In the words of one of my favorite India Arie songs, Summer, "Goodbye summer, I hate to see you go." However, I am excited for another new year and all of the feelings that accompany it. Teachers know them... the anticipation of seeing the class list...the determination to try something new...the hope to better the lessons that were taught last year...the fun of buying new "stuff" at the teacher store. It happens every year, and I am excited to say this year is no different. I have a lot of new ideas and can't wait to see how they go.
One of my new "trials" is a new blogging platform for my students. Last year we tried to blog from this same blogger account, but it just didn't quite work the way I had anticipated. So this year I have set up each student with his or her own blog on Class BlogMeister. The link to this class blog is on the front page of our website http://www.mrsssmith.com/. Each student will also have his or her own wiki page. I like using the two different platforms for two different purposes. The blog will supplement and quite possibly replace the journal that is used in Spelling class. Did I just detect a possible eyebrow raise? I know...I know...the kids have spellcheck on the computer. That would be cheating right? Well...no. You see, in that last sentence, if I would have put write instead of right, the computer may not have picked up my error. So spellcheck isn't necessarily the all-encomposing fix it for even the best spellers. The wiki will be a place to work collaboratively with students in the classroom or at home. It is as close as I can get in providing each student with his or her own webpage. And the beauty of a wiki lies in the fact that the kids can create as many wiki webpages as they would like. Our class wiki can be found here. I am going to head over there as soon as I am finished with this post to get pages started for this year's class. Last year's class pages will be archived in one folder.
I am looking forward to meeting the 19 students that match my class list and working with them this year. I hope they are as excited as me!
One of my new "trials" is a new blogging platform for my students. Last year we tried to blog from this same blogger account, but it just didn't quite work the way I had anticipated. So this year I have set up each student with his or her own blog on Class BlogMeister. The link to this class blog is on the front page of our website http://www.mrsssmith.com/. Each student will also have his or her own wiki page. I like using the two different platforms for two different purposes. The blog will supplement and quite possibly replace the journal that is used in Spelling class. Did I just detect a possible eyebrow raise? I know...I know...the kids have spellcheck on the computer. That would be cheating right? Well...no. You see, in that last sentence, if I would have put write instead of right, the computer may not have picked up my error. So spellcheck isn't necessarily the all-encomposing fix it for even the best spellers. The wiki will be a place to work collaboratively with students in the classroom or at home. It is as close as I can get in providing each student with his or her own webpage. And the beauty of a wiki lies in the fact that the kids can create as many wiki webpages as they would like. Our class wiki can be found here. I am going to head over there as soon as I am finished with this post to get pages started for this year's class. Last year's class pages will be archived in one folder.
I am looking forward to meeting the 19 students that match my class list and working with them this year. I hope they are as excited as me!
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