Blogs in Education

Using blogs in classroom is a great resource for students and teachers. Students can communicate with each other and with the teacher almost anywhere and teachers can receive instant feedback from their students. After searching educational blogs on the search engines Google, Yahoo, and msn I discovered that they shared the most popular educational blogs but each one also had a few of their own. Most search engines have the most popular sites but also have a few that are only located on their search engine. I noticed that some search engines also compiled the results from other search engines on to their own. The most popular sites people view are always going to be the first ones on the list results.
Searching through the educational blogs I found many interesting and innovating ways blogs are being used in K-12 classrooms. One teacher found out that using blogs helped his students connect with each other in blog communities. They discussed homework and also got to know each other better through their blogs. The teacher’s only concern was that most of the time he felt he was left out of the discussion. This time he is going to use the blog to connect more with his students and use them to as a tool to help his students get to know him better as a person not just a teacher. Another blog that I found interesting was about helping first year teachers with their struggles in the classroom. I found this one interesting because it was a way for experience teachers to share advice and knowledge to new teachers who might not be receiving this advice elsewhere. Another blog I found innovating was one being used to help teach technology in the classroom. They have conferences by classroom tech experts from around the world. This way teachers can listen in and not have to leave there classroom.
RSS readers/aggregators , also known as feed reader, is software or a web application that syndicated web content such as news headlines, blogs, podcasts, and vlogs in a single location to make it easier to view. They reduce the time and effort needed to check websites for updates, allowing its user to create their own personal information source. Teachers might use RSS readers/aggregators in the classroom by having updated information available in from any source they want. This can be useful in many subjects including subjects were current information is important. Science and health are two subjects where the most recent information or discoveries are needed. Using blogging and using RSS readers in the classroom can have many positive impacts. Students and teachers can receive updated information in the matter of minutes. They can also post their own views or comments on a subject just as quickly.
Using blogs in the classroom can benefit the students and teachers in many ways. Students can receive help from their teacher or from a classmate, they can discuss their own ideas, and with RSS readers find current information on a topic. Although using blogs and RSS readers in the classroom has many pros there are some cons. Some students many not have access to a computer or the internet at home, their typing level is not high, or when using RSS readers finding information that you once found before could no longer be available.