Blogging towards literacy

Teaching ESL in South Korea for 12 months was a fantastic experience. This experience is blogged at http://gcasey.edublogs.org/ and blogging with South Korean students at http://classblogmeister.com/blog.php?blogger_id=97161. This same blog is also being used in 2008 with my classes at Geelong High School.

Reading and writing provide the foundation of education.

Storytelling can be considered as the first steps in developing literacy - Blogging can provide an excellent medium for students to achieve some great literacy outcomes.

We start to tell stories at a young age and they mean many things to many people. My students have been blogging towards literacy with digital stories at http://digitalstories.globalteacher.org.au/ and  http://gcaseyglobal.globalstudent.org.au/

Blogging allows our stories to be dynamic and interactive. It gives students a stage in which to perform. The practice of telling stories allow our language and reading skills to grow - there is so much evidence around to supports this.

Some extracts and great supporting sites for the use of blogs in literacy include the following:

Blogs represent a perfect medium for literacy. Authors must read and write as they would on paper, while increasing their comfort with computers and the Internet. Because blogs do not require exceptional technical skills, but still offer the opportunity to “tinker” using Web programming languages for customization, blogs remain equitable for all age groups and both genders, and still provide a medium for learning programmatic skills - http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue9_6/huffaker/ (The educated blogger: Using weblogs to promote literacy in the classroom by David Huffaker)

http://blogs.ala.org/aasl.php?title=blogging_toward_literacy&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1
(The official web log of the American Association of School Librarians.)

Blogging Toward Literacy: raytick_bloghandout.pdf  - a must read for educators interested in blogging. Creating a community of readers among middle school student (Presentation Handout from the NECC 2006 Conference,
San Diego, California. Karen Connaghan – Pam Raytick)

Blogging has been an amazing experience. In each direction that I turn I have been surrounded by support. GHS teachers and administration have welcomed blogging with open arms - it has been a means to achieve something that both students and staff can be extremely proud. The Department of Education and Training have continued to support this project as a trial and have seen teachers work flourish - they have bent over backwards to support, change and make things work in their endeavour to develop a blogging environment that is safe and secure in an educational setting for all students to engage in learning that is not only fun but real and dynamic learning.One of my key phrases “Blogging towards Literacy” has allowed me to stay focused on key educational goals and build on my interests in ESL and TESOL successfully.The quality of the blogs developed by teachers and students are evidence of the projects great success. Much of the evidence is documented through comments and posts throughout the blogs. I have continued to enjoy being a mentor and coach to so many teachers and to watch the amazing comments generated by students has been a very rewarding experience. The comments documented by educator surffing past our blogs have been inspiring - check out:

http://dsglobalclassroom.globalteacher.org.au/2006/08/13/digital-stories-by-gail-casey/#comments

http://dsglobalclassroom.globalteacher.org.au/2006/10/05/come-blog-with-us/#comments 

http://digitalstories.globalteacher.org.au/2006/07/17/1/#comments 

http://gdrijver.globalstudent.org.au/2006/08/14/successful-learning/#comments

From the results of this project it is clear that blogging is here to stay. Students now have an environment that they can showcase work to parents and friends which has given them a real stage for their work.

I am part of the Literacy Professional Learning Team. We have been meeting regularly all year with the aim of improving student literacy outcomes through investigating and implementing appropriate literacy strategies. One of the  strategies I have been implementing is the use of Blogs in a range of currriculum areas. My interest in ESL and TESOL, teaching English to speakers of other languages, has also led me to extend my blogging work to the global community - US, Korea and China. Work in these areas has been absolutely facinating for me and can be found at: http://ssong.globalstudent.org.au/
http://kyunshin.globalstudent.org.au/
http://gcaseyglobal.globalstudent.org.au/
http://studentsguthreyds.globalstudent.org.au/
http://guthreyds.globalstudent.org.au/
http://year7bbghs.globalstudent.org.au/

The development of the GHS bloggers has allowed me to investigate blogging in the wider curriculum area and with many other teachers including members of the Year 7 Curriculum Team. Some excellent work from these teachers includes:

http://acostanzo.globalstudent.org.au/
http://gdrijver.globalstudent.org.au/ and http://studentsgdrijver.globalstudent.org.au/
http://fcowey.globalstudent.org.au/ and http://studentsfcowey.globalstudent.org.au/

Many other teachers at GHS are now looking at using blogs - see the the side panel links.

Teaching 7BB for English while working with Justin Harris has been an excellent opportunity for me to investigate blogging in the English classroom while still maintaining a focus on reading  and writing.

What do you think? What are you doing? What would you like to do? What do others think? Comments from Educators are welcome.

Lets use this blog as a means of communicating - I hate meetings and it is really hard to catch up with everyone, it would be great if we could use this area to share our work and ideas. Click on the comments link to add your ideas.

We have lots of new blogs about to get started this term they include:

http://mhermans.globalstudent.org.au/

http://hhatzis.globalstudent.org.au/

http://ksaunders.globalstudent.org.au/

http://hlawrence.globalstudent.org.au/

http://ssong.globalstudent.org.au/

http://jharris.globalstudent.org.au/

http://gcaseyglobal.globalstudent.org.au/

http://ecole.globalstudent.org.au/

http://johnstove.globalstudent.org.au/

http://studentsfcowey.globalstudent.org.au/

http://studentsksanunders.globalstudent.org.au/

http://studentsguthreyds.globalstudent.org.au/

http://csturgess.globalstudent.org.au/ 

I have made some short video clips using a software called contribute and developed a help blog. Check out http://help.globalstudent.org.au/ 

Hope you find them useful (by Gail Casey)

Hi,
The aim of this blog is to share ideas hence develop futher stages to our blogging project.

Stage 1: This was when our team commented on the digital stories blog (http://digitalstories.globalteacher.org.au/).

Stage 2: We are just about finished this stage - we have been developing our own blogs and most of us have had students commenting on our blogs. The work I have seen is fantastic. I have enjoyed reading the blogs and it was great that Diane also got invovled by commenting on Georgies blog (http://gdrijver.globalstudent.org.au/2006/08/14/successful-learning/#comments) - very inspiring for our students.

Could I please get our team members and any other interested staff (some may wish to come on board during term 4) to add any comment ideas to this blog by clicking the comments link.

Questions for our team:
How have you used your blog? (share your ideas with others)
What other ideas do you have for blogging in your classes or with other classes?
Where are you up to with your blogs? Do you know what to do next?
How many blogs do you see yourself needing in the near future?

Other comments on blogging and how it could be used in an educational environment would be appreciated by any interested educator.