Why is This Working?

This is not the first time that I have taught students how to blog.

For many years, I had my tenth-grade students create blogs for their project-based research projects. We connected with writers and with experts on their topics.  Some students spent hours exploring other blogs, using them as mentors for their own writing, making sure their posts were loaded with images and links to entice readers.  But inevitably, this would be the exception and not the rule. Most of their blogs read like mini-essays, each post written in a typical five-paragraph format.

This semester, something has changed.  But I'm not quite sure how or why.

My seniors have started blogging to reflect on their reading of a "banned book." They selected a book of their choice from the American Library Association's list of challenged books. We will spend the month of March digging into issues of censorship and reader's rights. My students are reading everything from Huckleberry Finn to Looking for Alaska, and although they have only just started their blogging adventures, I'm noticing a difference in the depth and the quality of their reflections.

Take for example this morning.  Cheyenne is reading American Psycho.  She came up to my desk and asked, "I want to include lines from my book in my post, but I'm not really sure how.  The writing is much more dense and dark than I expected."  We got to have a conversation about what she thinks might most benefit her readers, and think through the best approach for including lines.  Should she type up a paragraph from the text, blocking out particular words so as not to offend some readers? Or, should she take a picture of a page in the book and simply post it along with her annotations written on the page?

Madeline just asked, "How should I cite this?"  We've been talking about ensuring that we give credit to the original writers and artists.  Students are including specific passages, evidence, images, and links to other news articles and writers.

So why is this blogging experience working out so much better than earlier years? I need to spend more time reflecting on this question, but my initial thought is that this time around I spent much less time instructing students how to set-up our blogs and much more time pointing out what good bloggers do.  We looked at more examples than I had in year's past, and I started the first week by having my students comment on one another's first posts.  In doing so, not only did they receive feedback on their writing, but they also had an opportunity to explore how their peers had designed their online spaces.

In short, I spent less time on instructions and more time on having students get hands-on with writing.

And here's how their looking so far.  We would love your feedback on their blogs!  Simply hover over the images below to access links to my students' blogs.

Let the Blogging Begin

The only sound in my room at the moment is the crisp clicky-clack of 224 fingertips typing.  And then Cheyenne can't contain herself any longer. She turns and whispers excitedly to Madison, "I can't tell if this is supposed to be dark funny, or if I'm misunderstanding this. So, there's this guy..." And she goes on to explain in a whisper that grows into a conversation why it is that she has gotten sucked into her book. Her banned book.

Image by Emily Podsiadlik

My Independent Novel Studies students, mainly seniors, just started our unit on banned and challenged books.  We've explored the ALA website of banned books and discussed their Bill of Rights.  We've combed the library shelves for challenged books that pique our interest. This morning, my students are blogging, many for the first time, on their reading of a self-selected "banned" book.  Cheyenne is hoping to get some feedback on her reading of American Psycho.  Emily calls me over. "Ms. Ward, you gotta read my last paragraph. I created a hashtag!" #blogon.  She's also posted a picture she snapped of her and a friend engaged in a staged conversation over a book.  They are loving this.  I am loving this.  The excitement is palatable.

So let the blogging begin!

Slice of Life Blogging Challenge

March begins with a stutter start.

For the second week in a row, I will likely be out of school for multiple days. Last week, under a wet blanket of 10 inches of snow, we were out of school on Thursday and Friday.  I'm off today as a result of the piling snow, currently at about six inches with more still coming down.  I expect we will be out again tomorrow.

Usually, I am pressed for time to write.  Starting a new position this year - new state, new home, new school, new curriculum, and lots of new students - I have struggled to make time to blog.  So this stutter start to March - our multiple snow days - brings with it a welcome return to reflection through the annual Slice of Life blogging challenge issued by Two Writing Teachers.

The goal: blog. every. single. day. At least for the month of March.  I tried to do this in earnest last year, and I nearly made it. Okay, so I only had 14 entries in March of 2015.  But in 2014, I got a bit closer with 22 entries for the month and even had one of the entries published in the book Elevate Empathy. This year, I'm aiming for a perfect 31.

But what is this whole "slice of life" thing?  The blog challenge started with an inspired English teacher. Stacey Shubitz shared her experience about discovering "slice of life" writing while reading her students' writer's notebook entries:

"In February 2008, Stacey was reading one of her student’s writer’s notebooks and came across a piece of writing about his sister’s lost necklace. Christian wrote an entire entry about the outrage he felt when his mother made the family drop everything to search for his sister’s lost necklace in their apartment. Thirty minutes after they lifted up couch cushions and checked under all of the beds, her necklace turned up on her neck! There was something about his entry, this little snippet of Christian’s life. It seemed like a slice of life story. Stacey googled “slice of life” and found that it’s a term frequently used in literature and entertainment. It essentially means to describe everyday experiences with as much realism as possible. Stacey realized that was exactly the kind of entry Christian had written."

