So I've been thinking...

I've been trying to think of ways that blogging could be used in the classroom, and while doing research on learning logs for another class, I ran across many articles on weblogs. Learning logs on the web is how they described them, but the possibilities are endless.

I just had a second to sit down and go through today's mail. On the front page of our Catholic Newspaper was an article featuring my children's school's former principal. Mr. Knoop left our school as principal to go back to his passion, teaching science. How amazed I was to see that he not only had traveled to Anarctica for a week in early September to collect data to study the effects of climate change with a team of international scientists and volunteers, Mr. Knoop used a blog to ask and answer questions for his students, posting pictures and his research, and even broadcast via skype into the classroom. An article was also included in The Tennessean. I am happy that the technology I read about on the internet is already being embraced right here in our own backyard. I am looking forward to asking him questions about other ways he uses technology in his classroom. While I was sorry to see him go, I understand the need to teach. Fortunately his predecessor thinks along the same lines and is very technology driven.

While we are on the subject of his predecessor, Dr. B. is always looking for ways to make life easier for her teachers and staff. They are currently struggling to produce a 15+ page weekly newsletter for every family in the school. In an effort to go green this year, they decided it would only go out electronically. While searching for useful tools and websites to add to my portaportal, I found and suggested a site to Dr. B. Since I am a parent that would be receiving this information, I really looked for all the 'glitches' per say, that they would be sure to look for, cost being #1, and found none. While the School secretary/nurse was skeptical, after I explained the concept of it being a blog she updated as needed, when she had time, as opposed to trying to make all the articles fit into Publisher and rush to get it out every week, she was very receptive. The Tech Director is looking into it further, so hopefully we will stay green and Dr. B. and her staff won't go gray!

I am really excited about the use of technology in the classroom. This class and the assignments make you think about how you can use the technology you use everyday in a learning environment in an entirely new way.