Using Kidblog for My Students First Blogging Experience

My students and I are a couple weeks into using www.kidblog.org for our blogging tool.  I like the ease of the tool.  No bells and whistles for the landing page-- just blogs!  I decided to open it up for anyone to see and comment.  My students and I have talked often about being safe on the Internet and have create important rules:

1. ALWAYS use your first name ONLY!
2. NEVER use personal information!
3.  Keep comments and posts sensible- remember you are representing the school.
4.  ALWAYS proofread, edit, and spell check what you write!  We are communicating with other classes now and want to show off our writing and thinking skills!

I like that this blogging site allows me to monitor the posts and comments.  I have to approve everything before is published.  The site also allows me to add the teachers we connect with as guests so they can publish and have access as well.  

I'd highly recommend this blogging tool if you are new to blogging with your students.  There are many other tools out there but this is the easiest one I've seen.

How I Jumped on the Blogging Train

I recently heard Karl Fisch speak at our Jeffco Tech Share Fair.  The keynote was amazingly motivating!  I've been batting around the idea of getting my kids connected globally for a couple years but could never find the extra.. time, motivation...   However, my excuses stopped January 22nd. 

6:00 AM January 23rd
The power of Twitter!

 

 

 It was this simple.  I threw out a request to my PLN (personal learning network). Within minutes, I had Tom Barrett, Karl Fisch, Rachel Forward, Lee Kolbert and many others who retweeted or said they could connect me!


~6:15 AM
I was connected!  My tweet had gone global!  The power of sending out a plea via Twitter was priceless.  My students will now be connecting with a class in Virginia, Missouri, several in the UK- London area, New Zealand and Australia is on the horizon.