Rip, Mix, Learn Playground

Sitting in the workshop I am drawn back to the possibilities that all students are able to have a sense of belonging to the community of their math class. It is going to be an interesting mountain to climb and challenge to tackle. I am excited to see the increase in the math chatter that will occur once they are created.

How many quiet kids don't understand what you have just taught. Do they not say anything because they are shy or just don't want to ask the question because of the ridicule of their peers. Blogging is a way for those who will not speak in class to have a voice.

Teenagers are at their best after 3:00 in the afternoon. blogging might be the work that they choose to do when their brains are working at their peak level.

Though I feel literate in technology I am wary of creating a blog space for 140 students.

As any person who cannot dance taking the first Ballroom Bootcamp steps will be the most daunting. I am confident though that by the time January rolls around the students will be beginning to have their first math blogging experiences.

The results of the final exam in June will show the increase in math literacy from their conversations online.

Darren your enthusing is infectious.

Thanks for spreading it!!!!!

As a teacher I have wondered how the blog could be used to the best of its abilities to create and foster a strong learning environment especially as a middle years math community. I am still a little overwhelmed with all the technology and how to use it. I am also wondering in which way it could be used by a classroom teacher that potentially could have over 100 students responding to a prompt. How to manage?

I strongly believe that writing is an important part of any learning and that communication between students and teachers is vital to learning. However when faced with the numbers of possible responses and the time it takes to read I don't know that it would be a feasible task. How would you handle this scenario?

Hi ... I thought Mr. D's metaphor on the "tango" was a fascinating way to showcase the way in which "partners" in education can help our students dance to the beat of todays music.

Without wanting to "dance" around issues, I invite bloggers to comment on how we can protect younger students in schools and classrooms from inappropriate blog and web sites and yet give older, more responsible students access to the world-wide community of learners that share ideas and resources through blogging.

Remember "to dance is to live ... to live is to dance."

I asked my students if they had ever used a blog before and many of them had. I asked them if they liked using blogs and they all replied, "Yes! It's a great tool for learning." This is why I signed up for the workshop.

I am pondering how this can work at my school. My students have a "computer class", with their computer teacher, twice every six days, but have little or no access to the lab during the rest of the week. As well, not all students have a computer at home, or if they do, not all have internet access. The logistics of this are discouraging me from beginning to blog with my students.

My most struggling students need this the most and I am unsure how to motivate them so that they will give blogging a chance.

Any help would be appreciated.

I am so excited! I had some recent surgery that left me deaf in one ear and some problems with my balance. I don't have very good balance, especially when thinking about dancing. Hey, no problem! I have one very good hearing ear and here I am today still dancing away! And to think, I thought my dancing days were over. No way, here I am doing the tango! What fun!

This is an incredible workshop. I am connecting with an incredible group of Canadians. Who would have thought that a Georgia girl could make such a connection? The day was started with the group singing "Oh Canada". It was beautiful.

Right now all the participants are creating blogs and making their first post. Darren just said this is his favorite part of the day. He gets to see what others are thinking. Well, I give Darren a great big tip of the blogger hat! I can't believe I had the good fortune to spend the day here. The semester is over and we have a little down time to catch up on things. Forget catching up - gotta go tango!

For those of you who didn't come to Martini's for lunch, we had an interesting conversation that eventually led us to the topic of ethics and appropriate behavior. It was agreed that some inappropriate behavior on the Internet can be expected when kids are not properly supervised. One would hope, however, that students should understand what is and what is not acceptable and act in an appropriate manner whether they are under the scrutiny of a teacher or not. When we are part of a global network, it is important to abide by a consistent code of ethics.

I therefore feel that we, as educators, should teach internet "appropriateness". If we all took the time to do this, perhaps our division would not have a need for such a limiting proxy server as exists at the moment.

What is YOUR opinion?

BTW, wouldn't this discussion be a perfect topic for a blog...

Errr.... I guess that's just what I'm starting right here!

I looked over the sites to do with English classes, and noticed that most of the day's postings were about how hectic the students' lives were and how hard it was to keep up with classwork and how many hours they were working at their part-time jobs. like teacher-endorsed MSN. But I scrolled down and found the on-topic postings - discussions of Shakespeare, interpretations of novels, etc. It was impressive. i can really see this working for a group of students I have who love to read and will discuss their reading spontaneously, but not necessarily broadly. I would like to see applications to literature circles. Did anyone see a site on this?
Rebecca

Mr. K is the most Blogtastic guy in the blogiverse. He allows the stublogs to take their edublogcation to levels unimblogagined before. He also blogs the blogging with blogerific blogitude and bloggety blog blog blog bloggy blog blog.

I've really been enjoying blogging with Erin and the S1 math class. It's opened an opportunity for me, as a student teacher, to get to know the students better since I don't seem them on a regular basis like regular classroom teachers. It also gives me the opportunity to interact with students outside of school.

A thought that's come up out of this workshop is that all student teachers should have a classroom that they're blogging with right from the beginning of the school year. It's a "win-win-win situation" (right Darren?). This way a student teacher can track a class, their activities, and their learning an entire school year AND contribute to these things as well. The cooperating teacher benefits from having another teacher "managing" the blog, and the students benefit from having another teacher-mentor. Plus, the class could be anywhere in the world! That's something that always interests me. When I did a teaching practicum in Costa Rica, my eyes were opened to a whole other approach to education and I know there is much to be learned from other perspectives I have yet to cross.

Are there teachers out there that would be willing to have their class "adopt" a student teacher for a year?