Module 1: Three Ways to Use Blogs in Teaching

Will Richardson, in his book Blogs, Wikis and Podcasts shares many ideas on how blogs can be used for teaching and teachers' professional development. His ideas have helped me identify three ways that I could use blogs in my teaching of English language learners (ELLs):

1. Collaborative Blogging: I love the idea of students learning from each other in a collaborative manner, and think that blogs could be a great tool for this method of learning. Blogging seems to be very compatible with the Cooperative Language Learning (CLL) approach to teaching, an approach that is gaining favor in many language learning classrooms. When students publish their ideas through interactive technology every voice is heard, and teachers can structure tasks to encourage cooperation between students. Group assignments that rely on the input of all group participants are likely to encourage joint accountability for, and ownership of, both the assigned task and the blog. For example, I could designate small groups to create a shared blog where all group members posts their thoughts on a particular literary passage. For English language learners (ELLs) this might be a reaction to a fictional character's experience of moving to a new culture. Students could share with one another their experiences as a non-native speakers entering a new culture. By reflecting on their own experiences and reacting to a required number of their group members' blog entries, students would generate content and language that could be used in a personal essay to write and submit individually.

Student communication with peers through blogs would also aid in learning apppropriate social skills in the target language, another principle of CLL. By blogging and reacting to others' blogs, students would learn electronic forms of social communication in the target language in a relatively low risk environment.

These collaborative uses of blogs would fulfill the following New York State Learning Standards for ELLs (for grade 9-12) as published by the NYS Education Dept Office of Bilingual Education (NYSED OBE):
* Students will listen, speak, read, and write in English for literary response, enjoyment, and expression
* Students will listen, speak, read and write in English for classroom and social interaction
* Students will demonstrate cross-cultural knowledge and understanding

2. Opinion Blogging: Blogs can be used as a platform for students to develop and communicate opinions on a variety of topics, including current events in the news, class activities, and other issues of relevance to their lives. Student input on classroom activities would not only give students practice in expressing their opinion, but would also provide useful feedback for me as a teacher to modify and guide my teaching. To develop students' writing, I would post on a classroom blog examples of persuasive language and links to opinion columns. Each member of the class would be instructed to respond to these samples with their ideas on what makes opinion writing effective. Discussions about constructive language for voicing opinions could evolve as we share our opinions with one another.

The primary NYS learning standards for ELLs that would be met through students' opinion blogging is:
* Students will listen, speak, read, and write in English for critical analysis and evaluation.

3. Information Sharing Blogging: Taking Richardson's advice for teachers to "start small," I would begin my entry into classroom blogging with information sharing blogs. On a class blog, not only would I post class logistics (assignments, due dates, grading criteria, etc), but I would encourage students to blog on new discoveries related to topics presented in the classroom. To stimulate blog participation, I'd ask students to visit and comment on specific links or respond to specific questions. The idea here is to provide students with opportunities for repeated exposure to language through different learning modes. Reading and writing through a classroom blog is likely to appeal to today's "connected" students and reinforce language forms and uses presented in the classroom.

The NYS learning standards for ELLs that would be met by students' information sharing blogging would be:
* Students will listen, speak, read, and write in English for information and understanding.
* Students will listen, speak, read and write in English for classroom and social interaction.

These are only a few of the many ways that student blogging can be used in second language learning.