Learning About Blogs FOR Your Students- Part II: Writing

You are reading Part II of a series of blog posts that started out of the desire to help teachers learn more about blogs for themselves in order to help/coach/facilitate their students’ blogging adventure. My guiding questions for this series of blog posts are:

• How can I make it easier for teachers to learn about the process of teaching and learning with blogs?
• How can blogging enhance student learning?
• What are components of QUALITY blogs?
• How can I guide teachers in experiencing a shift in teaching and learning and help them make a pedagogical commitment to blogging.

In Part I, I laid out the importance of READING blogs in order for the teacher to be able to gain and understanding of student blogging as a platform FOR learning, not “just” a vehicle for technology integration.

I do see blogging as a journey. It is not as simple as waking up one morning and deciding “Let me blog with my students” or attending one Professional Development workshop or conference presentation about blogging and thinking to yourself: “I’ll start blogging on Monday.”

The journey begins with reading blogs, but it has to continue with WRITING.

I firmly believe, that an educator who expects his/her students to blog for learning, NEEDS to be blogging for their own learning. 

The biggest obstacle for writing is YOU! I hear educators, who are or want to blog with their students,  tell me over and over again the reason why THEY don’t/can’t/won’t blog for themselves:

1. I have nothing to say that might interest anyone
2. I am not a good writer/ I don’t like writing
3. I don’t have time

Let me address each one of these:

“I have nothing to say that might interest anyone”

My response to the reluctant or scared bloggers, who feel that they have nothing to contribute to the edubloggersphere, is usually that blogging should not be about “others”. Writing a professional  blog should foremost be about yourself as a learner and about your own journey. Writing for others might come later down the road.

I explored “Who do You write for?” in a previous post. I listed MY reasons for writing.

• I write for myself, because I enjoy writing.
• I want to practice writing in order to get better at doing it.
• I blog because I want to have a record of my thoughts, my learning process, and resources that I find.

Seth Godin,  in a video, expresses that the METACOGNITION of thinking matters when blogging.

It does not matter if anyone reads it. What matters is the humility that comes from writing it. What matters is the metacognition of thinking about what you are going to say. How do you explain yourself [...]? How do you force yourself to write in three paragraphs why you did something? How do you respond out loud?

The blogger needs to realize that the primary reason for their blogging is NOT to please others, but to be a process that aids in their own learning.

“Obvious to You, Amazing to Others” is a short video clip by Derek Sivers that talks about what so many new want-to-be bloggers also feel like in respect to their potential writing contribution to the field.

“My ideas are so obvious, I will never be as inventive [as others]… but I continue to do my work, I tell my little tales, I share my point of view, nothing spectacular, just my ordinary thoughts.

He continues to explain how one day someone emailed him to ask HIM how he ever came up with that genius idea?

“Everyone’s ideas seem obvious to them[...] so maybe what seems obvious to oneself, might seem amazing to someone else.”

We need to keep this profound little discovery by Derek Sivers in mind, when we think that we might not have anything to contribute through our writing that would be of interest to others!

“I am not a good writer/ I don’t like writing”

Diving into blogging with our students, it is our hope that they grow as writers, that they connect their learning with new knowledge and that they will be able to express themselves in age appropriate eloquence. We also acknowledge that looking and preparing our students for their future must include a literacy (of reading and writing) through different media and new genres.

If we are in charge of preparing our students, we need to be riding the wave as well.

Karl Fish asks on one of his blog posts titled “Just Write Poorly. In Public. Every Day.”

This begs the question, of course, about how much our teachers are writing. Particularly our Language Arts teachers, but really all of our teachers. If it’s so important for our students to write, how come we’re not modeling it?

Seth Godin continues to share in the same video mentioned above that

If you are good at it (blogging) someone is going to read it. If you are not good at it and you stick with it,  you will get good at it.

If you are one of those who feel that they just don’t like writing, maybe due to writing assignments from their own years as a student, keep in mind that:

Writing for your own blog IS NOT like a writing assignment from college. There is pleasure, inspiration and satisfaction to be found in your writing.

Give writing another try, without the deadline, performance Angst or grading pressure that used to come with it. Remember you are writing for yourself. You are writing for your own learning journey.

I don’t have time

Oh yeah… the good old response: I don’t have time…

It is a great response for almost anything. It is easy and quick to say… It fits perfectly, it molds itself to any request, idea, proposal, thought… for the not so good, the great and the best ones…My thoughts are somewhere between “then don’t”… and … ” choose your priorities wisely”…

So, let’s get down to real life tips to help you write your blog. Keep in mind, that the same basic principles apply when facilitating blogging with your students.

