The Write Weblog

No Goodbyes

Wow! The final project is going to be great! I enjoyed watching all of you work on it today. I will try my best to get it all together and published soon. Your readers are going to be in for a real treat!

Now, I refuse to say goodbye because I know I will see you again. If I don't see you, I'm sure I will be reading something you're writing. If may be on blogs, newspapers, magazines, books, or other places. Every year I get the most incredible group of students and you continue to amaze me. It is such a joy to work with you. I don't like it when the year ends (sniff, sniff...) but my spirits rise when I think of all you will accomplish as you continue through your learning journey at school and elsewhere. You're the best!

One Week Off & Raring to Go!

I hope you all have had a great week off! I know you'll come back raring to go! I have a surprise for you that will provide you a lot of fun! You're going to make some more connections! No more, remember, I said surprise so you will have to wait! I will share in the morning!

Today we will be blogging our news reports. You need to share all that learning J. H. House students get each and every morning from CNN Student News!

Now on a personal note, I thought you might enjoy seeing a picture of my kids and grandkids. They had a great time at the circus! Any of you get the chance to go? I hope so.

I want to share a great link with you. The link is "If I Were a Carpenter: The Tools of the Writer." It is good food for thought. I think we can perhaps adapt it to fit writing on blogs by elementary students? Up to the challenge?

See you tomorrow! It's going to be a great day!

A Red-Letter Day!

Don't you think the cover for author Pat Street's book is the cats meow? I love it! All the animal sayings and illustrations inside are sweeping me off my feet! Pat Street  focused on similes, metaphors, idioms and proverbs in the book. If I were talking instead of blogging there would be a frog in my throat because I would be shouting praises of the book to the four corners of the earth! Yes indeed, I'm not mincing words when I say that this book is top drawer!

I will be e-mailing Pat Street today and hopefully in the near future we might hear from her. Wouldn't that be mar-vel-lous! Simply marvelous!

Ms. Meeler and I were on top of the world last week as we watched you creating idiom sentences on your blogs.  Here's a sampling of some of your sentences:

• Marcos was on pins and needles when we took that test.
• Mrs Henning said Mike was on thin ice.
• For me math is a shot in the arm.
• Adriana has to chill out.
• I'm good at social studies, but in math I got Achilles heel.
• I've gone bananas over weblogging
• Webbloging is all about playing with words.
• Ashley and Adrieana see eye to eye  on tests.
• Weblogging is when the pen is mightier than the sword.
• When Juan found out that Jhonathan had spilled the beans, Jhonathan was a dead duck.
• Juan told Jhonathan to add a little elbow grease to weblogging.
• My grandmother is no spring chicken.
• Alejandra's heart is in the right place because she has good intentions.
• Ashley, when you weblogg, always remember that you are dealing with mind over matter.
• Erika let the cat out of the bag when she told our biggest secret.

Wow! I'd say you guys were developing the gift of gab! The best part of the day was watching you laughing, swapping idioms with each other, giggling, thinking and learning.  Yep, it was a red letter day in the computer lab! I am really looking forward to reading the idiom stories you will be creating and blogging this week!
 

Session Synopsis

I think we're off to a good start! Everyone came in and got right to work browsing the different current events sites. I am amazed at your good choices for stories.

Copies of our categories and the Bloom's Taxonomy words were distributed.

Download Categories.doc

Download blooms_taxonomy.doc

Then you went on to comment on this site. I was impressed with your use of the comment starter sheets we used last week. That helps bump up your thinking and I can't wait until you add to the list.

Download comment_starters.doc

Next, you all put your shoulders to the wheel and made your new posts. Then you proofed your work and called on a friend to proof it for you. Mrs. Meeler and I are working on the proofing system to make it clearer for you and more "user-friendly". We'll get your input a little later. We have a ways to go in this area but you have really improved from the first posts you made. Keep up the good work!

I know some of you even managed to find time to make comments here and there on other blogs. We will try to make sure time is allotted for that next session. This is my reminder! :-)

Now I wish I had known this before today so I could tell you but you may be surprised by some wonderful visitors on December 2nd! I know you will enjoy the visit and they will love seeing what you are doing.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving. Give thanks for all the wonderful things we have in our life. One of the many things I'm thankful for is working with a wonderful group of students like you!!

A blogging we will go!

I want you all to know that I was with Mrs. Hooper when she read your comments on her weblog. She was "grinning like a Cheshire cat!" You will understand that feeling when you start to receive comments on your weblogs.

