I have had to let the idea of having a classroom Ning go. The site is blocked by my school district and I need to get my student’s into blogging ASAP.  I have decided not to do the wiki for my students. I think wiki’s look boring. I want more flash.  That decision was easy. The hard part is deciding to give all my students a blog to decorate and write on, or should I just give them access to the one 4thgradetech blog.  Let’s weigh them in.

All on one blog:

All of my students will blog on Thursday’s at the computer lab. I am not sure if the edublogs server could have that many kids publishing to the same space at the same time.

With everything on one page parents can easily click on the link from the class website.  I will not have to deal with students losing their blog address.

I am not sure if one blog will help me get the students where I want them. My idea was for each of my students to have special interest blogs where they got to choose the topics  and write all about that. For example: Jack’s All About Basketball Blog. If I put them all on one blog it won’t have that option.

Since the students will be writing in their journals and then the blogs, this may take time- more time for some than others. With one blog it may be more regularly updated. Also, the students may be required to have an email account. Our schools do not provide them, and I am not sure if  I want that responsibility.

I am ready to introduce blogging to the kids now. I could have them on the 4th grade blog sooner than the individual blogs.

I can use the 4th grade blogs for free!!

What do you all think?

I assigned my students a Civil War webquest to complete together last year and it was a collaborative nightmare. Students worked on their parts and used thumb drives to save their work. When they were done, the student groups put their presentations together. Unfortunately, some lost their drives before they could add what they had done and had to redo them. Making changes after their work was assembled was awful too. Google Docs may be the way out of this collaborative maze. The video below makes it look so easy and logical. I do have questions however. For example, students do not have email accounts. I believe you must have your own email account to edit presentations. If all you need is a username and password it may work. I am going to see if I can make it work. I will keep you posted on what happens.