The Past Few Days

Good Morning!

These past few days have been exciting in terms of my Bulldog Blog. I told my grade 10 class about the blog and sent home a letter to parents. To my somewhat surprise, only a few students in my class have looked at blogs before (they all knew Perez Hilton). None of them have ever blogged before. We had a brief discussion of digital natives and digital immigrants. I explained how I fit in between both. This will be discussed in more detail later on. The boys in the class seemed really intrigued by the blog especially when I discussed the fact that having a class discussion blog will less homework since we can start a discussion faster in class because we have all had "thinking time" when we look at the blog the night before a discussion. This will give us more time in class to get work done. It will also allow students to multi-task. They can blog while on the bus, on their lunch or during a commerical break while watching their favourite TV show. I shared with my class the research I had read about youth being able to fit in 10.75 hours of media into 7.5 actual hours as a result of multitasking (Kaiser Report).

Yesterday, I took my class to the library to set up their Gmail accounts. We spoke about digital privacy and the need to remain nameless when creating an account. My biggest challenge will be remembering when reading posts all the pseudonyms and their corresponding students. I will be posting a list of all the pseudonyms on a chart in class and provide them with a bookmark of the names to refer to. Perhaps this idea of having a pen name will benefit the discussion in that we can all hide behind an alter virtual ego which may allow students to be more genuine in their responses. This blogging idea is sounding better and better each day!

Yet, technology is never perfect and that was certainly the case in the library. After the first batch of students created accounts, Google would not allow other students to create accounts on the same computer. The error said this was due to the prevention of spam. Thus, some students will create their profiles at home and then follow the blog. Flexibility is key both in a physical classroom as well as in a e-classroom.

Over the weekend, students are going to "test" the blog by posting a comment to a question I post.

One final note. I chose my grade ten class for a number of reasons. One reason is that it is an important year for them because they are writing the OSSLT test so this will help improve their writing skills. Logistically, it is also easier to a new blogger like me to follow only one class as opposed to my two sections of Grade 11 University classes. Yet, my grade eleven students I have seen grow up since I have taught many of them since grade nine. With my grade ten students, I am still establishing a relationship with them since the new semester has just begun and yet, I am letting them in on my reflective thoughts. This is very similar to what I will discuss with them in terms of posting on a blog - the fact that the blog is public and what is posted is not private on the most basic level. Yet, for us, no one really knows about our blog so it does allow us a cozy e-space.