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Be a Blogger

Handout

Chapter 5: Be a Blogger: Social Networking in the Classroom

Herrington, Anne, Kevin Hodgson, and Charles Moran. Ed. Teaching the New Writing:

Technology, Change, and Assessment in the 21st-Century Classroom. New York:

Teachers College Press. 2009. Print.

Traditional Writing Processes Used to Create a Blog

- Pre-writing: brainstorming through a free writing process that includes pausing tofind and write a focus sentence and then returning to free writing. The free writing

continues again after an image has been selected, so that a well-developed blog iscreated by the time of publication.

- Review and revision: using the Self-Assessment Matrix on pp. 84-85 (see backpage of handout) as a rubric for required elements. The review and revision step

reoccurs throughout the creation of the blog.

- Research: transcendingtraditional research to include the blogs of peersto findsnippets or quotations related to the subject of the blog. The matrix and blog siterequires proper attention to copyright laws and citations of used quotations or images.

- Re-presentation: using at least five key word tags for search engines that restate thefocus of the blog, similar to arriving at a clear, concise summary or conclusion.

New Multimodal Writing Elements

- Nonlinear format: allowing students to determine their starting point, the steps to takethroughout the drafting and revising of the blog, and the elements of the blog, all

within the guidelines and requirements of the matrix (see back page of handout).

- Image:illustrating or representing the bloggers attitude or the blog topic.

Audio file podcast or RSS audio: of author reading the blog with emotion

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AssessmentPaul Allisoninitially assesses student work based on a mixture of quantity and quality, but the

assessment changes to a self-assessment and peer assessment at about mid-term. Ultimately, theassessment includes a review of the required elements within the matrix, but depends more

heavily on performance of the student during an independent posting of a blog.

Important Resources Educators

Blog Site:http://youthvoices.net

The site was created and is maintained by educators, administrators, and interested parents. Thesite observes and enforces copyright issues with regard to images, quotations, and other

resources used in the blog.

Images:The class and blog site observe copyright laws. The following image sites offer free, non-

copyright images:

- Flikr Creative Commons: http://flikr.com/creative_commons/by-nc-nd-2.0[This site appears to be accessible only once an account has been created.]

- Stock.xchng: http://sxc.hu- Morgue File: http://morguefile.com- Wikimedia Commons: http://comons.wikimedia.org/wiki

- FlikrCC: http://flickrcc.bluemountains.net- Creative Commons Search: http://search.creativecommons.org[This site offers search engines that MAY offer creative commons licensing (share

licensing) free of copyright, but no guarantee is offered that the images are copyrightfree.]

Research Software/Sharing tools:

The anecdotal classroom in Chapter 5 uses a lot of Google-based applications, such as Google

Docs and Google Reader. In the section Rivers of Research Material on pp. 88-89, Allisondescribes the process that he teaches his students to use that brings resources to them rather thantheir searching it out. Some of the resources used to find research sources are:

- Google Blog Search: http://blogsearch.google.com- Google News: http://news.google.com

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