Blogs are learning gems… (Sue, I hope you’re reading this!)

I am teaching some colleagues about blogs at the moment but I have reached a crisis point. We have explored ‘best practice’ examples in education, fossicked about in the blogosphere, started blogs, written posts, added links, grappled with blog ‘buzz’ words and experimented with themes. One of my colleagues is convinced and blogging along nicely…the other is wondering why on earth she should bother!

Where do I go from here?

I love blogs (I have four!), I am already a convert. How do I convince someone else that blogging is worthwhile? I have spent some time pondering this question but time is running out…our third session is coming up in two days and I am getting quite desperate! In fact, this post is my last ditch effort to ‘tease out’ ideas

Use the force…of my PLN!!

I realised all I had to offer Sue, the non-believer, was my own (short) blogging experience. Clearly, I needed to widen my search for information and ideas. Hence, this plea to my plurk buddies:

11 responses later most seemed to think it was important to stress the importance of commenting on other people’s blogs and not being a blurker (someone who lurks on blogs but never leaves comments). Thanks to gkat, and drlaurie for their suggestions. Drlaurie also provided links to a relevant coolcatteacher post.

Next stop: Google Reader (665 unread)

Trawling through my subscriptions proved useful. I discovered this blog post by Dean Shareski: ‘Student and Teacher Blogging that Succeeds’. It seemed to reinforce what I’d learned from my fellow plurkers. It also forced me to face the worrying thought that had been simmering: the blogs started by my small group were in danger of failing!

Educational Blogging: be open to the possibilities and just do it!

Blogging is about being involved, really involved, in the ideas of others; engaged and passionate involvement in reading, writing and sharing; a commitment to reflection and, of course, some interest in the topic. My colleagues need to develop good blogging habits; they can’t just start a blog, they need to become engaged in the world of blogging.

The Challenge (Sue, you’re on your own…)

I’ve decided my next blogging session will be about getting involved. I will encourage my group to read, comment, share, and learn. I will also issue them with a series of challenges: write a post once a fortnight (at least); explore the blogosphere, subscribe to a few blogs and comment on them regularly (at least once a week); keep at it for at least three months and then decide if they are bloggers at heart.

Teachers sharing = lots of Learning Gems!

Teachers have always shared material and ideas (some better than others, it’s true) and now the Internet has made sharing much easier for all of us.

I must admit to being a slow sharer; I always thought my work and ideas unworthy until I was encouraged by several colleagues. However, once I started sharing I was unstoppable!

A light bulb moment

Anyway, it suddenly occurred to me that as a blogger, I now have a way to share materials with a wider audience and, hopefully, save someone a little bit of time or, even better, inspire them!

So here goes…

Sharing some recent ideas:

Literature Discovery Festival

I’m quite pleased with this idea…feel free to use it if it suits your school situation. I decided one week to celebrate literature and reading was simply not enough! Rather than one ‘Book Week’ I decided my school needed a three week festival to celebrate books, reading, writing, literacy…etc. It includes author visits. During the festival I am running a daily quiz and several competitions including:

Fifty-word story competition: I’ve run this completion before and was quite surprised how well it worked.

Bookmark book review competition: Designed this sheet yesterday to simplify the book review process .

I hope the above handouts and ideas are useful to you and save you little bit of time!

During the festival I am also running an adapted version of the reading game. (The link is a Powerpoint presentation explaining the game.) I have adapted the game to suit my school library.

Enjoy!

PS: Please let me know if you find these ideas useful.