Most Media Specialist takes on the role as Technology Facilitator. They collaborate with teachers keeping them abreast on new technology. The Media Specialist works with the teachers in the classroom assisting them in teaching the students skills in technology. Technology is part of every Media Specialist day.
The articles bring out so many ways blogs can be used. Students can use blogs to discuss certain topics. Today’s students are used to video games, cell phones, and cable Television. They are multitask tic. Most students are used to interactive technology. By introducing them to blog, it will make learning fun and easy. It helps the students to collaborate and build a social network.
For years, savvy teacher have used various media to help their students connect to the world. Kids have conducted living-history interviews with elderly relatives or other community members or opened up discussions with other children in distant places. Students having difficulty writing essays can find that producing audio clips gives them an outlet to tell their story. (Butterfield, 2007, p.22)
Teachers can use blogs to deal with issues in the classroom. By having a network of teachers to collaborate with, the teacher can gain a wealth of knowledge and understanding from other teachers. New teachers can ask question on how to deal with disruptive student or what is the best way to teach an assignment. Blogs can also be used by Media Specialist to deal with questions and problems.
Blogging is a powerful information tool that should be incorporated into every school library. It can be used to highlight collaborative lessons, new books, events in the library, student reading events, student-led book discussions, etc. We have only scratched the surface. (Foote, 2007, p. 65)
I am a Media Specialist at Ayden Middle School in North Carolina, and we use the blog to collaborate among the Media Specialist. If we have questions, we will send out a blog and usually within a day, we will have an answer. We have a county protection on our blog - only the Media Specialist in our county can get on. This gives us an opportunity to send sensitive items over the blog. The articles encourage me to try to start a blog within my school. I hope that all the teachers will be as excited as I am about this new technology.
About Me
- Chris Howell
- I am a Media Coordinator at a middle school and I am working on my Media degree.
4 comments:
I think that is a great idea that you have groups readily available to help one another out with suggestions on topics. Many of us, including myself, have said that blogs are time consuming. However, if we think in terms of the valuable information that we are able to gain from setting up the right type of blog, then we are saving time by not having to drive to and from a meeting or conference, etc. Sometimes the benefits outweigh the disadvantages with blogs.
What a great way to get help in a quick and timely matter. I know that there have been many times when I wish I could shoot out a quick "help me with..." message! It would be great to get a response by the end of the day! One thing I don't like about blogs is that they are available for all to see, the county protection your Media Specialist blog has would be great to have!
Students today are used to technology and I think that there is a need in some schools to teach the teachers how to use the technology available to them to help teach their students.
I agree that for lots of schools and faculty, the media specialist does take on the role of technology facilitator. So it is important to try to stay up-to-date along with everyone else on your plates!
Hopefully this course starts you on a path of that.
Using blogs as an internal communication tool could be very powerful. Privacy would be an issue though. You wouldn't want to air out all that dirty laundry. But again at least in Blogspot, you can change who can view and add to your blog under the settings.
It is great that you have an authentic situation for applying what we're learning about blogs. It makes learning stick for as the saying goes "Use it or lose it". I am not in a school setting yet and I've been thinking of ways I could sustain blogging even after this class is done. This is my first blog and I'm still exploring its potential.
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