So the annual Slice of Life blogging challenge asks writers to share snippets of their every day, their ordinary, to write with details about a particular moment.

And so I am thankful for this stutter start to March. It is a much needed pause. Time to reflect.  Time to soak in and respond to the ordinary, the every day, and to capture a moment. Too often I am concerned about what is happening next, what is over the horizon. Today, I get to sit at my dining room table, watch the snow fall and birds flock to my feeder, and reinvest in my writing.

At least until the kids, who also have a snow day, burst through the back door in dripping wet snow pants and bright red cheeks come in search of cups of marshmallow-filled warmth. "I don't wanna get frost-nipped, Mom, so I neeeeed hot cocoa," my little one looks up at me with laughing eyes.

This blog is my hot-cocoa, my warmth. When I have felt out in the cold for too long, this is where I need to warm up, to write my way into understanding. So thank you, March, for this snow day stutter start.

Blogging in Class

I'm covering a class right now. Web Design. Students have just started to explore blogs as a means of writing for an authentic audience, of making connections through their writing.  The students tell me that they have done some researching: looking at other blogs, post types, design ideas.  Today they have logged into WordPress to create their first blog.  Of the fourteen students sitting in this room, no one has blogged before.  "Does Twitter count?"

So what do these novice bloggers think about blogging?

• "It reminds me a lot of Twitter, just longer."
• "This is just something I have to do for class."
• "I feel like blogging could be dangerous because people know what you are doing."
• "I took this class so I wouldn't get stuck in another gym class, but now that we've started, I'm kind of excited."

So am I.  I try to share all the connections and collaborations that I have made as a result of this blog.  I'm blogging in front of them at this moment, my words looming large on the screen in room 214 to demonstrate just how easy this process is.  I'm going to hit "publish," share this out on Twitter. Can you help me demonstrate how people connect using blogs? Leave a comment to let us know that you are visiting. 

What advice do you have to offer to these novice bloggers?

Anything? Really? Really!

When I first describe our #HavPassion research project to students, I get this quizzical look. "I can research anything? Really?" Really!

For the last eight weeks, my tenth grade students have delved into the origins of the word passion, explored what it means to have grit and persevere through initial stumbles and failures, and ultimately share their passion with readers and audiences outside of the classroom.

Today after school, I listened in as Skylar interviewed someone form the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education in order to learn about how one gets into this field of study. Earlier in the day, TJ pulled up curriculum outlines for computer programming language courses and computer science classes taught at a high school in Washington. He mentioned that he was going to try contacting a principal from the school to help with his current research. He thought he was just going to be building a computer from scratch (which he did), but then he asked the question, "Why don't students have the opportunity to do this is school?" So this weekend, he put together a course proposal and research curriculum guidelines and state teaching regulations which he plans to share with our principal and hopefully the school board. Jillian connected with Duckworth Labs and with professors to learn more about growth mindset and its impact on student success in the classroom. Juliet was excited when her free book arrived after she connected with Ed Lebetikin, store owner and teacher at The Woodwright's School (if you are a fan of PBS, you might be familiar with this show). We tweeted best-selling author of Born to Run and running advocate Christopher McDougall when Abigail started to research how to prevent running injuries. He's making a visit to our school next month! Students have been taking cake decorating classes, shadowing landscape business owners, composing scores for orchestration, conducting and teaching middle school band students, and so much more. And all the while students have been blogging, sharing their research and their reflections with students both around the country, as well as those around the block.

As my tenth graders selected their topics and looked for mentor texts and experts to interview, we also connected with fifth grade students in our district completing a very similar inquiry project. Using Google Hangouts, elementary library Christina Brennan and I connected our students, encouraged them to share their inquiry interests, and then we connected our learners further using collaborative Google docs.  My high schools students read through her students' initial questions and research findings and commented back to the fifth grade students, sharing research strategies and connections. My students moved from finding mentors to being mentors.

We have come to our final week for our #HavPassion inquiry projects. When I shared this with students on Monday, I had groans. But they were not groans complaining about having a week to work on research. Instead, they were groans hoping for more time. Students want to do more, read more, blog more, connect more. Now they are saying, "We can research anything! Really!"

