teaching and blogging

April 26, 2007

April was a bit of a stagnant month for me, but I think we are getting back on the ball. Bawl. Bowl. Bald. This week, I’ve been thinking a lot about how to step it up a notch in my class, using da blogs. There is a new blog site called edublogs.org. ANd as the name implies, it is meant to attract students and teachers. The platform is all Wordpress, as far as I can tell, which is great. I am trying out different skins and widgets before I officially migrate the class blog there. Here is a work in progress I can’t get the Democracy widget to work, which is the one that lets you do polls. I am bummed about that since I think it offers great possibility for student participation. (Feel free to check it out and give your 2 cents.)
I also signed up for an account at teachertube, a teacher-oriented variant of youtube. Cool.
Now I have to come up with ideas that my kids can handle. 2 days ago, I caught one of my students staring at a login screen; he had been doing it for 15 minutes.
“Barry, what are you doing??”
“I forgot my password.”
“JUst click on ‘forgot password?’. Get a new password from your email. I can’t believe you have wasted so much time!”
“Ok, teacher.”
20 minutes later…
“Barry why aren’t you logged in your blog yet??!??”
“I forgot my email password.”
It’s not all like that, but this is not an uncommon scene. It is very frustrating, I tellya. SO finding something to do which is constructive, positive and instructive for 300 students, but more importantly something they can ALL do, is a daunting task. I’d like the students to start creating (videos, podcasts, montages). Am I asking too much?
But more to the point, IS there a point? Am I just trying to exploit technology for technology’s sake? For the sake of my job and peer approval?
I took an online IT quiz and was rated at 55, or “geek wannabe”. I am surprised I even scored that high. Ok. I’ll quit before this post coagulates any further into a clot of self pity.
Here is a pretty cool video, from a teacher’s point of view anyway. The soundtrack is in a minor key, hightening the sense of foreboding I have about my incapacity to get digijiggywiddit…
The author writes:

Since most of today’s students can appropriately be labeled as “Digital Learners”, why do so many teachers refuse to enter the digital age with their teaching practices?

This presentation was created in an effort to motivate teachers to more effectively use technology in their teaching.

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