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| Can students blog? You bet your bippy they can! |
| 04.19.04 (12:57 pm) [edit] |
I’ve been following Will’s discussion about whether or not students can blog. To me, blogging is all about the audience – it’s about the fact that there IS an audience. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t get any response from readers. I know because I’ve tried journaling about a dozen times and never kept it up longer than a week or two. It’s the interaction between my readers and I, my reading other blogs, and my ideas being picked up on other blogs and commented about that keeps me blogging. It’s the audience and community, the reading/writing connection, that makes blogging so fantastic for me!
Now, here’s the problem for student bloggers. Students don’t have an audience! But, it doesn’t have to be that way. I think we should form alliances with other teachers that use blogs in the classroom so that students read and comment on each other’s posts. Why not? So what if the audience is contrived! When you think about it – our audiences are contrived, too. I mean, most of us don’t simply stumble onto blogs, we read certain blogs and follow their links to other blogs. Linking is a powerful way to form community and readership. If a blogger posts about one of your posts, usually you respond on your blog, and link back to his blog. It’s contrived – I mean, I don’t have to link to another blog to discuss it, but it is the way of the blog, grasshopper! Blog-wisdom that sustains the community, at it’s very best! So, why not form an alliance with another teacher who’s blogging, link to the class blog, and have students read and comment – create a student blog community!
In a way, I’ve been doing this with Anne’s Wrinkle’s group. I, that is, SuperThinker, has been their audience, commenting on student blogs for a couple of months. If I had a classroom position at the moment, you can best believe I would have a class blog dedicated to blogging with Anne’s fabulous bloggers! My students could really learn alot from her group – they’ve been blogging for 2 years and their writing has really developed under Anne’s tutelage!
Since I don’t have a classroom I decided to try spotlighting Emily, one of Anne’s bloggers on BlogHeads. What a wonderful idea it’s turned out to be! I wholeheartedly advise it for everyone. The excitement it has created on the two coasts (they’re in Georgia, we’re in California) has been wonderful! Emily’s post is fabulous. Students at my school have been reading and commenting on Emily’s post. Read her full post and student comments to her post at BlogHeads. Here’s a snippet:
Ok, to sum it up this way, I Love Blogging! Blogging has allowed me to express my feelings, hear what other people have to say about my work (which I dearly love) and finding out how good of a writer I was. I'm telling you, I cannot go through a Thursday (The days I work with Mrs. Davis) without blogging. Taking away writing in my life, I would be nothing. Never think your no good at writing. Some day you might be the next Dr. Seuss.
Here’s what she said on Anne’s blog:
OK!!!! That was unexpected. I was just reading what Mrs.Davis was typing and then BOOM!!! She hands her blog to me. Well, I'm absolutely flattered. One day I'm a regular blogger, but the next day, I'm a guest blogger on a blog!!!
This webloging group has showed me many opportunities. I have tought some other kids with my writing, which has been one of my dreams for a while. I have also learned from other webloggers. One main point I have learned from others is to always copy your writing before you post. Very, very helpful at times. Writing has shown me a career I am now considering to become(when I'm older). I can become a journalist! Now I know that journalism can be fun, exciting, and even exhillerating, not just boring.
All you people out there who say that elementry students can't blog......You Are SO Wrong!!! Look what it's done for me. It has taught me so much, while letting me have my voice shown across the web. I have been blogging for 2 years now and I haven't had a problem yet. Each time I post a blog entry, I feel like I'm on Cloud 9. It feels like I just got elected for the first women president! It feels like I just gained a million really close friends! Get what I'm saying? It's like your favorite thing, times 1000!!! Without blogging, I don't know what I would do. Again, elementry students CAN BLOG!!!!!
I wondering who's going to read this.....Oh well. Blog to ya later!
I love it! This little lady's a force to be reckoned with! What enthusiasm, and her writing -- heh, she's in the 5th grade!!! People, I say we should get busy and start creating blog alliances and get our students some readers so they can create community and gain the benefits we adults gain from blogging. What are we waiting for!?!
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| Cuban and Irish wed -- Que viva verde! |
| 04.14.04 (1:31 pm) [edit] |
"There is nothing nobler or more admirable than when two people who see eye to eye keep house as man and wife, confounding their enemies and delighting their friends." Homer, Odyssey, ninth century B.C.
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I haven't posted much because I've been busy. Last Friday I was co-Maid of Honor for my Tia Sisi's wedding. Sisi is a wonderful kinder teacher.  She married my new Tio Patrick, a software developer, who is equally wonderful. It was a beautiful wedding and what made me the happiest was that my Abuela (Sisi's mom--my paternal grandmother) was able to attend. She's 84, and has advanced Parkinson's, but she's a trouper. Her years of athleticism, along with Tia Sisi's extraordinary efforts, have kept my Abuela active and on the go (she was a dancer in a troupe that travelled throughout South America in the 30's and 40's.)  I'm planning to make a photo-quilt to commemorate their wedding, so I spent time looking over old and new wedding pictures. Here's one that will go on the quilt -- my Abuela Inocente Ernestina on her wedding day in Havana, Cuba, 1926. I love this picture because her eyes sparkle with dreams of youth and her smile speaks of her happiness that day.
Here's another that will go on the quilt -- my mother, Olga, a doctor of pharmacology, marrying her first husband, Jose Enrique, an attorney, in Bayamo, Cuba, 1949.  I love this picture for two reasons. First, because my mother has fond memories of designing her dress and traveling to France to purchase the satin and chantilly lace she used. Second, because of the proud look on my Abuelo Valentin's face -- he was so happy because she was "marrying well." My mother thought her husband was "dreamy." Ah, love, it DOES make the world go round...
Congratulations Tia Sisita and Tio Patrick!
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| A cool Project Blog... |
| 04.03.04 (3:10 pm) [edit] |
I just came upon "Where is the love?" a blog which is an EFL collaborative project. In it Italian students from 6 different schools discuss issues related to the song "Where is the love?" by Black Eyed Peas. Here are some of the words to the song they're discussing:
What's wrong with the world, mama
People livin' like they ain't got no mamas
I think the whole world addicted to the drama
Only attracted to things that'll bring you trauma
Overseas, yeah, we try to stop terrorism
But we still got terrorists here livin'
In the USA, the big CIA
The Bloods and The Crips and the KKK
But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And when you hate then you're bound to get irate, yeah
Badness is what you demonstrate
And that's exactly how a n* works and operates
N**, you gotta have love just to set it straight
Take control of your mind and meditate
Let your soul gravitate to the love, y'all, y'all
What a great use of a blog -- getting students to dig into popular culture in a meaningful way -- meaningful because students relate to the music and because the words are deep. It reminds me of "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye.
Mother, mother
There's to many of you crying
Brother, brother, brother
There's far too many of you dying
You know we've got to find a way
To bring some lovin' here today - Yah
Father, father
We don't need to escalate
You see, war is not the answer
For only love can conquer hate
You know we've got to find a way
To bring some lovin' here today
Picket lines and picket signs
Don't punish me with brutality
Talk to me
So you can see
Oh, what's going on
What's going
Ya, what's going on
Ah, what's going on
That song really meant something to me and my friends when I was growing up. I was only in the 5th grade when it came out but the Vietnam War was all around -- I even remember wearing a POW/MIA bracelet engraved with the name of a soldier who hadn't come home yet. 
I hope to see more blogs like this one. If blogs are about having a voice -- getting your ideas out -- then I can't think of a better way to empower students than to get them discussing social issues that personally impact them (and us all) by using a blog like this one.
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