Classes blogging in New Zealand

Rachel Boyds class is a 6 & 7 year old class at Nelson’s Central School in New Zealand. They use their blogs daily in almost every aspect of the class. They use their blogs to do their daily creative writing and reflect on their activities and what they learned the day before. My personal favorite is using it for their daily picture blog. Everyday they go out and take one picture around their school and then each child comes back to class and blogs about the picture. I feel this is a very creative way for their kids to use their visual ability to find the perfect picture of that day and then write what that picture means to them and what they see in the picture. I feel this is a very interesting idea for any classroom and would love to implement it in my classroom when I teach again. http://room9nelsoncentral.blogspot.com/


Jody Hayes class is also a classroom in New Zealand. This class is at Our Lady’s of Lourdes School of 9 – 11 year old students. I couldn’t decide if I was more interested about the school or the blogging. This seemed like a very artistic school and they blogged daily and displayed pictures of what they were doing in the class and what trips they prepared for. They called themselves navigators and are navigating their audience through what they call a journey of the leadership in their schools. They were basically teaching their students how to be leaders using the virtues of cooperation, excellence, creativity, enthusiasm and courage among many others. This teacher has found a way to unite the classroom in every aspect of the class and keep them interested in what is going on in the classroom. http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=1638

Using Blogs in the K-12 Classrooms

The teachers at East Orange, New Jersey have developed a blog site called Scholastic Community that allows all K-12 teachers in East Orange to be in direct contact and receive feedback from students, parents and the community. The home page is a message board that tells exactly how to get where you need to go and a list of blogs that have been posted. It has a message board for teachers and parents and a second message board for kids.
This particular site also posts teachers, educational tools, announcements and a most interesting program called Read 180. It allows every student from the community that is a member of the Read 180 program to share their experiences and there successes with other members. It also allows them to post their recent achievements in both teaching and learning. This is definitely a site that every teacher should take a look at. http://community.scholastic.com/scholastic?category.id=TeacherBlogs

At Butlerville Elementary school they have a very successful blog site stemming mainly from a

very interesting program that embodies all aspects of education. This particular site is called escrapbooking. The E in escrapbooking stands for electronic, educational, engaging, expressions. This allows students to reflect on ideas and share perspectives using process and product. It is a creative way to determine if a student has met standards and provides concrete evidence of a teachers performance. Escrapingbooking is a way to combine journals and logs with visual aids such as pictures, video, audio, etc. to evaluate a students performance. This is a creative way of combining old school learning with today's technology so students learn but also have a fun time doing it. http://escrapbooking.com/basics/index.htm

Alabama Connecting Classroom, Educators and Students Statewide "ACCESS"

Access is a multimedia resource that allows all students, to take advanced diploma courses to better prepare them for college or today’s workforce. Students are able to access other teachers and classrooms across the state by internet and through television to attend classes their school may not offer. They are able to receive instruction from various teachers with different teaching styles that will allow them to better increase their knowledge, interaction and communication skills. The students are able to enroll in duel classes to earn college credits while attending high school. This will put all students in this state on equal ground in ensure they all receive a high quality education with the opportunity to attend various colleges.

I truly believe that ACESS is an excellent program that has been designed with the idea of improving educational opportunities to all students across the state. The state of Alabama is in great hopes to implement this educational program in all schools across the state by 2010, giving every school the same educational benefits. All teachers will be monitored to make sure they are increasing their knowledge and effectiveness in the classroom and the students will be monitored to ensure progress is being made and that they are learning on their proper educational level. To learn more benefits of the ACCESS program go to the ACCESS website, http://accessdl.state.al.us.