Blogging has been on my mind a lot lately. Probably because of the course I am working on for my masters program. I was thinking about the biggest failing point at incorporating blogs in classrooms. That is the setup time, instructions, use, and enrolling students. If each teacher has their own blog that they need to enroll students for, that is a lot of wasted time. This must stop now.
The solution. Using a blogging platform that will allow multiple teachers to use the same database of users across multiple blogs. Now setup is once, users enrolled once, and instruction time can be done once. Think of the time saved and organization created.
One way to carry out this is to pay a company to set up a blogging community for you. This is not a good option unless you are a giant school district. Another is to download free blog software that is designed for multiple blogs. LifeType is an example of such software. If you have a full-time network manager at your school district, this could be a viable option. But then you would still need to have a site to upload it to.
Last option, and obviously I consider it to be a great one, is to use a free online blogging community. Blogs.mu is one that I have used before had really enjoyed using. It is set up by WordPress and uses the WordPress blogging software. This is what Blogs.mu is according to them:
Blogs.mu is a site that allows you to set up your own WordPress based blog community or network – with the least of fuss. Set up blogs yourself or let users come to you.
If you have ever set up a blog before, there is only a few more steps to it to create a blogging community. But the rewards are astronomical. You could even use this school wide where students would each have a blog where they post various writing assignments, have discussion, etc. This would also benefit the clubs and extra-curricular activities in a school. The most difficult thing for clubs is communication and trying to get meetings together.
If anyone knows of other blogging community setups like Blogs.mu please let me know. From what I have found in my research, Blogs.mu is the best in the category.
Brilliant. You are absolutely right, setting up individual users and monitoring them class by class is a daunting task and keeps many away from blogging in the classroom. For the elementary school classroom, think.com is a great option. It lets one person set up and administer initially and then other teachers can be added on as administrators. All can pull from the same group of students. It is a closed blogging platform (only those registered on think.com as a school can see the blog and comment) so it may not be the best option for older students. For students just learning the ropes, it has been great!
Think.com does seem to be a great option for the younger students. I will put that into my list of possibilities for blogging communities. Thanks for the link!
Another option for any level is Moodle. I’m in my 3rd year of using it with 3rd and 4th graders. There are various levels of security from completely closed to open with a login as guest.
Dan
class of ’69 O’G HS