Nina+Edelstein+Artifact

__ Culminating Artifact __

__ Introduction __ My interest in the 21st century Dobb’s cohort was initiated by my desire to increase my personal knowledge of the skills I thought that I needed as an educator to assist my students in the learning process. I knew after the very first cohort meeting that I had a lot to learn and that this fellowship was going to be a great experience. By coincidence, several weeks earlier, during my summer break, I had decided to begin a class website and a class blog. Since I had absolutely no experience in either, it was a trial and error sort of thing. I spent many hours researching and checking out other teacher's sites. I have to admit that I think I did an excellent job in my first efforts. I received many compliments from parents concerning my sites. When I began this cohort, I really had no idea what a 21st century classroom was, what it would consist of, or what my role would be in one. I was amazed, really, by all of the technology that was available already. Some people in the cohort already seemed to know about quite a few of them, while some others were like me, somewhat ignorant of what was out there. I wondered what I had gotten myself into, but the other cohort members and the facilitators were a welcoming group and I quickly felt comfortable with them.

__History__ From the very first days of school I began introducing my students to our class blog. Their first assignment was to read an online book, __The Birds Who Flew Beyond Time__ on the __International Children's Digital Library __ and respond to questions I had posted. It didn’t quite turn out the way I had hoped. Many of the students did not have email addresses and had trouble commenting. I would say 99% of them had no idea what a blog was or how to comment. Being a novice myself, I was not very adept at fielding questions or solving their problems logging on, etc. I also discovered, much later, that I had not set up the individual class pages correctly. I know now that they should have been separate blog pages linked to the main blog. Some students followed my directions about not putting their full or real names. Instead they chose names where I had no clue as to who they were! I was not pleased with the results I was getting. I found it frustrating for me and my students. The more I learned, the more resolved I was to help other teachers avoid the pitfalls I had experienced. I was still confident that blogging was a worthwhile endeavor for my classes. I was also trying to maintain my class website, __ Mrs. Edelstein's ELA class __ and keep in touch with parents, and learn 21st century classroom skills all at the same time. There was no one at my school who was informed enough to assist me, nor was anyone else attempting what I was attempting. That was alarming to me. How could we prepare students for their future when none of the teachers were utilizing the fantastic tools that I was finding out existed? Everytime we had our cohort meeting, I learned of fabulously helpful and useful sites that I could use to make my work easier and excite my students. I couldn't believe that all of these sites were out there on the web and I, nor anyone else that I knew of at my school, knew these sites existed. I felt an urgency to share what I was learning on my own and at the Dobb's cohort with my colleagues before our students moved on without learning what they needed to succeed in their future. This is how I came about developing my project for the next school year. I am determined to bring the rest of my colleagues into the 21st century classroom with me.

__Project__ It is my firm belief that teaching students how to live and work with the technology that is available to them is a primary responsibility of educators. We must propel ourselves into this new technology head on without hesitation, or else we are not doing justice to our students. It is not enough to continue the same old lessons as if the world is not changing daily around us. It is this belief that has given me the incentive and made me move forward with my project for next year. Not only do I intend to get my students to blog more frequently and be comfortable blogging, but I also hope to convince and help every Language Arts teacher in my department to start a class blog this next school year. I will not limit my efforts to only Language Arts teachers, either. Other teachers have approached me telling me of their desire to have a class blog as well. They have asked for my help. I hope to improve on my own class blog to make it more viable and interesting for the students. One way that I can accomplish this is by not making the blog just another homework assignment. The students need to feel ownership of their blog. I will allow them to suggest topics for posts, as well as write journals, their thoughts, about various topics of interest to them. At the beginning of the next school year, when I present the class blog idea to teachers at my school, I will share with them the research I have found that supports blogging as a way to increase student writing ability. I will share my PowerPoint with them explaining all of the benefits of blogging. We will discuss using student blogs as a web portfolio that students could maintain throughout their middle school years. Hopefully, teachers at my school will see that having a class blog is beneficial to them, as well as to their students. With me as a guide to getting started, perhaps it will not be such a challenge to teachers, or considered a time consuming task to them. I know that I will have the Principal's desire for teacher's to have a class blog to assist me in convincing them that it is the right thing to do for our students. Students need to understand that they are part of a world wide community and they need to know how to live and work in that community.