Next weekend, some of my students will be joining Christina and me as we present at EduCon on the mentorship relationship forged between our two groups of students. My students aren't being graded for their presentations. In fact, they are joining me after our class together has come to a close. But this is what passion-based learning inspires. Student and teachers building a community of learning that extends well beyond our physical classrooms and beyond the boundaries of one particular class.

Please check out their blogs. This week they are adding up their final reflection posts and we will be celebrating their accomplishments in class on Friday. I would love to share any words of encouragement that you might have, so use the comments section below to share!

UPDATE:

Interested in bringing this to your classroom?

Feel free to adapt my student materials to suit your student needs! Here's a link to my student materials:

Powerful Connections

It is my lunch hour...okay, half hour. I am standing here nearly in tears and a bit at a loss for words. Just a few minutes ago, the bell rang and my tenth graders hurriedly shelved their Chromebooks and scuttled down to lunch. Today was our #HavPassion research day, the one day each week that my students have to work on their independent inquiry projects. They had 90 minutes. And now that I have a moment to reflect on those 90 minutes, I am in awe.

In 90 minutes, my students not only blogged the introductory posts to their research and shared a video pitch of their project, but they connected. Really connected. As part of our #HavPassion project, I have been encouraging students to develop their own personal learning networks by engaging other researchers and bloggers. As part of helping to foster those connections, I've reached out to a few other teachers who are also blogging with their students. My students will be reading and commenting on the blogs of other students who are completing similar 20% time / Genius Hour projects. But some of the most important connections are not those that you can plan for; they just happen.

A fellow Pennsylvania Writing and Literature Project (PAWLP) teacher, Brian Kelley shot me a quick email yesterday after I shared a link to my students' blogs.  He was contemplating opening up his classroom blog for others to comment on his students' writing.  Would it be okay for his students to respond to my students' blogs? Yes! Would we respond to his? Of course. And so today in class, I posted the web address for Mr. Kelley's 8th grade writers.  I'm not going to lie, I was a little nervous. How would my high school writers respond to his middle school writers? How would his students respond to mine?

When my students logged into their blogs this morning, I heard an audible wave crescendo around the room. "I have 55 views on this post!" "Ms. Ward, I have 11 comments!" "Holy cow, people are reading my work!"  And then my students started to respond to Mr. Kelley's writers.

Julia, an eighth grader in Mr. Kelley's class, wrote about her struggles with blogging, with coming up with topics.  And my students responded, honestly, with empathy, and with encouragement.

This is the power of having students compose for real readers. This is the power of connection!

Beginning Bloggers: Sharing our Research

Welcome to 2nd block.  This is my group of inspired researchers. They are learning about music production, about the perceived value of homework, about opening a bakery, and how to tell if someone is lying. And they would love to learn with you. You'll find their blogs connected in the image below. Please read, share, connect - learn with us!

WHAT IS #HAVPASSION ALL ABOUT?

The basic premise of our #HavPassion project is that it is student-driven, passion-based inquiry research. The idea behind this project started with Daniel Pink’s book Drive.  Pink, a former speech writer for Al Gore turned author, cites an idea that started with the 3M company and was expanded by Google. Google encourages its employees to spend one day each work week, 20 percent of their work time, focusing on their own projects. Why? It turns out that when people have autonomy over their work, time to master their skills, and a clear purpose, they are more motivated to learn. And scientific studies and research supports this claim. In fact, Google’s philosophy of 20 percent time is how we have Gmail!

DISCOVER  ★  QUESTION  ☆ REFLECT  ★  TRANSFORM

THE PROJECT:

What do you want to learn? Each Friday during the second quarter my students and I will be using our time to research the topic of our choice, an idea we are passionate about. Our goal is to become an expert on that topic. But this project is not just about researching…it is about doing something with what we learn. To complete this project successfully we will:

1. Pick a topic we are truly passionate about, something we want to learn. Students may work alone or in small groups. Keep in mind what we learned about the origins of the word "passion." Passion is rooted in suffering; what is it that you are willing to suffer through, to push yourself to learn?
2. Find a book to guide our learning.
3. Pitch the project idea in a project proposal to the class for topic approval. Students will submit both a written proposal and produce a video proposal to be posted to our class site for our community of learners to vote on.
4. Connect with an expert to interview.
5. Blog each Friday reflecting on our progress. Each post should also incorporate reflections on how our selected mentor text is guiding our research.
6. Produce something – a presentation, a writing piece, a show, something tangible – to share with people outside of our classroom.
7. Reflect on what we have learned in a TED-style talk.
8. Share all of our work on our online portfolio.

