Students have valuable contributions when it comes to solving some of our most pressing problems, and they grow stronger in their interpretation and understanding of the world the more they write. Blogging has been one of those challenging mountains I had yet to climb as a teacher until last year. I knew I wanted my incoming AP Language students to write a blog for their summer reading project this year (www.apenglishwhs.edublogs.com), but I first tested it with my English 11 classes last spring when we formed an online book club. It was a huge success, one that I intend to build on this year in PAGES.
This site that I found is recommended by scholastic.com as one of the top student blogs. It gives students an opportunity to respond to current issues in the form of argument, letters to policy makers, creative writing, and many other options. Here is what the blog says about itself:
“We are a site for conversations. We invite youth of all ages to voice their thoughts about their passions, to explain things they understand well, to wonder about things they have just begun to understand, and to share discussion posts with other young people using as many different genres and media as they can imagine!”
Image Credit: http://kicis.blob.core.windows.net/kipismedia/2013/10/StudentVoices3-780×350.png