Technology & Me (in the Classroom)

My Classroom Blog February 3, 2009

As I am becoming more comfortable with technology I thought I would resurrect an idea I ran with a couple of years ago when I was first exposed to blogs.  I attempted to have daily blog updates upon classroom activities to assist students and parents in the daily activities of the class.  There were problems though that made it difficult to go on with.  The computers and server were notorious for going down, which caused me to not update the blogs regularly.  Also frustrating was the fact that I had a stat counter that seemed to be going nowhere.

This time around I am trying a few new things.  The first obstacle was getting the school division to unblock the blog site.  With new filters in place, security was making updates and students seeing it very difficult.  Secondly was communication with parents.  So this year I sent a form home, that the parents had to sign, with the blog address clearly indicated for them.  I hope these measures help students to succeed more as they can have a constant connection to what is going on in class.

That said I would like to find a way to have students access to forms, assignments, etc. on the blog.  I think I have researched this by using Scribed.  I understand as a third party software it is supposed to do so but I have as of yet to try.  I am also hoping by forcing some of the Journal entries upon them via the blog to get them used to checking it out.

The blog address is http://handspiker.blogspot.com/