Why blog?  Your current process of emailing parents  or sending written notices home works just fine! Why change you ask.  What makes blogging so unique? Blogging accomplishes many goals that cannot be accomplished as well as email, paper notices or student planner comments.

Yes, blogging is an easy way to share homework and expectations for projects and classroom rules/beliefs.  What crystallizes is the ability of a blog to flip literacy on its head! We invite parents and the world into our classroom to connect with our work world, to help students further understanding of the global world, to engage in threaded conversation.  It is a place to reflect and extend our thinking processes over time; to develop our voice with authentic problems and issues; to explore and create our own.  Imagine inviting an author to respond to your students or a scientist to engage in questions, or students reporting out their learning knowing that the world is hearing them…

At the heart of blogging is literacy! Yes, to be great bloggers, students must read, read, read.  Then analyze and synthesize to rework ideas.  This sounds a lot like your reading lessons – that’s exactly what it is (authentic focused reading comprehension).  Consider communication – writing (include oral language – early primaries can audio record) that is targeted to a wider audience than just the teacher.  Imagine a student with grandparents living in other cities – a window of inclusion is opened for them…

Writing quality comments or posts takes scaffolding.  Like writing workshop lessons, blogging needs modeling to write powerful posts. [Think of all those comments you see: “I like your blog!” or “LOL cool!”].  A blog conversation can be used as a rich learning experience; one that begins with high quality commenting that is beyond beginning blurbs…   The resulting threaded discussions can offer an increased level of writing rehearsal.   We’ve found that more students (even reluctant writers) engage in this platform than in others due in part to the integrative nature of online tools.

If you’re using sd41 blogs, we can import whole classes to your blog.  Ask us how.

Even though you may love Writers Workshop, the challenge comes in keeping track of all the confer/revision comments for planning purposes.  We know that immediate feedback, specific and targeted will support our students’ approximation of great writing.  How do you keep your ongoing comments on students? (I used to use post-it notes – hundreds of post-its.)  How do you create target groups to differentiate lessons?   Google Forms allows the ability to gather, collate and analyze information, set the stage for targeting mini-lessons, as well as provide a running record of growth for each student. This can be accessed   by any computer, mobile device (ipad, iphone…).

Here is my version of a working form based on our BC  Performance Standards (Informal Writing).

The data populates into a spreadsheet; each column can be sorted so you can group your teaching points.  Note that the Observation column is using ‘standards based grading’ [Mastery, Progressing, Starting, No evidence] rather than a numeric system. (More on this later in another post) Hover your mouse over the Observation column, right click and click Sort.  Data will be grouped by M, P, S, N – an easy way to see new groups of students for mini-lessons.

This should be called “informative assessment”!  Imagine how teaching might change with this type of immediate information at your fingertips.  How are you organizing your comments? Would love to hear from you – drop a thought in the comment box.

Made with: http://learnenglishkids.britishcouncil.org/en/make-your-own/comic-strip-maker

Sometimes a picture says it all…

While using ComicLife is a powerful tool to create comics, sometimes what’s required is a tool that has its own built in media library.  There are many out on the web to choose.  The one above is from LearnEnglishKids by the British Council. A range of panels, backgrounds, characters and bubbles are provided for you to select.  No registration is needed. More importantly, there is a download feature that allows you to publish anywhere or just print it.   Another site that you may try is MakeBeliefsComix, which has similar features.

How would I use it? Try activities with a sequence; writing lesson on speaking and “thinking in head” using bubbles; post (fiction/non-fiction) reading build a summary or theme; science experiment sequence; 3-panel beginning-middle-end of story; newspaper editors column; reflection piece.

We would love to hear how you’re using comic strips. Please drop us a comment.

It’s December and most every hour is in high gear, trying to get those last minute  projects  merged in with winter festivities.  And just this weekend, we got our first whiff of snow.  Magic is in the air among the smell of gingerbread houses, mandarin oranges and other treats popping up in all locations.  Not to mention the dreaded tinsel and glitter that seems to attach themselves everywhere or the impromptu breakout in song.

We’ve had a lot of projects this term.  Blogging has continued to see an increase in the number of teachers and administrators who are wanting to open their communications to a wider world as well as providing spaces for students to practice their online digital footprint.  One of our specialized groups  - the teacher-librarians facilitated by Patricia Finlay are meshing understandings of “Learning Commons” and what that might look like in a blogging platform. No matter the purpose, it takes a coordinated effort in how we see the role of technology in our lives and how we use it to deepen both our understandings of the world and as a communication platform.

Writers Workshop launched with great energy as teachers work with their students to explore their writing in focused ways that include collaborative conversations, real time revision and blended support (in class face-to-face and online).  Our tool of choice is Google Docs through Google Apps for Education.  Stay tuned with us as we capture the journey.

Our Secondary Inquiry Assessment team is off to the races with a dedicated group of teachers across the disciplines and from a variety of sites.  Questions and connections in how to include ‘standards based assessment’ or rubrics that are more than checklists are issues that deserve time to grapple with.  Some have made a commitment to digging into ‘flipped classroom’ process and finding that it opens up time to work with struggling students (a positive surprise).

The iPad and other idevices have taken schools by a storm.  What has become apparent are the creative ways that people have found to connect beyond the basics (the play) to delve deeper – asking bigger questions.  The spiral of intensity increases as teachers connect and share with others; affirming, cross-referencing and in some cases challenging each other to extend.

What is even more of a privilege are the chance encounters down school hallways with teachers who are excited to share their insights.  Their stories (successes and not successes) are the fuel that light the possibilities.  Your learning stories are important and we love hearing them.  Please consider sharing them here or give us a call.

Thinking extends to greater possibilities when we’re together supporting and learning from each other.  Our second session of dynamic writers took us through a series of activities to explore ideas of “writing,  what it means to write in the digital age, identified the principles of writing workshop, …  We had a bit of time to read and reflect on the writing process and recorded our brainstorms on an online board called Wallwisher as well as write on individual Google Docs.

A Strategy:  4 images were shown where we imagined what was happening; a walk around  allowed for ideas to gel as we were charged with writing the first paragraph (for the first image); a few minutes to write in our Google Docs; facilitator notes powerful ideas as they are generated on the docs; a bit of a share.

We rounded our morning with time to plan/chat through ‘howtos’ and record a commitment to action before meeting again in a couple of weeks.  [Our ongoing journey is posted under Learning Series - Writing Workshop Learning. ]

Nothing of any worth happens without risk and a desire to learn more.  What we experienced was energizing – imagine being with a group of teachers who willingly dive into exploring the writing process, asking hard questions as well as marry that with new environments (eg. Google Docs, Wallwisher).

Please consider following along with us as we explore this territory and connect with each other and our students’ learning. You will find an ongoing history of posts (categorized under Writing Workshop Learning) and pages as we work through the year.