Week Two : Reflections & Learning!

Well, the biggest lesson I learned this week was to type my discussion posts in Word and then copy & paste! I mean, I knew to do that, but didn't! AHH.  So, my post for the week got cut off on the discussion board.  Here are parts of my posts on blogs and why I really believe they are a great tool to use with students:

My subject line is a direct student quote from my classroom!  This past fall my students blogged with another school. It was a comprehensive project. First, we created videos about the culture of our high school and so did the other school (they were in Boston and my school is 45 minutes northwest of Chicago).   Then, we swapped videos for our classes to watch about the other schools culture. Finally, the students blogged together reflecting, questioning and commenting about the two different schools. It truly was an amazing process to see my students so motivated to WRITE!  

With permission from 2 awesome 2nd hour students :)
This was posted on a class blog! 

A few weeks after this, we were in the gender unit in Sociology and one of my male students (who does not like to write), yells out, "We going to blog about that, Kilgallon?...I have ALOT to say about girls and gender issues).  It was very funny and shocking, all at the same time.  So, from personal experience I will say that blogging and writing for an audience is a huge motivator for students. 

Here are two blogs my students have contributed to:

http://cgpsych8.posterous.com/ 

http://trojanandpanthernorms.posterous.com/