Thing 1: Blogging

*Who am I?
My name is Karen Fronhofer.  I live a small rural area.  I am happily married with four children.  One boy and three girls ranging from nine years old to 17 years old.

*Where do I work?
I work at Salem Central School in Salem, New York.  It is a small, rural K-12 public school.  I am the K-12 school librarian.  It is a great place to work!

*Why are you taking part in this program?
I am taking part in this program because it has been highly recommended to me by several other librarians who have previously taken the program.  Also, I am eager to update my use of technology, so that I can use these tools with my students and aid my teachers in using technological tools as well.

*What I've learned during this session.
I have  learned a great deal during this session.  The point that stands out the most to me are that students can benefit from blogging because this is a comfortable tool for them to use to share their learning and their reflections.  I really appreciated the point made in the article Empowering Students Thru Blogging, stating that when students publish work online "they want it to be good" because their peers will be seeing it as well as their teachers.  I also really liked that idea that blogging is a worthwhile authentic  assessment tool.  Many of the articles/videos pointed out that it is a good tool for giving feedback, for showcasing work, for documenting progress, and for forming a better understanding of your students.

The Teach Thru Technology articles were very helpful.  I like his idea to have the students research what a blog is before they begin the blogging process.  The idea to start slow and use a question on a large piece of paper and have the students use post-it notes to answer the question and to respond to others' answers seems like a great way to begin the blogging process.  I also like the idea from the Blogfolio video regarding having the students create their own commenting policy.

Another great use of blogging mentioned in a couple of the articles is to teach about cybersafety, cyberbullying, and online etiquette.  This seems like a great format for these lessons.  I also liked that on the EduBlog page there was a lesson on "Images, Copyright, and Creative Commons."

I would definitely like to use a blog to start an online book club in my libraries.  I have been struggling to find a good time for book clubs to meet, so I think that this will be a great alternative.  I did see on the blog list several libraries who use a blog for communication in regards to what is happening in the library.  I would like to see some examples of how blogs are used in library lessons, particularly at the elementary level in fixed class situations.

*End Note:
Just a little more information about me.  I did sign up for this class once before and was overwhelmed by the fact that we would have to write regarding each lesson, so I did not continue with the class.   I love teaching, reading, and technology, but I do not love writing.  It is something that I dread and feel that I am not very good at, so please bear with me as I write these posts.  I am staying with the class this time because I feel that learning the technology is so important to my continued learning as a librarian.