Tech Talk Tuesday: Little Smarties – Blogging with the Early Years

Stefanie’s great blog header

When: Tuesday, August 14th 4-5pm, Melbourne, Australia time (gmt+10)

About this session: Stefanie Galvin will be our guest presenter.  ”The Little Smarties“ in room 16 is the title of her class blog with grade prep/ones. Stefanie will  share how she started blogging with the Preps last year (as part of The Victorian DEECD’s Contemporary Literacy Practices in the Early Years research project), how she uses it in her classroom, the participation and support from school and the local community, and how it’s shaping their school environment.

Please join us and share in the conversations. Here is the link to the recording.

10 Things you should know about Blog Comments

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The third challenge in the Advanced Student Blogging Activity looked at comments on blogs. Here are 1o Things you should know about comments. (They are not in any particular order.)

1. They are highly motivational
2. Comments can create conversations and therefore learning
3. They are a vital point of contact or connection: as blogging provides a global presence, people who wish to learn more about you, connect with you or just communicate can easily do so via comments
4. Care needs to be taken with comments – use proper English, be positive, use appropriate language. Remember that some readers may need to use a translator.
5. Always reply to someone who comments on your blog post, read what they are blogging about and ask a question where possible to keep the conversation going
6. Actively encourage comments by asking a question(s) in your blog post
7. Ensure you moderate comments to keep spammers and unwanted bodies at bay.
8. Allow at least 10 mins per week to comment on others’ blog posts
9. Whenever you read a blog post, please consider commenting to let the blogger know that you have visited – even if it is just to say “Thanks for posting”
10. You can be updated on further comments added to a particular blog post,  by subscribing to the comment feed.

Some Further reading:-

• How to comment on a Blog – a Beginners’ Guide
• Teaching Quality Commenting
• 10 Techniques to get more comments

What would you add to the list of things you should know about blogging?

Rules for Blogging

The second challenge in the advanced Edublogs “Blogging with Students” challenged bloggers to write a post on “My Blog Rules”! Upon reflection here are the guidelines that I ask my students to follow.

1. Enjoy blogging and the benefits it brings! Develop a great digital footprint!
2. Use appropriate language at all times – no swearing, slang, words of dubious nature or double meanings. Show you are a good digital citizen
3. Stay safe at all times: Keep your personal information private eg no last names, phone numbers, addresses etc
4. Always use complete English ie no Instant Messaging (IM) or txt language. Online translators cannot translate IM.
5. Use a spell checker.
6. Global communication: remember different age groups and people from different cultures may read your blog. As your blogs are online, you may be writing for anyone and everyone around the globe!
7. Take care with images:- do not identify any children, obtain permission to use others’ images, where possible take your own photos, make sure images are appropriate etc
8. Always reply to any comments: read what commentor is blogging about, respond with a comment on their blog or email them, thank the commentor,ask them a question to keep the conversation going
9. If in doubt, just do not do it! Once it is online it is can always be found somewhere online.

What have I missed? I need a 10th rule to round this off. What would you add? Have you set up a set of rules for your students when blogging? Do you think the same rules apply for both adults and students?