Russell Street School Impressions

For our assignment this week, Dr. Barbour had us “visit” Russell Street School’s website and their Google Site to take a look at how their elementary students and teachers were using blogging as an educational tool, and to then share about our impressions on a class blog. I viewed several blogs, from what appeared to be kindergarteners all the way up to maybe 5th grade age, to get an overall impression of how blogging is used.

I completely understand why we were given this task. The students at Russell Street School use blogging as an integral part of their learning curriculum, and as a result, we get to view authentic examples of what we are learning about in school.

The Little Einsteins blog (Kindergarten, I believe) was filled with an assortment of learning experiences and information for the families and students. I was really impressed at how well laid out the blog was, and how many resources were made available including academics and the arts. I read one post that encouraged parents and family members from around the world to leave comments because the students enjoyed receiving feedback. I could easily imagine the teacher reading all of the comments as a daily “read aloud”. Modeling is a huge part of teaching, and this class blog gives plenty of opportunities to model effective communication strategies, even as early as kindergarten.

Another blog that caught my eye was one from older students called Poutama. This blog was used by 3 different classes and included 90 participants. It was rich in text and images, as you would hope an upper elementary blog would be, but it had a community feel to it because the teacher interacted with the students on the blog. One thing that caught my eye was a discussion entry post called “What a Win” that was written to elicit critical thinking skills about an athlete’s mindset in a recent athletic game. I could see the connection to real world experiences, and not just something out of a textbook. Students were expected to share their opinions on the discussion questions, just as we did for one of our blog assignments.

In my 504 class (theories of educational technology), I researched and wrote about “Communities of Practice”, an emerging theory based upon the philosophy that learning occurs when groups of people are brought together by a common purpose, and in doing so, learn more effectively  as they interact with each other. This seemed to radiate through the blogging I viewed at Russell Street School, and is at the heart of how I hope my "blogging with students" experience to be.

Russell Street School Blogging

I was really impressed with the activity and the content in this site. There is much to learn just by looking and reflecting. What I noticed and what I have taken away most is that content is king. It doesn't have to be perfect, or look amazing. It just has to exist. The children are clearly involved and whenever children are given responsibility, there is a good chance that they rise to it.

I also noticed the use of the word 'self' a lot. Pupils, faculty, parents and families are all obviously involved in this community and blogging and communicating has become an important part of that. I particularly like the use of video and am looking forward to next week to see how I can start to use different media in my blog to engage a little more.

Perhaps my favorite takeaway is that there is not just one way to do it. It seems like lots of styles and poeple all coming together and painting a picture of life inside the school. My little boy trotted into the room when I was watching one of the videos. He is 3. He stood there and watched 2 or 3 videos and then asked if it was my school. "That's cool. Is that your school Daddy, where I am going?" I wish it was.