• Just write!
  Write for yourself first. Blogging is about your own learning. Use it to remember, to document, to follow and refer back to your own journey. Remember that the destination is not always the goal, but that the journey is what you after. No more excuses for not getting started.
  
• Write about what interests you
  No reason to force subjects and topics on you that bore you. Digg deeper into your area of expertise or explore something you always wanted to learn more about. Don’t feel confined. You can find a niche by writing about one area of interest/subject matter or you can write about anything that think and wonder about. It is, after all, your blog
• Don’t force a certain writing style on yourself
  Find your own: be formal/conversational/narrative/ straight forward in outline form, etc. Experiment with different forms.
• Link to what you read
  Connect ideas you read about to your own ideas and thinking (give credit where credit is due of course!). Collect quote and citations you come across, as you read traditional books or during your online reading. See them as puzzle pieces that you assemble during your writing to paint a picture of your point of view.
• Add visuals
  Find ways to add visuals that support your thoughts. Creative Commons images (from Flickr for example) are your best friend. Sometimes a single visual can even spark your writing. Remember to also take your own images( to use in your blog) as you explain the way you see the world. If you enjoy graphic design, consider creating your own visuals as well. Many visual minds learn best by taking an idea or concept apart and by visually re-assembling it.
• Make writing  (on your blog) part of your work and learning process
  Don’t see blogging as something in addition to what you do. Incorporate, embed, braid it into your work.
  Need to write a lesson plan? Lay it out via your blog. Explain your rational for choosing certain activities and pedagogy. After you taught a lesson, make reflecting  (on your blog) part of the lesson planing cycle.
  Doing research about a certain topic and need resources? Use your blog as the platform where you collect and review the resources you find.
• Leave a positive Digital Footprint
  What would you like others (colleagues, students, parents, administrators, future employers) to find about you, if they were to google you? The answer to this question can give you ideas about what you could write about as you are starting to share and shape your digital footprint.
• Create a professional brand
  Brands used to be reserved for companies. Since we have become a “producing” society (not just a consuming one), the concept of branding has spilled over to us “individuals”. Your “brand” represents who you are, your beliefs and points of view across different media and online platforms. The writing on your blog will help define your professional brand.
• Don’t be a perfectionist
  Obviously do your best, but the point is to get it out, to process your thoughts, to formulate your thinking. Don’t spend hours on finding the “perfect” image at the expense of actually writing the post.
• Don’t get stressed
  You don’t/ won’t (most likely) get paid for your blogging, so don’t add unnecessary stress to your life. Work at your own pace. Don’t set yourself deadlines that you won’t meet and only stress you out. You will enjoy your writing much more.

Gwyneth Jones, The Daring Librarian,  in a post titled ” Just Blog it! Blogging Tips & Ideas” gives the following advice:

Blogs are like pets – you have to feed them regularly [...] If you start a blog you should try to maintain it. Post when you can, be upbeat, share what you can, give anecdotes about your profession, tech tips, lesson ideas, student successes, & professional philosophies.

• Start When You’re Ready, Already!
• No Excuses!
• Keep an Idea Folder Going!
• Schedule it
• Get Graphic
• Share Shamelessly
• Gimme a Widget!
• Be You!
• Give Credit
• Be Thankful
• Be Stubborn

Just as Karl Fish called for above: Just Write Poorly. In Public. Every Day. I am calling educators out to start writing too. To start writing FOR their students (Not necessarily FOR them to read your professional thoughts), but in order to become:

• better writers FOR them (to teach/coach/facilitate)
• transparent learners
• aware of their own learning journey

How can we teach/coach/facilitate blogging and hence writing, if we have not gone through the process ourselves?

What is the most important advice you would give a teacher to start blogging/writing?

Transliteracy- QR Codes and Art

Transliteracy is defined on Wikipedia as

The ability to read, write and interact across a range of platforms, tools and media from signing and orality through handwriting, print, TV, radio and film, to digital social networks. The modern meaning of the term combines literacy with the prefix trans-, which means “across; through”, so a transliterate person is one who is literate across multiple media.

Ryan Nadel, in an interview on Spotlight on Digital Media and Learning, defines transliteracy even further:

“The most fundamental notion of transliteracy is the ability to adapt. It’s creating a literacy and fluidity between mediums that’s not tied to space or modality.”

