Blogs in the classroom

Will Richardson’s weblogg–ed.com a teacher at Hunterdon Central Regional High School in New Jersey uses blogs in his classroom. In the journalism class, students collect news stories to write about and then edit each other’s work. In the literature class, students comment and critique class readings. For Richardson, blogs allow his students to be more aware of their writing and their audience. The teacher assigns a book or some type of reading and each student in the class has to get on the website and blog about their thought on the book. This is good because it gives students who maybe do not like to be called out or talk in front of people an opportunity to give their honest opinions.

. J.H. House Elementary School in Conyers, Georgia uses a blog to encourage writing for third–graders. The teachers use to blog to spotlight select writings of children. Similarly, Buckman Arts Magnet Elementary School in Portland, Oregon uses blogs to create a portal for all classrooms. The blog links among each teacher, showcasing photographs, student artwork and classroom news. This shows that even young children can and want to participate in these type of classroom assignments also. This is a good way also for teachers to talk to parents and other students about what is going on in the classroom and at the schools.
http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue9_6/huffaker/index.html#h5
http://www.schoolblogs.net/wpress/

http://www.edzone.net/~mwestern/stuff.html
This is a great website for teachers and students to use technology while learning.

Teachers and students today have access to the internet and computers both at school and at home. Students are taught how to use computer and are expected to complete assignment that both teach and practice their use on the computer. Some good ideas that teachers are using these days to teach students how to use the internet is have them create websites and assigning different online assignments.

*Research
Research is the number one reason to use the internet in education.
Creating a Website
A second project that can help integrate technology while truly getting the students excited about school is website creation. You can publish a website with your class about information the students have researched or personally created. Examples of what this page might focus on include a collection of student-created short stories, a collection of student-created poems, results and information from science fair projects, historical 'letters' (students write as if they were historical figures), even critiques of novels could be included. One concern that will be discussed more in part two is fears of plagiarism and parental support.
. *Online Assessment
A newer area of the internet to explore is online assessment. You can create your own tests online through your own website. These require knowledge of the internet, so many new users might not be quite ready for this. Although, it might be a great way to interact with Advanced Placement students over vacations and the summer. In the near future, there will be many companies who will offer not only online testing but also instant grading of exams.
http://712educators.about.com/cs/technology/a/integratetech.htm