Got Blogging?

Lisa Bowen

EDT5410

Sharon Peterson

August 12, 2011

Final Synthesis Project

Writer’s Workshop Blog & Anthology

Targeted Audience: This project is designed for Language Arts students ranging from 5^th to 8^th grade.

Context: This project is designed as a year long at home extension of writing taught in the classroom.  It requires the use of Google Blogger and GoogleDocs.

Learning Objectives:  Students will learn how to identify literary genres, analyze and respond to profession writing, write several writing pieces of their own, and publish a writing piece they feel proud of. 

Detailed Description of Lesson/Intervention: Students will be required to create their own writing blog that is linked with the teacher’s blog list.  Each month in class a different literacy genre will be introduced and studied (autobiographies, persuasive writing, memoirs, expository, poetry x2, narrative, compare and contrast, and informational reports).  Each month students will be required to complete four assignments using the blog system.  It will be their responsibility to find a computer with Internet access to use each week. They may use a personal/family computer, a public library computer, or a school computer if they set up a time with the teacher before or after school.  Time will not be provided to work on these assignments during class time.  The four blogging assignments for each month are as follows:

Week One:  Find and post a short example of this month’s genre being sure to cite the author and source.

Week Two:  Respond to two examples posted by the teacher or one of your classmates.

Week Three: Write and post your own example of this month’s genre.

Week Four:  Read and respond to two classmates writing.

At the end of the year, students will learn about publishing and create a Writing Anthology.  Students will be required to choose their favorite piece of their own writing, revise it, and add it to the Writing Anthology File using GoogleDocs.  Standard font size and style will be enforced to establish coherency. The teacher will then print the final document as the class/team’s Writing Anthology for the school year. 

Artifact:  I have posted artifacts on my blog (http://mrsbowen.blogspot.com/) as an example of a month of learning about memoirs.  I have also created an artifact of a Writing Anthology in progress. (emailed to instructor as a collaborator) 

Justification:  This blogging project transforms Writing Education because it allows space for more collaboration when sharing professional examples and personal writing, and it requires no extra classroom time.  When students write in their own paper journals the teacher sees their writing and perhaps one or two other students.  However, with online blogging, students are able to see and read everyone’s writing (including that of students is different classes).  Because students are sharing their ideas with the entire class/team, they are encouraged to find and create better writing and because the writing takes place at home, they have time to make sure it is done well.  It would take the majority of class to provide time to find professional examples, respond to examples, have students create their own writing, and respond to each others’ writing.  Often teachers run out of class time and students are rushed and never finish.  Whereas blogging provides time at home for students to work at their own pace, and the teacher only needs to introduce and highlight key elements of writing with plenty of time to also focus on reading. 

The GoogleDocs portion of this project is also transformative because it saves the teacher time and makes creating a Writing Anthology more feasible.  In the past, when I have created writing anthologies, the students submitted somewhat legible paper copies that I was then required to hand type and format into a document.  It took hours to decipher students’ writing, type their work, and format the document.  This gave me little incentive to continue with the project in upcoming years.  GoogleDocs allows students to type and format their own writing.  It takes the responsibility off from the teacher and places it on the students.  It also allows students to take more ownership of their work.

Artifact 3: Memoir of my own

Shelling
By:  Lisa Bowen

No one ever knows what gifts the ocean waves may wash on the beach overnight.  Hoping the day would lead to discovery, we rose early and walked down the beach in silence.  The ocean panorama was beautiful.  The sun was up and sparkled on top of the water.  People were awake and wandering along the beach, but overall the scene was quiet and serene.  As we approached the water's edge, we turned to the left, our eyes fixed on the shore.

Aunt Maryann was an expert at shelling; her condominium decor reflected her love of the sea.  She had baskets filled with colorful shells, and along the bookshelves, she displayed beautiful purple sea urchins that she had carefully cleaned and dried out.  My aunt even had two books on Florida shells to help classify what each shell was.  Other than a quick flip through her book, I was clueless as to what shells to look for.

