

Wonderings Blog

Question blog

Invite students to submit a question about course content, related ideas, or “I have always wondered” in advance of starting a new unit.

As the course progresses and students are able to answer their wonderings they will revisit and update the blog.

Organization Skills

Organization tips

Invite students and their parents to share tips for how they stay organized, not just for school, but for life.

Ask students to try one of the organization skills they learned about and report back.

Collaborative Storytelling

Continuing Stories

Start a blog story (set up the setting, characters, and initial situation in an opening paragraph) and let each student who visits comment by adding a sentence or two.

Students can edit the story for grammar and to add more details or clarifying words.

Share new videos and links

Share materials, news, downloads, links and more

Ask students to share a news story, video, or link once a week and write a small summary of it.

Ask students to respond to at least one new item weekly.