Blogging to Enhance Social Literacy

Blogging to Enhance Social Literacy 

As I am presenting social literacy to you now, using a blog is a way for our students to communicate outside of the classroom about the curriculum they are working on during school hours. The video above gives you a little sneak peak into why using a blog as an educational tool can be beneficial. In my previous posts, I have discussed that social literacy can be used to enhance our students' interpersonal connections through collaboration and appropriate interactions. Blogs allow our students to post questions, reflections, misconceptions, ideas and thoughts about the content they are working on. Not only can they post their thoughts and ideas, but they can connect with the peers outside of the classroom and comment on each others questions, concerns, or ideas about the material they are trying to master. This form of technology offers an avenue for our students to express themselves and their feelings about the content and connect with their peers on a different level.

APPLYING IT INTO MY MATH CLASSROOM......
When introducing blogging inside the classroom, I would need to do an immense amount of modeling to show students the appropriate way to communicate with each other through technology. I would at first use class time to show them how the blog works and how to comment on each other's posts. After the first week or two of using it in the classroom, I would use it as a piece of homework. Instead of giving my students a list of 20 math problems to complete, why not allow them to reflect on what they learned during that day's lesson? What did they find most challenging? What did they find helpful when they were learning the new topic? I would encourage the students to be unique in their posts, such as using videos, pictures, meme's, etc.