Blogs

Currently I am in a year one class for my practical experiences, and the students have a minimum amount of access to a class set of computers. Currently the students are working on a unit called Around the World, and this focuses on the ways in which different groups of people’s lives are different from ours, such as Native American Indians and Eskimo’s. As the students are only in year one, they don’t actually do a lot of writing as such, as they usually only practice letter shapes and have just started writing simple sentences.

Therefore, personally I would not design learning experiences which require the year one students to write an individual blog, as they are still at the stage where they can’t even log onto a computer by themselves. However, if I was to allow my students to create a blog a lot of modelling would occur prior to them actually blogging by themselves. During this modelling phase issues in regard to appropriate disclosure and safety in the public domain would be emphasised to the students regularly, as it would be quite easy for the students to break copyright laws and display personal information unintentionally (Central Queensland University, 2009).

In order for my year one students to develop an understanding of different technologies and explore blogs, I would be more inclined to explain to the students what a blog is, show them some blogs and then as a class create a blog based upon the student’s thoughts to each group of people from around the world, whilst continuing to incorporate discussions about appropriate disclosure and safety in the public domain. For example, each week on a Tuesday for the student’s handwriting task they are required to write at least one fact about the group of people that the class is focusing on for that week. After writing their fact, the students then reflect upon their writing task by sharing with their peers the fact which they wrote about, along with, their thoughts in relation to the focused group of people from around the world. Therefore, during the reflecting stage the students could choose a few facts that could be posted to their class blog, and their learning manager could post the facts and the student’s thoughts about the group of people to the class blog on behalf of the students.

Once the unit is finished, the students are inviting their parents into the classroom for an hour in the afternoon to show them the different things that they have created throughout the term. I think that a class blog would be a perfect piece of work that could be displayed throughout the classroom for parents and carers to read, as it would allow them to gain a better understanding of the learning journey that their child has taken.

However, due to insufficient time I have been unable to create a class blog with the students, therefore, I look forward to doing so in the future. If you have any other ideas of how blogs could be used with younger students, feel free to make a comment as I am interested in discovering ways in which blogs can be incorporated into their learning experiences.

Reference List:
Central Queensland University (CQU). (2009). FAHE11001- Managing E-Learning: Moodle site. Rockhampton, QLD, Australia: Scot Aldred.