I agree with Ryan: Transliteracy is closely related to “fluency“:

• the ability to know when to use one media over another
• the ability to move effortlessly between media
• the ability to comprehend, build upon, and remix different kind of media
• the ability to relate, communicate and connect via multiple forms of media
• moving between media feels: intuitive, unconscious and smooth

Let me share a transliterate learning opportunity with you that I created (Art, iPads, QR codes, Language Arts and Digital Storytelling)  in collaboration with our Art teacher, Mrs. Gutterman and the 4th grade classroom teacher, Mrs. Teitelbaum?

During Art class, fourth graders adapted Vincent van Gogh’s chairs and placed things on and  around them that were important to them.

In Language Arts, students wrote a script, explaining their choices of what they drew and why it was important to them.

We all gathered in the library to record their script as an audio file on the iPad. We used the AudioMemos app (free) to record. Students then emailed the wav file to me.

1. I then converted the .wav files to mp3 files with Garageband, since I did not know if all mobile devices would play .wav files easily.
2. These files were then uploaded via FTP to our school’s server
3. I inserted the URL of each mp3 file into http://goo.gl
4. Clicked on “Details” to get to the generated QR code
5. Saved the QR codes as an image file

I inserted the images into a page and then printed the QR codes out for the Art teacher to attach them to the original art work.

Now anyone with a QR scanner on their Smartphone, iTouch or iPad walking by the art work, can scan and listen to the student artist’s audio reflection. The next step was to create a poster to catch the attention of the visitors and parents walking by and give a short explanation of what to do with the QR code

Working on iPad Fluency with Lower Elementary Students

I am NOT interested in using the iPad with my students as a worksheet substitution!

Kill and drill apps on the iPad are still just that… kill and drill activities.

I want my students to :

• use apps to create, not just consume
• fluently pick apps that will serve their purpose
• fluently switch between apps, then insert, embed, share and disseminate their creations

We have to expose students to a variety of apps to help them gain skills in iPad Fluency

By fluency I mean the ability to:

• connect tasks effortless together (ex.creating and editing a video, then uploading, embedding and disseminating on several platforms)
• CREATE and then being able to COMMUNICATE- the ability to create and communicate your creation is one of the main characteristics of fluency
• record, edit and then publish a movie that automatically posts to my blog
• take an image…edit…then automatically post to my photo stream as well as embed into a blog post
• work within several apps, then remix content from each one by being able to import them from one app to another.

In the first few weeks after the iPad deployment, we are concentrating on allowing students to test and explore a variety of apps, as well as work on that fluency piece. Here are a few examples of our lower elementary school students.

In first grade, students practiced their Hebrew letters in Doodle Buddy.

They then drew illustrations and learned about emailing the finished image to the teacher.

In second grade, we are helping students create an image, then saving it into the Photo Gallery (by an in-app function, via the built-in camera or taking a screenshot) and then edit and email that image to their teacher.

Yoel

Second graders were learning to introduce themselves in Hebrew. We decided to create an eBook with each student contributing their own page. Take a look at this post how to create a collaborative iPad book.

The image can be created in a drawing app, such as Doodle Buddy, or being taken with the iPad’s built in camera, then imported into Doodle Buddy to write or type over it.

By adding an International keyboard to the iPad, we were able to easily switch between the English and Hebrew letters.

Here were the instructions for our students, which we modeled by mirroring the iPad display via projector:

1. Take an image with the built-in camera
2. Go to Photo Gallery and edit if needed
3. Go to Doodle Buddy app by finding the app icon or by searching for app by name
4. Import image from Photo Gallery as background
5. Choose a marker, color, thickness and write your name in Hebrew on the image
6. E-mail the image to your teacher

We are realizing that after a few run throughs of creating- saving- sending, our students are picking the sequence up easily.  (The hardest part for these early elementary school students is to spell my name in the email correctly

We are also making it a point to have students explore the apps we have loaded on our iPads. As we are discussing, at the beginning of class, WHAT we want to CREATE, we are asking for input from the students:

1. What app would be best suited (any alternatives)?
2. The sequence from creating to saving and then the best way to share it with others (email, publish, classroom blog, etc.)

It is crystallizing itself clearly, that the iPad lessons are building on each other. The best success, I have been able to observe, is when students had explored an app in one class, worked with the app to create, in another class and finally pulled the sequence together for a larger project by remixing, sharing and collaborating.

What are some of the activities you do with your students to increase iPad fluency?