I'm a bit nervous about sharing my ideas, thoughts, and reflections online. I have never blogged before. This is completely new to me and I'm a very private person (personally.) I have many professional observations and ideas that I enjoy sharing with others and this will be an opportunity for me to share what I've learned in this course and how I plan to use the "things" in sharing with students and the teachers I work with. I noticed that the g-mail account I used has my first and last name so I have shared my name. According to the blog I just read students are not to share personal information. I should have set up a new e-mail...but I guess this is not a huge problem.
I think it will be very valuable when teachers share with each other (is this Thing 7?) I feel students are going to like sharing with others, (as long as they keep their reactions on topic and appropriate.) I can see where they may get off task or try to comment on what "so in so is doing" since they are so focused on their friends in Middle School. Is this a problem in blogging? I think they would be very creative in setting up their own blog since they are producing it for others to see. Middle School students would be able to read a chapter and comment on their "blog." They may take it more seriously in explaining their thoughts. This may be what it takes to get kids to be more successful by motivating them and building relationships with them by giving them this opportunity to set up a blog.
Obviously student blogs would need to be anonymous for their own protection for the reasons you just cited and others. David Warlick has created the Class Blogmeister website that allows teachers to set up a classroom blog and gives the teacher the right to publish or not publish a student post. Regardless of what platform is used, the students will require a lot of preparation and discussion about what is appropriate, and the need for anonymity and privacy. Parents would also have to be notified and grant their permission and their fears and concerns addressed (Thank you NBC Dateline).
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