As we set back out into the blogging world, feeling excited and proud of this trendy project we work on, we must acknowledge that we are not on our own. We are not even the first Chagrin Falls students to take on such a task. This week I discovered that my little sister’s third grade class blogs as well. Their blogs cover various topics including thoughts on the best Christmas present, sleepovers, pets and much more. My sister gave me a quick tour of the different sites and I became very fascinated. They do not receive points or a grade from blogging but they post and comment as often as possible, in vivid fonts and coloring. One post, a short anecdote about catching a frog, received seven comments. Another post, which discussed their views on monsters in graveyards, received nine comments. Not only from their peers, but also from their teacher and principal. My blog has never received more than three comments and I can guarantee that her blog receives triple the amount of page views then mine does. Feeling a bit intimidated from her blogging status, I showed her my own blog. Sadly, she exhibited little enthusiasm about it and overall did not appear impressed, only commenting “nice” and “I like the purple.” I did not let myself get too discouraged noting that they cannot change the background colors, create any sort of theme or most importantly add fish and gadgets. Yet, at the young age of eight and nine they already blog and write to one another on a daily basis. If they already have mastered this process I am curious to see what they will do in future. Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Not Alone
As we set back out into the blogging world, feeling excited and proud of this trendy project we work on, we must acknowledge that we are not on our own. We are not even the first Chagrin Falls students to take on such a task. This week I discovered that my little sister’s third grade class blogs as well. Their blogs cover various topics including thoughts on the best Christmas present, sleepovers, pets and much more. My sister gave me a quick tour of the different sites and I became very fascinated. They do not receive points or a grade from blogging but they post and comment as often as possible, in vivid fonts and coloring. One post, a short anecdote about catching a frog, received seven comments. Another post, which discussed their views on monsters in graveyards, received nine comments. Not only from their peers, but also from their teacher and principal. My blog has never received more than three comments and I can guarantee that her blog receives triple the amount of page views then mine does. Feeling a bit intimidated from her blogging status, I showed her my own blog. Sadly, she exhibited little enthusiasm about it and overall did not appear impressed, only commenting “nice” and “I like the purple.” I did not let myself get too discouraged noting that they cannot change the background colors, create any sort of theme or most importantly add fish and gadgets. Yet, at the young age of eight and nine they already blog and write to one another on a daily basis. If they already have mastered this process I am curious to see what they will do in future. 
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Wow, the fact that your little sister is blogging kind of scares me! I do not like this rapid movement of the integration of technology in such young classrooms. I fear that these kids will become so accustomed to using computers and other forms of technology, they will nearly forget how to write by hand. I was recently watching Fox News, and there was a study done on the legibility of children's handwriting and what negative effects this has on standardized testing agencies, ( like the Ohio 4th grade proficency tests for example) and how alarming it is to be a grader of the free response and short answer questions and not know how to decipher nor understand the words written on the page. Hopefully, the children of future generations will find a happy medium between using the old-fashioned pen and paper and the computer. I mean, the world wide web can crash at some point, right?
ReplyDeleteI actually like the fact that these young children are blogging. I'm sure all sorts of dedicated, hard-working little students in Asia are blogging constantly. I say we as America need to be just as good as them at blogging. And ping pong. Does your sister play ping pong? She better. I actually find it most disturbing that the teachers and administrators (and you) read their blogs. Talk about "Big Brother." Can't a kid get a little privacy?
ReplyDeleteKathryn, I can't believe that third graders blog! I have heard that they even use the IPod Touch as a learning tool as well. This makes me wonder, what kind of technology will schools use five years from now? Will new technological advancements take away from kids' social skills? I think it might. Sometimes technology is not such a good thing after all.
ReplyDeleteIt is insane how tech-savvy the kids are these days! My family always talks about how our parents’ generation are technology immigrants while we play the role of technology natives, because all these innovations truly are like another culture to learn and grow accustomed to. But like your moment with Mary Fran’s blogs, I came to a realization with my three-year-old cousin that we may not be as native as we think. We were playing “Cut the Rope” on the iPad (which I highly recommend, if you’ve never played) and while he couldn’t play the game too well, because he can’t grasp the physics strategy of it, he mostly enjoyed the bright colors and the lovable Omnom. But this kid is three and he navigated the game like a pro, he can’t even read and he knew what to press to restart and go back home. Seriously, these young children will present a huge competition in the workforce, technology-wise, I worry for our generation.
ReplyDeletep.s. Congratulations on getting a post with more than three comments!