Week 1 in 53302

This was my first week in a graduate level class. I have not taken any colleges classes this year after graduating last December. It has taken some adjustment on my part to get back into the swing of school work! I must say I have enjoyed my "free" time the last seven months, but I have also missed the experience of learning new things and challenging my self!

I am most proud of myself for creating this blog! I have never created a blog or webpage. The closest thing I have done would be facebook. While I enjoy posting to facebook, I don't find it appropriate to use in the classroom for educational use. I could see myself using this blog or another one I create to use in the classroom. Parents could use it to see what we are working on in class for the week. Some parents do not feel comfortable meeting via telephone or face to face weekly to discuss classroom activities. Or maybe, their schedule will conflict with mine and blogging just might be easier! I would also like to teach my students how to create their own blog, if I feel they are mature enough to handle this. We would need to discuss blogging etiquette, and their own rights and responsibilities for use.

A challenge I might face using blogging to interact with parents would be that some of my students may not have internet access at home. Some families may choose not to have computers in their home for whatever reason. To overcome this challenge, I would let all parents know that this is not a requirement. They are more than welcome to contact me via phone or face to face. Anything that I post on the blog will also be sent home in a bi-weekly newsletter. I would not want to make any parent or student feel like they were being left out of something. My students will hopefully have access to the internet while they are at school.

Another challenge could be parents posting personal comments about their child or another child in the classroom that needs to be discussed in private. I will explain how the blog works at the beginning of the school year when I first meet with parents. I will let them know what is acceptable on the blog, and what is not.

The challenge for me now is not knowing alot about blogging myself. Hopefully by the end of this 8 weeks, I will have overcame my own challenge!