7 Benefits to Blogging in the Classroom

 “To blog is to share, to connect, to create, to inspire.”

–  The Gingerbread Gem

Blogging with your students in the classroom can be a fun and positive way to connect and share with parents on a regular basis. There are also many educational benefits that your students can gain from blogging. This blog will outline 7 benefits to classroom blogging and also some suggested platforms that you could explore.

1.Parent Communication

Parents want to be continuously informed about what their child is learning about, what they did at school that day and how they are going in class. Especially in the early years. They also love to see photos of their child in their learning environment.

It’s great to get into the habit of taking a few photos or a short video each day. It doesn’t take long and helps maintain open communication between home and school. At the end of the day or at the end of the week, post the photos and videos on a classroom blog with a summary of the learning that took place. It might be a fun English or Maths task or a whole class activity. Encourage parents to comment on the post and provide opportunities for students to reply.

2. Internet Safety

Through the use of a classroom blog, teaching opportunities for informing students about cyber safety will naturally occur.

Instead of a stand alone lesson, the teaching of cyber safety should be an ongoing conversation with your students. When these opportunities take place, discuss with your students the importance of being safe online and how to be a responsible member of an online community. Discuss with your students how to keep themselves safe online and what to do if they are presented with an unsafe situation.

3. Improved Literacy Skills

By setting up a classroom blog and expecting students to participate, blogging can increase literacy skills and engagement. Blogging provides students with a purpose to write, which in turn encourages them to produce higher quality work.

Blogs are also a perfect tool for teaching spelling, grammar and language conventions. By editing a blog together with your class, students are able to understand the importance of self-correcting before publishing to an online community.

4. Improved ICT Skills

Through the use of blogging in the classroom, students are able to develop their ICT skills, becoming more ICT literate and prepared for the 21st century.

Your students’ knowledge of ICT skills, such as keyboard shortcuts, researching online and publishing, will improve giving them greater confidence when using technology in and outside the classroom.

5. Authentic Audience

By engaging your students with classroom blogging, you are giving your students an authentic audience to communicate with, instead of it always being you or their classmates reading their work.

A blog provides students the opportunity to reach a wider audience, such as their parents, other students or teachers in the school, or people from an outside community. Students are able to receive immediate feedback, increasing their level of engagement and self-improvement.

6. Sense of Community

A sense of community can be created in the classroom by working together to write a blog.

Blogging as a whole class requires great teamwork and collaboration. Students need to work together as a team and agree on the content in order to create an engaging and interesting blog post that represents their class. When a class has a sense of community, students feel like they have a purpose in the classroom environment, increasing their level of engagement.

7. Global Connection

One of the most exciting benefits blogging provides children is the opportunity to connect with other students, classrooms and schools across the globe.

Your class can connect with another class anywhere in the world as a blogging ‘buddy ‘or to ask questions when researching about different topics. This gives students a better understanding and tolerance of the world they live in and provides them with a global connection.

Online Blog Platforms

• Kidblog – Trusted by teachers around the world. Set up your class for free in 30 seconds!
• Edublog.com – Let’s you create and manage teacher and student websites.