Why Blogging?

Teachers are constantly asked why do you do what you do in your classroom?  What have you learned from teaching the way you do in your classroom?  What would you change in the classroom next year?  These three things cause the teacher to constantly be metacognitive about what they are doing, what is working, what they are doing that is working, and what they are doing that is causing the tasks to fail.  Just like any other job, we are to be able to understand what we bring into the classroom and what we stop from happening in the classroom.

Last year I decided I wanted to break through the barrier that students had in the classrooms at the school I was teaching in.  Rather than having students go through a preset curriculum, I felt it was necessary for them to have a more authentic approach to learning and doing what they do in the classroom. This is a scary endeavor for not just the teacher, but the school as well.  I failed in some of what I set up in the classroom initially.  There were many nights that I went home thinking that I should just go back to the old curriculum that had been used and make it easier on me.  In the end, I decided that is not what I could do...it was not what was best for the students.  The students needed to see that what they wrote was important to me and that it was about their interests as well.

This year I will continue using google classroom as a means for getting information into the students' hands, explaining what assignments they need to do for credit and to have some sort of organization to the seven classes.  I will also be adding more technology to the classroom though.  There will be books available online to students, these blogs, online videos, and more.  I am excited to see what all the students will come up with and what they are capable of.  To find more information on why blogging is important in the classroom and for students in today's technology filled lives, see the following webpage: 6 Benefits to Blogging in the Classroom.

(This post was about 325 words long.  Notice that it is 3 clear paragraphs all on one topic. This would be an example of an informational blog post.  You need to have at least one source within it.  I expect to see at least 2 blog posts this long. One of your blog posts will be informational like this one and another will be persuasive in nature. I have also included a link to an external website that helps explain what I am thinking and why blogging is important to students.  You will be required to have at least 3 external links with clear explanations for their use in your blog.)