21 Ways to Use Blogs in the Classroom

They are great tools and obviously, I'm an advocate, but what in the world would you do with one or many in the classroom? This list will grow with time and I would love to hear more ideas through the comment section.

1. Book Blogs – students give synopsis, comment and rate their favorite books and/or characters.
2. “Who am I?” or “Where am I?” or “What am I?”Activity – teacher provides clues and students can guess or students can group and provide clues to the class.
3. Multiple Answers – teacher asks open-ended questions that have multiple answers, and students provide their answers on the blog.
4. Cartoon Critique – political cartoons are analyzed.
5. Add an Idea – begin with a big picture concept, such as “Capitalism,” and require each student blog something new about the concept.
6. Peer Assessment – provide a rubric for comments and use groups or partnered students to assess each others’ work
7. Sequence – any process or list where the student must blog “what comes next.”
8. Mind mapping - students add drawings, PowerPoint Smartart, Webspiration, Bubbl.us, or any online mind map and then explain the flow.
9. SMART Notebook- teacher posts a notebook for student use and questions to view (students will need SMART Express to do this). Students can ask questions through the comment option.
10. Homework Help - open the blog as a homework help forum where students and teachers help each other.
11. Create an Ending - teacher provides writing prompt and assigns students to create their own ending.
12. Graph and Explain - using Excel or Create-a-Graph or any online graphing tool; students create a graph based on figures, an experiment, or survey and post it with an explanation.
13.  Survey - teacher or student led. The topic can be an interest inventory, can examine learning styles, or gather information about a topic for which you need data or a decision.
14. Current Events – students blog about a current event topic or choose their own.
15. Podcasting – students create an audio (with Audacity) or video podcast program and deliver/publicize by uploading/embedding it to the blog.
16. Categorize – using the table feature and ask students to categorize words or pictures.
17. Digital Dropbox – use blogs as a method to turn in homework.
18. Delivering a Presentation – rather than using class time to present, students post/embed their PowerPoints in the blog so peers can view and assess the project.
19. Collaboration – create groups for a project so they can post group planning, design, and share files. (better suited to a wiki but this works too!)
20. Exit Ticket – students must write a personal reflection on the lesson before or after leaving class.  This activity can be provided as an open topic or can be used with a more focused approach
21. Embed Anything – teacher or student can embed code for interactive website, links, YouTube video, flash files, photos, etc.  This allows for the user to easily share resources with the class.

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