Blogging Sites:

	Blogger is Google’s free tool for creating blogs.
	WordPress is an open source web software you can use to create a beautiful website or blog. WordPress started as just a blogging system, but has evolved to be used as full content management system and so much more through the thousands of plugins, widgets, and themes,
	Edublogs is the world’s largest education blogging platform, focused on teachers and students with educational support and features

Comparison of Blogger, WordPress, and EduBlogs (maintained by EduBlogs)

What is a Blog:

Blog is a shortening of Weblog. A Blog is on online journal, a personal diary. A collaborative space in which you can share with the world. You can create your blog to be whatever you want it to be. Essentially blogging makes anyone a columnist. When blogs were first created they were used by people who wanted to share their voice. Now blogs are even used in the professional world with a targeted audience to help build credibility and name recognition. A blog is a great place to get out information about a business especially if it home based. Creating a blog is also beneficial for educational use (Jackson, 2010).

Blogs in Plain English

There are sites that are free for educators, www.21class.com, www.schoolrack.com and www.free4teachers.com are just a few that are available.

An Introduction to Classroom Blogs

Advantages of blogs in education:

In education communication is a vital skill. Communication is key with the students but with the parents as well. Through creating a blog for yourself and your students you open a new way for your students to communicate with other students. It creates a social interaction between you and your students which helps the students to become comfortable in their learning environment, leading to student success. Studies show that students perform better when they are being student taught. When students use blogs for their writing assignments other students are their audience, this helps students create better writing skills and encourages students to collaborate about these topics. You as the teacher can post websites that are beneficial to their learning or even post games for them to practice certain skills. If a student or parent has a question about the homework they can post it. I you do not respond right away, another parent or another student may be able to answer it for them. It is a great way to communicate with parents and keep them involved in what is going on in the classroom with their child, even if they cannot physically be there. Blogs are search engine friendly and they are easy to maintain. Another advantage of blogs is that many of them are free, which is a concern for many schools (Advantages of Blogs).

Benefits of Classroom Blogging:

Trying to get children excited about learning can be difficult. When doing assignments through blogging, students are excited and are eager to participate. Blogging is a great way to get students motivated because they often do not mind talking with friends and classmates virtually. Children enjoy seeing their work published on the Web so they are willing to participate in reflective writing on classroom topics. Students like to have feedback from other students and blogs make that easy to do.(Jackson 2010)

Disadvantages of blogs in education:

Some of the disadvantages in blogging are that the public is able to look at your blog. This raises concerns for many people, especially for teachers and students in education. However, many of the blog sites now have privacy settings which allow students and teachers the ability to designate who can post, who can view, and even who can comment. Although maintaining a blog can be easy, it is also time consuming to keep up-to-date. You must keep adding new information and posting intriguing information in order to keep your audience (your students) interested. Blogs though they are beneficial for communication they cannot be used for having a conversation, due to the time gap between replies (Blogs- Advantages and Disadvantages)

The risks of blogging are real. Steps to lessen the risks of inappropriate entries.

One of the first steps that you, as a teacher, need to take before creating a blog for your students is to get parental permission. Make sure you know your school and district acceptable use policies and convey them to your students. Try to avoid blogging sites that require students to share any personal information like their full name and e-mail accounts. Educate you students in what is appropriate and permissible for the blogs. Also teach them the importance of respect for others' opinions. Make sure like any other assignment that you give your students a clear understanding of what the rules, expectations and consequences are.

Examples of Classroom Uses:

Blogs in the classroom can be used to post assignments and dates of which they are due. Teachers can create a class newsletter. Photos about what is going on in the classroom can be posted to the blog. You can post online readings for students and then have them respond to the reading assignment. Blogging can encourage the students to give ideas and opinions on topics that were discussed in class. Creating a blog can also link classes to other classes, another version of penpals. (Jackson)

reflect on their reading or classroom discussions.
investigate topics on line and then report on their research.
record group progress on a project.
talk about shared classroom experiences.
copy and paste thought-provoking quotes from other blogs, and then offer their own thoughts on the topic.
ask professional writers to edit their blogs, or provide feedback. (Lorrie Jackson 2010)

It is important to gradually introduce students to blogging. First invite students to use blogs for a while, just for fun so they can get use to how to utilize the blog. Then once they are ready assign a blog topic for each week on a class-related topic and emphasize on reflection. As they become more familiar with blogging encourage students to give feedback on each others' blogs. This will create student discussion on the topic and self reflection which will help the students to become more in depth thinkers. (Jackson, 2010)

Resources for Classroom Use:

Keesee, G. Welcome to the Wonderful World of Wikis and Blogs. 2010. Fayetteville Technical Community College. PowerPoint.

Richardson, W. Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms. 2nd ed. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press. 2009. Print.

References:

About WordPress. WordPress.org. (n.d.). Web. 29 Jan 2011. <http://wordpress.org/about/>

"Advantages of Blogs." Robin Dhakal. 2007 November.

Ezine Articles 28 Jan 2011 <http://ezinearticles.com/?Advantages-Of-Blogs&id=811640> This citation is incorrectly formatted. The author should be first.

"Blogs- Advantages and Disadvantages." Online EDU Blog. n.d. Web. 2 Feb. 2011. <http://www.onlineedublog.com/blogs/>

Jackson, L. "Blogging Basics: Creating Student Journals on the Web." Education World. n.d. Web. 2 Feb. 2011. <http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/techtorial/techtorial037print.shtml>

An Introduction to Classroom Blogs. 3 Dec 2009. YouTube. Web. 5 Feb. 2011. <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7UqGpcMeuw&feature=related>