After a few minutes of walking, we noticed a line of seaweed that had been swept half way up the beach.  We decided to see if there were any treasures in the seaweed.  As we moved closer and gained a better look of the gathered seaweed, re realized that mounds of shark eye shells had also been blown in.  Before now, my aunt had only found a handful of shark eye shells.  She was stunned to see them lined up along the beach.  Right away, we set to work looking for unbroken shells that no longer had a snail inside.  Knowing that this many shark eye shells in one place was uncommon, my aunt was determined to pick up as many as possible.  After a short while I noticed that she had begun to step on the slimy snails while twisting and pulling the shell.  I gave her a questioning look.  She smiled at me and replied, "I figure they are washed up her for a reason."  I contemplated her response for a moment and then realized that she was right.  The snails were on this shore because they could no longer survive in the ocean. It was as if the ocean had spit them upon the shore, knowing that we would find them and marvel at their beauty.  I joined in with her technique of stepping and twisting.  It didn't take us long to fill the bottom of our shelling bags with shark eye shells.

After finding so many shark eyes shells, we were excited to continue on our journey.  We made our way out to a rocky point.  Fortunately, it was still low tide, and we were able to find our way around the rocks to the other side.  As we walked the shore, I was amazed to see that the beach was scattered with broken sea shells.  By leaping out on the rocks, we were able to find conch, whelk, tulip, olive, and clam shells.  The shells that I placed in my shelling bag were diverse in color, texture, and shape.  I was more than pleased with the treasures that I found.

We could not stay on the other side of the point long because soon the high tide would come in.  As we made our way back around the point and walked the beach back to the condo, we chattered about our ocean treasures.  We were almost back when I stumbled upon a nine-pointed star fish.  I carefully cradled the star in my hands and carried it back with us.

When we returned, my aunt got out the bleach and dental pick.  We right away set to work; we scraped at the shells and then placed them in bleach to soak for the day.  Later, we would pain them with Elmers Glue to help strengthen their shells and give them a hint of shine.

That night, I sat down with my ocean treasures and researched them in Aunt Maryann's books.  I looked up information about all the different shells that I had found.  I discovered that I had found the Florida state shell, a horse conch that was a vibrant color of orange.  I also wanted to know about my nine-pointed star fish.  I had found five-pointed star fish before, but never one with nine points.  My aunt's book told me that nine pointed stars are rare to fine with all nine points.  This is because as a defense mechanism they often detach one of their legs and try to escape as their predator munches on their single limb.  My starfish had all nine points.  One of the points was wobbly, but all nine points were still attached.  I had found something that was rare and unique.

I began the day not knowing what the ocean had laid out for me.  Not every shelling day was as successful as this one, but that is what made this one so special.  It was as if the waves has left those gifts there just for me to find.