We are ready to proceed! Your weblogs are ready! Hooray! I went ahead and posted for you the beginning posts that you had already made. Now they were posted exactly as you wrote them so be prepared to edit away today! I have a "Common Proofreading Symbols" handout for you. It covers many of the items you need to address. Yep, you're going to become the best little proofreaders at J. H. House!

Remember the Writing Tips we discussed last week! A quick review...........

• Grab the reader’s interest with the lead.

• Use vivid vocabulary so people will make pictures in their head.

• Give lots of details.

• Muse about what you wrote – I wonder, I think, I wish I knew, I think.

• Ask a thought-provoking question.

Here's a few more.....

• Remember to think of a catchy title that entices the reader to read your story.

• When you start a new idea, make a paragraph!

• Read what you have written out loud in a soft voice so you won’t disturb others.
You need to hear what you have written to see if it makes sense.

We'll go over all of this together, tweak it to fit our needs and away we go into the wonderful world of blogging!

I can't wait to see you on Thursday!

Catching Up

It's good to get back to posting on this weblog. Over the past few weeks we have been working on the biz pal project but General Mills has decided to stick with the email program instead of trying out blogs. I am disappointed but understand that they do not have enough computers in one place to set it up in the way that would be needed for this type of project. We're learning about the problems that can occur when businesses have complete access to the internet when it is really not needed for the job at hand. Maybe down the road it will be a possibility. Too bad!

So, back to the drawing board for other projects. Today Hillary created her first blog and she named it EduBlog Quest. I like it! She is just jumping in and learning by doing! She is using Manila so she can learn more of the ins and outs of weblogs. I like TypePad for the school projects and Hillary will be learning how to manage those but she needs to just have one all her own to really learn.

We're going to start a student group soon, then add some teachers to the mix.

The focus for the writing on the weblogs will be to encourage writing as a meaning-making process and  a tool for learning. Possibilities for writing/blogging include:

what they are learning in their classrooms

getting more involved in what they are studying so they can make real learning connections

extend their knowledge on subjects of interest by using the internet

ask and research questions they have plus pose questions for their audience

make predictions about what they are learning

have fun with language as they write about class activities

review and reflect on books or texts read

write about knowledge and facts learned in different ways

 

use Bloom's Taxonomy key words to help students expand their thinking and learning

The other important piece is to get the students to reflect on what they are doing and evaluate it. This will help them integrate and internalize the curriculum they are learning. It could help us as teachers know what is getting through and what isn’t.

The goal is to get students to connect what they are studying with the rest of their experiences, thoughts, and feelings. Learn how to write to learn! Then use the web to extend their learning.

Another goal is to use the comments feature by the students. They need training and guidance to do this in a worthwhile manner. We need to go beyond general statements and help the students learn how to make interesting and helpful feedback.

I can't wait to get started!

Meetings Galore!

This week's session at J.H. House was filled with meetings, from the instructional technology specialist (ITS), to the principal, to the counselor, and finally the General Mills representative.

Meeting 1
First, I met with Ms. Meeler (ITS). I showed her a mock weblog I had put together simulating how the Biz Pal/Student project might look.  This way she could visualize the back & forth posting between the students & General Mills mentor. We looked at the layout. This design includes the date at the top and a title. Actually, the letters back and forth between student and mentor don't necessarily lend themselves to titles as they usually contain several topics.  Even so, we are leaning towards including the title. The reasons are (1) to give students practice writing and (2) it's nice for readers to see the topics included on the TypeList on the sidebar.  It provides a "heads-up" for readers to have to make quick decisions on what they'd like to read.  Having only the date at the top of a post is too broad and would not pique interest for our readers.

Next, I reviewed the Weblog features we had discussed last week. Ms. Meeler is a quick study and grasps the info quickly.

Then, we brainstormed names for the Biz Pal project. We decided on "J. H. House and General Mills Mentor Project" for the parallel blog that Ms. Meeler will create. (All this is, of course, assuming the project gets the green light from General Mills.) The student blogs would be something like........
Jose & Ms. Jennifer's Corner. We'll be using first names only and ending up with names like corner, deck, desk, den, spot, world, etc. If you can add to this list, send some possible names for the ending part on our comments section. We plan to let the students pick the ending part of the name from a list. We like the idea of keeping it kind of consistent in this manner. Grades 3-5 will participate.

Finally, Ms. Meeler and I explored the inner workings of TypePad together and printed the online manual for her.

