Blogging With Students

My district has just begun a blogging pilot project. There are about 20 teachers involved ranging from elementary to secondary and across a wide variety of subject areas.

I wanted to get involved for a number of reasons. Perhaps the most important is that I strongly believe blogging is a skill that many of our students will need to use later in life.

The second, more immediate reason, is that I want my students to express in words what they understand and don't understand about the math they are doing. If they can think about what they don't understand, they have a better chance of being able to rectify the situation. I also want them to talk about how they learn best, what study habits they have and how they can improve.

On Thursday my students began writing their first blog post. I wanted to make sure that all of the technical details were taken care of so I booked out a lab and had them write a short post on how they planned to prepare for the upcoming test. Within a minute four of my students had explained that they don't actually study for tests, what should they write.

This blogging process may be more fruitful than I imagined. I never would have guessed that I would learn something about my students before they began writing. I can't wait to learn more.