A Fond Farewell
So this is my final blog! Although I swear that I have posted previously but I then cannot account for many of the things I have thought to have done within the last week working on only minimum hours of sleep. Anyways, I cannot say that I am going to miss blogging at all. Mostly because I don’t enjoy writing and if I do have to write I like to feel inspired rather than required. Don’t get me wrong the task itself has merit and can serve as a good tool in the classroom but I would have preferred more structured writing prompts because there were many times when I was at a lost as to what to write about. I have included a picture of a flower as a reminder that warmer weather is coming although not soon enough. This picture is from the flickr storm website, which I have made great use of trying to create my webpage for class. Now that will be a site to see!
cbrooks1 said,
December 8, 2007 at 7:29 pm
I like you idea of structured writing prompts as a tool you would use in your classroom Dana. I too have thought about how i would incorporate a blog in my classroom and i feel for younger children they will need a structured assignment to get the most benefit out of this technological tool.
Stephen Ransom said,
December 11, 2007 at 10:48 pm
Both have merit, for sure. Teachers often do sustained silent writing every day… no prompt… just to allow students the time to write. I often find that when I have nothing to write about it is often because I have not been learning anything new… and this causes me to think deeply about how I have been spending my time. When we are learning new things, there should be a great deal going on in our heads that we are thinking about, struggling with, not understanding, refuting… For sure, not everyone enjoys every content area. Some enjoy math or science far more than reading or writing. The trick is to find out why and to help students find a balance. But in the end, we all have our preferences. Howerver, the reality is that inspired writing is often different from required writing. That is why I did not mandate topics. But, if we did not require students to write, many would never write because they are not inspired. So, take it for what it is worth. Try not to let your own preferences color how you approach learning in your own classroom. For example, my son’s teacher is enjoys the language arts more than math, and it shows in how she approaches math and the time that she allocates to meaningful math activities. So, it is good that you can identify that writing is not your most favorite thing to do when required. However, you will have a diverse audience in your classroom. Be sure to try to balance everything and work on those areas of personal bias. It’s a tall order, isn’t it?!