Teacher/Student Blogging

I really think one day blogging will take the place of paper journals. Parents are already contacting me more via email than phone or in person. Students can benefit from "blogging" with their teacher and peers because they typically can get out exactly what they want to say by typing it. It also allows interacting to go on outside the classroom.

Email and Internet Projects

People often think that email actually hinders students writing skills by teaching students incorrect usage and misspelled words. Actually there are many things out there that are excellent in boosting writing skills. I do not think everyday email programs help children learn writing skills. I do, however, really like a web based program called Kidbiz3000 that focuses on email skills and many other process writing skills. Students must log on each day, respond to email, and complete other tasks. I used this program for a year in one of my classes and it really helped with writing skills. It was very minimal work for me as well because the program assess and graded everything.

Publishing to Internet

The benefit to having students publish work to the Internet is "true" publishing. It gives students a feeling that they have truly done a job worthy of sharing. It allows many to see the students work and make comments. There is really a possibility for students work to be seen and discovered when published to the Internet.

Writing Process and Technology

There are so many ways process writing can be affected by technology. The most obvious is that some processes, such as drafting and editing, can be combined due to word processing programs. Many websites and programs offer help and instruction on process writing. I was fortunate enough to work in a school that had laptop computers and a program call Kidbiz3000 that taught process writing to the kids. Computers in general help students who are unable to write, WRITE!