Elementary Edu-Bloggers

5/18/2012

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About a year ago, a teacher I follow on Facebook posted a link to a kindergarten teacher-blogger who was hosting a giveaway on her blog.  I checked out the details and found that to enter her contest you had to follow her top 40 list of bloggers.  So I did and also decided to bookmark the blogs to my browser for future reference.  Needless to say I didn't do much following because who wants to check out 40 blogs everyday?  But now thanks to my new tool, Google Reader, I have created a folder for my educational blogs and then subscribed to each of them so I can check one place to see who has posted new material.  Brilliant!  I have complied a list of my favourites for you below.
3rd Grade Gridiron



Globicate





Sunny Days In Second Grade


Teaching in the Early Years




The Lesson Plan Diva


Sharing Kindergarten



Made for 1st Grade


The Moffatt Girls


Kids Reading Activities
This is a 3rd grade teacher from the United States.  I like her blog because she shares lots of great resources and videos of things she has tried in the classroom.  She has also provided a list of her favourite online tools.

This is a neat blog with an environmental/global education perspective.  Her teaching principles include geographical knowledge and understanding, cultural awareness, working together as a global community to solve real-world issues, sharing the responsibility of caring for the Earth, and global kindness.  This blog also has some great links to facilitate connections to teachers all over the world.

This is a 2nd grade teacher blog from the United States.  She shares tons of resources and ideas from her classroom which is great because she also provides feedback for how things went when she tried them out.

I liked this blog by Shelley Gray because it is Canadian.  She blogs from a primary perspective and because she is in Manitoba, and their curriculum is very close to Saskatchewan's in some areas, her ideas can easily be adapted to meet our outcomes. I also follow Shelley on Facebook and used some of her resources during my pre-internship.

This 1st grade teacher blogger has great resources on her blog and on Teachers Pay Teachers.  She also posts a lot of freebies on her site, so it is a great one to follow.

This is a blog I hope to use a lot during my internship as I will be in a kindergarten/discovery pre-school classroom.  She has some great literacy resources and a tour of her classroom setup.

This is another 1st grade blogger.  I like the tabs at the top showcasing the literacy and math centers, as you can never have too many ideas for those!  

This blog has great resources for toddlers and pre school kids, which will also be valuable during my internship.

Lastly, this blog is a literacy resource for primary students.  It features lots of ideas and resources for teaching reading to young students.  This is one that would be valuable to primary teachers for finding different strategies to help meet different learners' needs.
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Dear World, Read My Blog

5/16/2012

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I have finally found a routine that works for my schedule this semester.  I have specific times of the day set aside for certain tasks that need to be completed.  This is the best way I know how to keep myself organized.  For example, I have chosen to blog every night after class/before bed.  I tried a couple of different times of day and found that this one worked best for me in terms of consistency.  I also had the opportunity tonight to listen to the ECMP 355 live session from this week which happened to tie in nicely to what I was thinking about for my post.  I love when that happens.  I feel like there should be fireworks or something.  Anyway, I paused the session to type this post so I wouldn't forget.  You never know when ideas will strike, so I am always prepared with a pen and paper to jot them down, or in this case, a blog and a keyboard.

This week we were asked to follow the #comments4kids hashtag on twitter and find a few classes to follow and comment on.  I went on twitter this afternoon and found a three that I wanted to post comments on.  The first was a news podcast created by 3rd graders in Oklahoma.  My comment hasn't been approved yet, but I tried to give the children specific feedback about what I liked so they knew I had actually taken the time to listen.  The second blog I found was a blog dedicated to book reviews written by the students.  I found a book I had actually read and posted a comment to that student, which you can read here.  I think peer book reviews are an excellent strategy for promoting literacy in the classroom and teaming them up with blogging is magic!  Lastly I visited another 3rd grade blog and commented on a couple of posts that I really enjoyed reading.  One of the posts has since disappeared, but the other one can be found here, along with my comment.

During the live session this week, Dean mentioned the power behind a comment from a stranger who had happened on your blog, and cared enough about what you were writing to leave some feedback.  This is so true!  I have had a couple of strangers comment on my posts and I was so excited that I immediately told my partner about them.  It made my work feel important and made me want to write more.  I guess in a way I payed that forward this afternoon and I hope my comments inspired some youngsters to keep blogging.  
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