Artifact 1: Example of a Memoir written by someone else

The Polka Dotted Scarf By: Geetanjali Jha

I remember opening up his big wooden wardrobe and burying my nose into his handkerchiefs. His clothes always had a pleasant, sweet, and mystical smell…not just his clothes, his closets, his bed; his entire room was infused with that intoxicating smell. Maybe it emanated from the special homemade lotion, he used. He mixed glycerin with rosewater with a couple of other things and his magic potion was ready. He claimed it was the purest thing one could use to keep their skin young and supple. I remember him passing on list of contents to my mother, she never tried making it. He was very fair skinned, of which I think he was vain. He looked his age but had good, healthy skin as a consequence of the homemade lotion he used every night. He was a bit rotund, but somehow that went with his cheerful persona. I wonder if he is my favorite grandparent, maybe… but I sure am his favorite grandchild, or so I would like to believe. My brother calls him babaji; I occasionally call him nanaji, as we typically call our mother’s father nanaji and paternal grandfather babaji. I have known babaji as a spirited person who never let his worries come to the dinner table, he always had a joke or two ready if domestic tension aroused. Also, I have never seen anyone eating oranges with such an extraordinary speed. He divides an orange into four and gulps it down, though I have my doubts but if he does chew , he does it at an amazing speed, almost invisible to the naked eye. In contrast with other people his age, he has real hobbies. Gardening is one of his hobbies; people say he has what they call a ‘green hand’. He is capable of growing roses as big as cauliflowers and we dare not touch a single petal. I remember he would come from work everyday and sit with plants with tools in his hands, unearthing the mud near the plants, adding water and some special mixture to it. He would also try to adapt modern techniques of gardening, I often heard of him using terms like grafting, cropping, etc. All this brought sweat to his brows but he said this is his way to unwind. He had another unwinding ritual; after lunch, all the adults in the house would gather to play cards. Though, money was not involved, the competition used to be fierce. Devious methods were used to score against each other. I don’t recall the regular double dealers, except that my father was always one of the accused. My father not being an expert in the game, did try to spice it up. My father would always pair up with my grandmother and my mother with babaji. Long sessions of cards during hot sultry summer months were a regular phenomena, it gave us kids a chance to watch television to our hearts content. Sometimes, we too would try to learn cards games and play alongside. Babaji’s side drawers had number of old, battered card packs, which were passed on to us. The game of cards was incomplete without paan. Everyone in the house, except for my father and the kids were experts in making paan. My nani used to make countless number of perfect triangular paans in the morning which were generally consumed by the evening. She kept laid the paan leaves on an old newspaper and then the paan would be kept in a pandibba, a container used exclusively to keep paan. Paan was an integral part of the household. There was a paan rack in the house where an assortment of colourful fragrant ingredients were kept, in quaint small containers. We, at times, used to sneak up to get some shelled cardamom from the rack. Another thing I recall of him is that he knows how to tie a scarf around his neck very well. He would often wear a polka dotted scarf. He used to wear that scarf so often that I begin to believe that he probably just had one. He had a friend from college in Delhi, he would often wear that scarf to his place. I guess it reminded him of his youthful days. Babaji used to sit in vajrasan after meals, though he didn’t have a digestion problem, nor did it help him in any other way. He used to sit on the floor after dinner, watching news on television, with his legs locked under him. He was quite a yoga fan; I think he had a book on yoga which he consulted from time to time. He did yoga in the mornings, during my exams when I would get up early to revise, I would see him in odd yoga positions. He stopped doing yoga once his knee trouble began, I doubt if he would still be able to perform yoga. At times, he would go out for his evening stroll and buy fresh fruits on his way back home. Mango was his favorite fruit and buttered toast his favorite snack. He hated spicy food and Dev Anand’s antics. He loved watching comedies and talking about his college days in Delhi. I don’t know much about the more important aspects of babaji life; I don’t know what he wanted in life, his problems, his experiences…. I wonder if I know little about him or just little but significant things about him. Still when I think of him, an intoxicating smell surrounds me and I wish I could once more bury my nose in his handkerchiefs.

Classroom Website

Here is my Google Website.  It is really just a skeleton website because I am taking a year off from teaching, but there should be enough applications/examples that you can see what google websites have to offer.  When I get back into the classroom, I will utilize it more.

Let's have a Picnik!

Picnik, fotoflexer, phixr, and sumopaint are all free image editing programs.  I edited this photo from my Mission Trip to Peru last summer using Picnik.

Picnik has editing tools for cropping, rotating, resizing, color, exposure, sharpness, and red eye.  It also has create tools for text, frames, effects, stickers, touch up, and seasonal.  It allows you to upload from and save to Facebook, MySpace, Picasa Web, Flickr, and Photobucket.  Some of the premium features cost $$ to use, but for simple editing projects, picnik worked great and was fun to use.  

The Sweetness of Office Suites

1.  Google Docs:  Below is the video "Google Docs in Plain English".  Google Docs works with a gmail account, but instead of sending individual emails to numerous people, you can work collaboratively on a single document.  It kind of reminds me of a wiki, but on a document instead of a page.  I actually have used Google Docs before when creating a School Anthology.  Several teachers got together and typed up writing that was submitted by students.  We then were able to have all the writing under one document which made it easier for the head editor to format and print.  This would also be a great way for students to work collaboratively on papers.

2.) Zoho:   Below is a video about using Zoho with Google Documents to manage your business.   Zoho appears to be a more focused towards business than education.  However, it does offer along with sharing documents, video conferences, chats, calendars, and planners.  These tools could become useful if students want face to face collaboration with each other or students from other schools.

3.) Think Free:  Below is a video about the mobility of using Think Free.  The advantage of this Office Suite is that is links documents to your mobil phone, PC, and the internet.  I see advantages of using this as a business person or administrator.  I personally do not encourage students using their phones, so I would not use this Office Suite in my classroom.

Capture the Moment

Using the free application jing, you can capture pictures and videos on your computer.  This is great when you want to show something from your computer, but are not in person to do so.

In this Screencast, I explain a few simple things about navigating around a blog.  I would use this Screencast to help explain to my students how to set up and use Blogger at home.