Over a few years, I have used many digital platforms to connect. I am a LinkedIn user, I love pinterist, I have a facebook page, but am careful who I connect with and are an active user of many groups on facebook. I have a twitter account. I also have a class blog and I enjoy looking through other classroom blogs. I have used a class blog for a number of years. When I first started to engage in blogs, students enjoyed posting their work online and seeking feedback. There was much teaching around giving appropriate feedback and what to comment on. Parents also got involved with commenting and the students were very excited when their parents were involved. It was a way of conencting the community.
A few years ago my class were asked to be part of a collaborative unit of work with a school in North Carolina USA. Each class told their story. I divided my class into small groups of pairs or threes. As a class we brainstormed how we could share our story of agriculture, horticulture, population and population density, land use, water quality, opportunities, and culture. We skyped each other, and even though the time difference wasn't quite right, my students were keen to come to class at 6.30 am in the morning for breakfast and hot milo's just to engage in conversations with students from North Carolina.
The teachers involved; myself and the teacher of the 'science' class at the North Carolina school, we collaboratively planned the unit of work through google docs. We shared our curriculum documents with each other and created a classroom blog for each class so we could watch, learn and feedback on each stage of the process.
This experience had a huge impact on my students, every day they contributed in some way to the blog.
Some of the challenges we experienced were maintaining the communication. With the busyness of other things for both classes, often there was no communication, then we had to set time aside to make sure we had communicated. This happens now with my current blog. I find unless you designate a specific time the blog does not get updated. I have a year 8 class and we are so busy with so many things that to keep the class blog updated takes time. I am also finding, students are becoming more aware of what it means to have work posted online, many students like the idea, but there are quite a few students who do not wish to have their work posted online because they have had a bad experience. Parents are now very busy, I have some parents who take part with the class blog. One way I engage my parents is including them in photostreams of the students eg; camp experiences.
I enjoy looking through the twitter feeds on specific groups. I also enjoy looking through the primary teacher's facebook page and secondary school Facebook page. I am also a member of a science facebook page. Facebook is blocked at our school so I usually find time later in the evening to lurk through posts. There are some very creative teachers out there who are prepared to share their experiences. The Linkin links often share professional readings as do twitter feeds. These are great reads from people who are like minded. Karen Melhuish is one person I follow. I also follow VLN groups, over the years these groups have been a great resource to ask questions about all sorts of areas related to IT.
Karen Melhuish thesis is an interesting read especially with regards to the delivery of teacher professional development. Networking in a social media forum is really conducive. It is a place to ask questions, get support, share experiences with many professionals.
Melhuish, K.(2013). Online social networking and its impact on New Zealand educators’ professional learning. Master Thesis. The University of Waikato. Retrieved on 05 May, 2015 from http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz/bitstream/han...
Seaman, J., & Tinti-Kane, H. (2013). Social media for teaching and learning. Babson Survey Research Group. Retrieved fromhttp://www.onlinelearningsurvey.com/reports/social-media-for-teaching-and-learning-2013-report.pdf
Sharples, M., de Roock , R., Ferguson, R., Gaved, M., Herodotou, C., Koh, E., Kukulska-Hulme, A., Looi,C-K, McAndrew, P., Rienties, B., Weller, M., Wong, L. H. (2016). Innovating Pedagogy 2016: Open University Innovation Report 5. Milton Keynes: The Open University. Retrieved fromhttp://proxima.iet.open.ac.uk/public/innovating_pedagogy_2016.pdf
Silius, K., Miilumäki, T.,Huhtamäki, J.,Tebest, T., Meriläinen, J., & Pohjolainen, S.(2010) ‘Students’ motivations for social media enhanced studying and learning.’ Knowledge Management & E-Learning: An International Journal, 2, (1). Retrieved on 7th May,2015 from http://www.kmel-journal.org/ojs/index.php/online-p.
Hi Mary.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your blog it was very interesting. I love what you did re: collaborative unit of work with a school in North Carolina USA. What an amazing experience for all involved. Planning with a teacher from the other side of the world wow! it just goes to show what is possible with a bit of commitment and work. My class blog goes weeks without an update, I think this is because there is very little parent interest in the blog. I have recently started a google sites class page to display information and children's learning. You are right you need to set time aside and be committed to up dating the information. You have noted some interesting Face book pages and people to follow. Many thanks.
HI Keryn. Thank you for your feedback. I have also found that there is little parent interest and mainly because many parents are busy. Google sites is a great platform to use for a class blog.
DeleteGood luck with your class blog.
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ReplyDeleteHi Mary, I am really impressed with all your Social Networking and the opportunities your are providing for your learners to connect with the world in collaborative ways. It made me consider my own practice and I have a long way to go as I have not yet traveled down this pathway. I not sure if it is because of the age of the children I teach and our school culture or my own safety concerns and possibly lack of knowledge? I think a mixture of both. However, this weeks subject has got me thinking and I am excited about the possibilities out there, especially reading about your experience with the school in North Carolina, how motivating for the children in your class.
ReplyDeleteIt was interesting reading about your class Blog and also that of Keryn's, who too has also commented, about the challenges of updating and continual parent interest. I could see this is something that I too would find challenging and whilst I enjoyed our video this week (Wk 30) on Kathy Cassidy's classroom, I am left wondering how much time is needed to sustain such an effective record of children's learning and progress on individual Blogs. Is this something I have time for? Who would I be doing it for and why? are questions that I am left pondering. Thanks for sharing your journey.
Hi Kelly, my students were very motivated. Every day they worked on their story. They created websites telling their stories, using wix or webbly and we uploaded these to the blog so they could be seen, the students from North Carolina were able to access through the blog. It does take a lot of time, and I am time poor, as are my students.....assigning blog writers in the class and handing the blog over to the students is one way I have attempted to keep this up to date.
DeleteHi Mary
ReplyDeleteI too enjoyed reading your blog post.
I do wonder about how we can get parents to engage in blogs or other online activity. Is their disinterest because of the generation they are? Are they not as technology savvy as their children? I also wonder if they would engage more with online activity that is their child's rather than a class activity?
If it is as simple as parents being busy, how do we get them to take just 5 minutes out of their day to do something that can have such a positive impact on their child.
Lots of questions I know, they are all things that I often ponder as the whole concept of whanau engagement seems to be a problem nationally not just in a few schools. Is technology the answer?
I guess the other challenge for us is to look at what platforms we use so that students are engaged and it is authentic.