What’s All the Blog About?

Leanne Forrest

Modes of Communication

Digital Immigrants……….US

Digital Natives……..STUDENTS

Text messagingBlogging

MSN

Letters

Face to face

Telephone/Cell phoneemail

Presentation Outline

Podcasts Blogs Fairy Tale Project Additional Ideas/Projects

What is a Podcast?

a computer assisted broadcast a collection of episodes released in a timely

fashion episodes are recorded audio files (mp3)

Examples of Educational Podcasts

Bobby Bucket Show Podcasts for Kids, by Kids Storynory Book Voyages Environminute

Podcast Directories The Education Podcast Network Podcasting News (Education) Times Top 10 Podcasts from 2006

The key to a podcast is the ability to ‘subscribe” – similar to a magazine that is delivered to your door.

However, it is delivered to an account on your computer. Bloglines or iTunes have this capability.

This allows the listener to check several Podcast sites with one click, save them to an mp3 player or their computer, and listen to them whenever and wherever they wish.

What is a Blog?

A grade 5 “bloggers” perspective

Benefits: Easy to use Interactive Easy subscription

(automatic update notification)

Motivating Meets curriculum

objectives Extends the classroom

Educational Blogs

The Write Weblog Thinking and Writing Wrinkles Grade 1 Newsletter Blog Eco-Kids Blog A super storybook about blogging made by

students ABC Book on Blogging

Blogging Resources

Blogging Webquest Blogging Contract Blogging Articles (see handout)

These resources are all available on the following wiki:

http://lforrest.wikispaces.com/Blog+Resource+Page

Fairy Tale Project Introduction

Gr. 4/5 class Culminating activity for Fractured Fairy Tale

unit. No previous blog experience.

Fairy Tale Project: Podcast

Students write their fairy tales. Students record their fairy tales using

GarageBand. Use the graphic organizer for planning. Discuss a rubric for grading the recording.

Fairy Tale Project: Blog Introduce blogging to students.

Follow “What’s All the Blog About” lesson plan Inspiration Mapping Discuss blog contract and have students/parents sign and

return. Create a blog. We used Edublogs.

Create categories for each student. Create posts for each student and upload the mp3

recording of each of their fairy tales. Allow time for students to listen and respond to each

other’s fairy tales. Use rubric to mark blog participation Use rubric to mark podcasts.

Tips!

Do not use students’ full names Start with a simple post/response

environment to introduce blogs File sizes can’t be too large – ideal listening

time is 2 – 5 minutes. If story is longer, the files will need to be split or they will not upload to blog.

Assign the students which stories to listen and respond to (popularity contest).