- A great way to encourage writing and typing skills (all of sudden my daughter wants to learn how to type).
- Gives an opportunity for extended family to take part in your children's education and for family to love and encourage them.
- Creates an opportunity for my daughter to encourage fellow homeschoolers by leaving comments on their blog and creates a support system.
- My daughter's blog is something of her own creation and provides something that she is proud of and excited about.
Just a note to keep in mind...remember to teach your children Internet safety and role-play what to do if they encounter inappropriate material. I am adding links to her fellow bloggers' sites to decrease outside exposure but teaching correct principles will empower them to govern themselves. Have fun!
Did you make a New Year's Resolution to get back to blogging yourself. Three posts in a week... I am loving it. You always inspire me.
ReplyDeleteHope all is well for you.
Ali
Thanks for the shoutout Dina! The blogging thing is working so great for us! The kids try extra hard on their writing assignments because they know people are visiting and reading them. We track visitors to the blogs and they get so excited to see who's visiting. There are various free ways to track internet visitors.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I have the kids type their assignments in a word processor first and save it there. Then I have taught them shortcuts to 1- Select all text "Ctrl" + "a", 2- Copy all text "Ctrl" + "c", 3- and paste all text into their blogs "Ctrl" + "v". I've taught them some other shortcuts too. They think that's super cool. I think learning to use a word processor is very important so that's why I have them do that. So far they know how to use Microsoft Word and Open Office. We also do a half hour a day of cursive/handwriting practice so it isn't all computer work. They copy the scriptures for 30 minutes a day. Great for cursive practice, scripture study, and more. It's been wonderful in so many ways for us as we've done that.
About Internet Safety...
First of all, we do watch who's visiting the blogs.
Second, in our classroom I sit in-between the kids and they each sit beside me with a laptop. I watch them both as they work on the internet. Blogs are great because they are NOT chat rooms. I also teach them about internet safety. For instance: when they both did their posts about seeing the Congressman at the school, they had included in the name of the school in their letters. I explained to them how it was important not to include that because someone could figure out our location from that.
Anyhow, good luck to Olivia and her blogging!
Love your blog!
Thanks Amanda for these great insights!
ReplyDeleteCeleste would like to frequent Olivia's blog if you're ok with that. Can we get her address?
ReplyDelete