This is not simply a research project.  Once we’ve finished the research phase of this project, we must do something with our new found knowledge.  Students will be creating products and presentations (either individually or in small groups) that will extend beyond the classroom, such as documentary videos, web pages, pamphlets, newspaper or magazine editorials, an article for the school or local newspaper, letters, public speaking presentations, fund raising, music, plays…or whatever we can think of to best make our community aware of our research topic.  The idea is to reach an audience outside the doors of our classroom in order to share our research.  We will need to identify leaders in the field of our research in order to connect and engage with those thought leaders. 

Need some inspiration? Here you go!

Let's Blog It

My tenth grade English students have jumped in, feet first, to our #HavPassion inquiry research projects.  Last week, we mapped our passions as we tried to narrow our research questions. This week, not only did we share our initial inquiry questions with one another, but we also had an opportunity to connect with fifth grade students at an elementary school in our district.  We used Google Hangouts to share our inquiry topics with the elementary students, and they in turn, shared their research questions with us.  In the coming weeks, both groups of students will be using Google docs to collaborate. We'll be looking for connections with our inquiry questions, building our knowledge together.

And, as a way to share our process and reflections, we set up our blogs.  This is a new adventure for me.  In the past, I have had students blog on our closed website, a Ning, which made it difficult for students to reach a readership outside of our classroom. But this time around, I'm jumping in feet first as well.  We're using Blogger, allowing for a greater connection to a wide range of readers.

Another change that I have made this year is spending a bit more time deliberately introducing the concept of blogging to my students. Today we examined the 20% time blogs of the Nerdy Teacher, Nicholas Provenzano's high school English classes as well as blogs from Mrs. Scheffer's Burlington High School students. Rather than standing in front of the room and dictating a list of what to do and not to do when blogging, I had the students use a shared Google doc to come up with the list themselves. Before they began, we reviewed our earlier discussions on the impact of written and digital rhetoric, and I asked students to pay attention to not only what they were reading on each blog but also how they were reading. Here's what they noticed:

What Works?
Having looked at a number of sample blogs, use the space below to note what works. What do successful bloggers do to engage their readers? Take into account both written and digital rhetorical choices made on the part of the author.

• No longer than 2 paragraphs.
• Black/white or blue/yellow text (contrast makes text easier to read)
• Times New Roman font is easy to read.
• Some posts are long and detailed, and others are simple and sweet. A mix of lengths, which is something that I like.
• I like how they give a brief description and then explain what they did to accomplish their task.
• Short headers, capitalizing works well and use of colors to separate sections of a post.
• Explain why they chose what topic they wanted to use for the project and the story behind it.
• Pictures!!!! Make it interesting.
• Actually title the post. Please don't title it Blog Post #3 and the date.
• Spell check!!!!
• Bullets are okay, but numbering is boring.
• Keeping posts short lets readers read the post without losing interest, while in a long 5 paragraph blog post, readers could lose interest.
• I like when they have pictures of themselves and when its colorful, not just boring white.
• Bold letters with color emphasize important points.
• Make sure the background picture doesn't distract from the text!!!!!!!!!!!!

I shouldn't be surprised, but for both sections of my tenth grade class today, we were hard at work to the last minutes of class.  In fact, I had a couple of groans in each class that our 90 minute class period had come to an end. On a Friday!  Students wanted more time to write. What more could an English teacher ask for!?

Learn with Me: Blogging Basics

^{cross-posted at Babee Crafts}

I've been blogging for a while...okay, not as regularly on this blog since starting my maternity leave this past fall, but you will find me blogging about my adventures in mommyhood over at Babee Crafts. That said, although I've been writing online for a number of years, I've always used sparse, pre-designed templates. I'm excited to have stumbled across a couple of really great resources this past week for expanding my blogging know-how and hopefully adding some professional punch to my blogging endeavors.

First, you have to check out the amazing collection of resources posted just last week over at Tip Junkie. Her post "Blog 101: How to Start, Make It Cute, and Succeed Blogging" is fantastic! I'm looking forward to really digging into all the resources and links she has posted. Whether you are using Blogger or Wordpress, she has a wealth of specific links for customizing your blog whatever platform you happen to be using.

And Heidi over at Sew. Craft. Create. started a new series today which will go through a number of questions she's received recently about blog design. So, if you're looking to punch up your blog's impact, be sure to follow along! She'll be going through how to add links into your header, create your own grab buttons, and so much more.

