Thoughts on beginning to blog.

September 2015. I have been here before. In fact, I wrote in this blog last September and if you look at the previous entries they address a lot of the questions that you might have during the course. The best resource I know for HOW to start your blog is from Dr. Candace Figg who is the chair of the Teacher Education department.  It is a simple step-by-step guide. Or try watching a YouTube with instructions on blogging.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FIk653lvkk

A blog will give you opportunity to begin to "brand" yourself. Your digital footprint is important. You have no doubt heard the advice not to post images on social media that suggest you like to party.  But the answer is not to turn away from engaging in social media. It turns out that lots of principals and those hiring in education "google" you BEFORE they look at applications.  And if you have a strong digital presence in the area of education then you will be considered before someone without such a presence! So the blogging this term is to get you thinking about your own "branding" - because not having a digital presence is not an asset in today's job market.

Last year I has a Master of Education student Monica Taylor. She began a blog for her course with me called Monica Taylor MEd Blog.

http://msmtaylor.blogspot.ca/2015_07_01_archive.html

She used the blog for more than just the course and continued on. Monica has established herself as a real presence and she is noted as an Ontario blogger at the OSSEMOOC site. OSSEMOOC is a grass roots organization that runs webinars during the year with Ontario educators. Its name suggests that this is secondary only but that is not so. The topics of interest refer to K to 12. One week they did a session on pedagogical documentation, for example, which is an assessment technique widely used in primary teaching. And a lot of the excellent secondary teachers know that the best high school class looks like a Kindergarten!


SO....  Take this opportunity to learn a practical skill as well as share your own thoughts about significant issues on the course. The rubrics for this are below:

Success Criteria	Comments
Uses “I” rather than third person
Integrates personal experiences with other resources and course reading.
Reflects upon connections to uncover new insights
Goes beyond description to deal with significant issues or concerns ­and shows depth/complexity
Uses language conventions properly. Paper is well organized, coherent and is reader ­friendly
Blog is scholarly in nature. There are at least 2 references in APA style beyond class readings. References can come from online sources, social media as well as traditional sources. References are noted at the end of the blog in traditional APA style.
Blog is aesthetically attractive. There is at least 1 image that is connected to the text and 2 hyperlinks to relevant connections on the Internet. Relevant You Tubes may be embedded into the blog. Attribution is given for images and videos.
Blog is only one page long. This is hard to estimate and images and You Tubes do not count in the length.

 You will be peer assessing the blogs of 3 other students so it is really important to give quality feedback. When you assess others you will also improve your own blogging skills. 

Blogging comments
Success Criteria	Your constructive comments
Feedback involves personal reflections on the blog
Feedback asks questions to provoke thinking on the part of the blogger.
Feedback provides constructive comments on how well the blog fulfills blog criteria.
Your feedback reflects the growth mindset.
Your written feedback is posted for each individual for class the next week .  On Nov You hand in one sheet with all your feedback comments on it to the instructor/TA.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDVSw54VU1A

The You Tube shows you how elementary students think about making comments. I look forward to your blogs and your comments.