September 5th - Blogging, Email Communications

Email is one of the biggest tools I use to communicate with my parents and students. I don't know what I would do without it. My students can email me from a form on my website without even having to access their accounts. Then, I can email them back from my school email by cutting and pasteing the address into my email. Students also use email to send me assignments that they are unable to print or that they forgot at home, or just something that they needed to get turned in and didn't want to risk not getting to me. Email is actually the easiest way for me to get in touch with parents as well becuase it's almost impossible to get to a phone at school. But email, it only takes a few minutes and I can get back to them in just a few seconds instead of having to hunt them down. I've not used blogging much, but I can see it being helpful with students, if for no other reason than it gets them to write regularly. I can also see it as a great way to get students in conversation about things that are going on in class or assignments that they are trying to understand. I have been using what our school website terms a "blog" but ends up looking more like a threaded discussion. I can see the students really enjoying the chance to write and interact online instead of just in class.