It takes a village to raise a child is a proverb which means that it takes an entire community of different people interacting with children in order for them to grow in a safe environment. The villages would look out for the children. This does not mean an entire village is responsible for raising them. When it comes to blogging in the classroom some may think it takes only the teacher and the class to have a fulfilling educational experience. However, parents can and should still be very influential in the enrichment of their child’s digital life. Check out these resources describing how parent involvement in classroom blogging can benefit a student as well as information for teachers on how to connect parents to your own Kidblog class.
Here one teacher describes the importance of writing for an authentic audience, especially parents and family.
“With weekly email blasts and tweets, I continue to keep parents updated on our most recent blog posts. I love when a long distance cousin, aunt, uncle, or grandparent has an opportunity to log on and participate in one of my student’s educational experience. Students in my class were equally excited about receiving comments from family members.”
Another teacher describes the importance of, as well as her ideas for creating open communication with parents through blogging,
“…parents play a significant role in student achievement. In order to guide student success, it is important to ensure a reliable means of communication with parents has been established. Teachers want ways to share the news and happenings in the classroom. Regular communication to keep parents informed about upcoming events such as assessments and class or school activities is important. Opportunities for sharing student work, so that parents see the learning experiences of students, is crucial.”
This 4th-grade teacher finds Kidblog to be a great tool for sharing student work with parents. These students are using multiple digital tools to create stories, share ideas and knowledge, and they use Kidblog to share all of their work with parents.
“Our Kidblog site serves as both a student-work portfolio and as a parent communication tool. Utilizing Kidblog to share student work with peers and parents has provided my students with an authentic audience to show what they know!”
Attention teachers using Kidblog, need a tutorial on how to add parents to your Kidblog class as guests? Check out our helpful how-to link here.
Once you’ve added parents to your classroom, learn how to get parent’s involved in your students’ blogs with this informative webinar.