All that said, watch for changes here! You should start to notice some subtle (and not so subtle) changes with my blog design in the near future...and hopefully a few more posts as well!

Bloggin'

Having just returned from the Google Teacher Academy in Washington, D.C., I have so much to write about! But before I get to all that I learned with my stellar cohort of 52 amazing educators, I thought I would pass along a wonderful resource:

The Edublog Awards

If you are looking to build your professional network, scroll down and check out the linked nominees for best teacher blogs. And, if you are interested in using blogs with students, these examples cannot be missed. And perhaps the most helpful to your professional and personal development - the list of gurus.

And while you are there, don't forget to vote!

Not Really A Post

It has been a while...okay, a long while since my last post. Turns out motherhood has changed a lot - my perspective, my priorities, and a vast number of diapers. I'll be sure to write a bit more on what these changes have meant to me as an educator, but for now, I have a resource that I would like to pass along.

MrsSugar over at Making Teachers Nerdy has posted an excellent list of educational blogs you should be investigating. It is impressive and very well organized. I was especially impressed by her blogroll of English/Language Arts bloggers. It includes a number of teacher-writers that I haven't yet had a chance to read. So set aside an hour or so to lose yourself in all the wonderful links.

Blogging Basics

In speaking with a colleague yesterday about finding authentic ways to use blogs in the classroom, I mentioned that I had been following an educator’s blog on the very same topic. The colleague replied, “You read blogs? I have a blog, but no one reads it.” I could sympathize with him because this was my initial reaction when I first started my blog this past summer. I didn’t understand how one gained a readership beyond just family and friends. However, the more that I’ve ventured into the blogosphere, the more I’ve learned that blogging is not merely about posting.

Effective blogs are not simply wonderfully written diatribes on a specific topic. Successful blogs are those that are articulate, reflective, and polished, but whose writers are also connected to a larger writing community. Effective blogs are those that are managed by effective bloggers. An effective blogger is not a writer who simply posts, but one who also reads and responds to other writers. As Will Richardson describes it, blogging should connect “…analysis and synthesis that articulates a deeper understanding or relationship to the content being linked and written with potential audience response in mind.”

I still feel relatively new to the whole edublogosphere. I’m still learning the lingo, still learning my way around. However, as an educator venturing into this arena and contemplating helping my students transition into the world of blogging, I thought it would be useful to compile a list of helpful resources to aid others in their blogging adventures.

Using Blogs With Students:

• ”Visonary Classroom Blogging” is a wonderful description of how to set-up and use blogs authentically in the secondary classroom. Not only does Clay Burell break down the step-by-step process of establishing a viable blog, but he also helps students find models for their writing through use of a Guide for Quality Blogs.


• Transitioning to Web 2.0 has a wonderful list of resources for why and how to use student blogs in the classroom. Janni Black, the author of the site, has assembled an amazing collection of resources.


• Online Educational Database (OEDb) has a wonderful post titled “101 Web 2.0 Teaching Tools” that lists and explains a number of wonderful and free blogging tools.


• ” Moving to the Public: Weblogs in the Writing Classroom” is a wonderful post on Into the Blogosphere about why blogs should be used in the classroom.


• Enhancing Technology & Learning @ BGSU has a posted a wealth of rubrics for grading student blogs.


• Classblogmeister is a free service that facilitates blogging in the classroom. The teacher establishes a blog, students submit posts to the teacher, and the teacher approves the post before it is ever published. It is problematic in that once a student leaves the class, he or she would not be able to post to the site, so it is not an authentic blogging experience for the student, but it is a good start for students and teachers who haven’t had much exposure to blogging.

If you know of other resources, please let me know. Happy blogging!

I Know I Don't Know

I have relearned a very important lesson this evening: I know I know nothing.

Okay, perhaps nothing is a bit extreme. But after being directed to the recent EduBlog Awards list by Anne Davis over at EduBlog Insights, I am overwhelmed: so many wonderful blogs, so much information, so many ideas. I’ve only recently wandered into the edublogosphere; I’m still learning the language, figuring out the netiquette. Perusing the list of nominated blogs, I am awestruck.

I haven’t made it all the way through the list yet, but I thought I would share a few of my favorites:

Best Research Sharing Blog nominee - edte.ch

Most Influential Blog Entry of 2007 nominee - “Did you know?” by Scott McLeod and Karl Fisch at Dangerously Irrelevant and their related wiki site, Shift Happens, and ”The Ripe Environment” at Discourse about Discourse

Best Teacher Blog nominee - Clay Burell’s Beyond School

Check out the list for yourself!