I never realized the potential of blogging, and its educational benefits until I started taking LAI 590: Technologies in the L2 Classroom. I have never used a blog before but just using it a couple times I can already see how it can be beneficial for my professional development as an educator and for the learning development for my ESL students. I learned a lot from the articles I read this past week, "Blogging in Language Learning" by Rita Zeinstejer and "Seven Reasons Teachers Should Blog" by Steve Wheeler.
I cannot wait to use blogging as a means to educate myself on ways to becoming a more effective and efficient teacher in the L2 classroom. Now that I am becoming more familiar with the blogging community I see myself searching for blogs that give advice on teaching ESL and that provide links to different sites and learning tools for my students. I would love to read and comment on current ESL teacher's blogs and learn from their teaching experiences. Once I am teaching I think I will definitely use blogs as a way of posting assignments and lesson plans for my students and as a way to allow my students to get to know me and their classmates on a more personal level. I feel that in order to be comfortable in the ESL classroom, where cultures are so diverse, it is essential to give students the opportunity to get to know each other in other environments outside of the classroom; I feel forming an online blogging community will meet that need. According to Zeinstejer, blogs can do all these things and more.
Upon reading and learning about blogs this past week I realized that they meet a lot if not all of the NYS Learning Standards for All Subjects including English as a Second Language. In the specific field of ESL two of the main standards blogs meet are: Language for information and understanding, in which through blogging students will acquire, interpret, apply and transmit information for content area learning and personal use; and language for social interaction.
NYS learning standards/ESL
Do you know what would be cool about reading blogs from ESL teachers...getting their first-hand accounts from countries all over the world. That could really enhance your professional development by being better prepared for the students entering your classroom. Just an idea, though.
ReplyDeleteI hope that in the next mod you choose links to some good ESL teachers to put in your sidebar. That way, you can easily benefit from their posts and comment on them if you have something to add or questions to ask.
ReplyDeleteHi Angela, I like the point you made about the importance of getting to know students on a personal level, especially in ESL. A blog would certainly help students to feel more comfortable around teachers and also remind them that teachers can be interesting.
ReplyDelete