Meeting 2

Next stop was the principal's office. Mrs. Hooper posted her thoughts, "I Think I'm Going to Like Blogging."   She will be working on her post on honesty later and will publish it early next week. Last week, we had talked about introducing weblogs to the school counselor. She is pretty good with technology and might be interested in participating. So, off to the counselor's office!

Meeting 3

I pulled up a chair in the counselor's office and gave her the URL of the principal/s weblog. I told her to read it from the bottom up. She said, "Oh, this is just like reading a continuing email." Then as she read, she got excited, and exclaimed, "This is so good." Laughter followed. I tried to contain myself as she was getting hooked. All the signs were there. She read a couple of comments people had left on the blog. I said, "Let me show you how to comment." Then, I got a phone call and when I walked back in her office she was commenting away. The comment was becoming like a post - I love it! She really enjoyed the post on school pride, and to say she was intrigued with all this is an understatement. I did a quick tour with her through Weblogs: The Possibilities Are Endless! (I have really found this information site handy to use!) She is going to explore some more weblogs and think about the focus she wants for her weblog. We will meet again next week and set up her weblog!  Hooray!

Meeting 4

The last meeting of the day was with Linda, the General Mills representative. Ms. Meeler and I conducted a quick tour of weblogs with her. Mainly we stuck with the principal's blog, this blog, and the mock BizPal blog I had created. Linda asked excellent questions, saw the benefits and was interested. All the emails from General Mills in the email project for the past two years have gone through Linda for a final check. The emails here at J.H. House have gone through the ITS.  In elementary school settings, these parameters are necessary. Wish it could be otherwise, but it gives us the chance to make writing the focus, teach our students responsible use of weblogs, and pave the way for students to blog in worthwhile ways in the future. So our thinking here is that we may make Linda the author of all the blogs from General Mills, Ms. Meeler the author of all the blogs from J. H. House. Then all the other mentors and the students would be junior authors. This way final checks could be done on both sides. If any of you out there have used TypePad, let me know if you think this is a good approach or if there is another way to achieve the same thing.

There's just one hitch to all this. General Mills does not give its employees internet access across the board so Linda is going back to the tech department to see if there are work arounds. She'll be back in touch. We're hoping they can figure a way because we think this project is great and needs a green light! I understand why companies don't give Internet access across the board to employees, especially if it is not really needed for their job but it gave me pause. I'd like to see a project like this come to light. In the feedback from last year's project they wanted the communications between General Mills and J. H. House to reach to others in the classroom and it would be great to see more having the opportunity to share the writings and then comment or even post as another junior author! I'll keep you updated!

Ms. Meeler and I are going to test drive the roles of junior author this week.

Off to a good start!

Last week I met with Mrs. Hooper, principal, and Ms. Meeler (instructional technology specialist) at J.H.House. I have high hopes for this school weblog project. The principal is up and going on her blog, Principal's Quest. ! Focusing on character education will have her writing and setting a fantastic example for her staff and for the students. The plan is to get the teachers and students involved with her blog initially through the commenting feature. This will set the stage for further blog development later.

I reviewed blogging "how-to's" with Mrs. Hooper. Then she moved over to a computer and began blogging her thoughts. This past week she blogged her first post on school pride and it is terrific! Go make a comment and share a time you felt school pride or saw it in action at a school.

As Mrs. Hooper was blogging, I worked with Ms. Meeler. This is her first year as an instructional technology specialist. She is enthusiastic, eager to learn, and sees the potential in weblogs. I took her on a tour of weblogs. She is going to follow-up by following the many links on Weblogs: The Possibilities Are Limitless! We talked at length about what she would like to focus on, on her blog. She's thinking about writing a parallel blog to run along side of the Biz Pal project we are hoping to convert to blogs. Tomorrow we will be meeting with General Mills.

We spent some time on the managment aspects of all this. Here are some of our thoughts at this point.

1- What's the best way to introduce this to teachers?
We thought we would go slow in this area. First, have the principal's blog up and going, followed by the ITS (instructional technology specialist). Get teachers and students reading these by getting them to comment on these blogs.

2- What's the best way to manage commenting with students?
We think we want to keep the commenting where people have to give their name and email address. That presents a problem where students are concerned - they do not have email addresses, for the most part. Should we have them use the teacher's email address and sign their own names? How is the best way to set this up in the classroom? Allow a certain time in the classroom, send them to the ITS at a certain time and use her email address?? Anybody out there have ideas?

Mrs. Hooper plans to post her thoughts tomorrow. I plan to post more of my thoughts later. I think we're off to a good start!