Blogging movie reviews

My seventh grade language arts students are currently writing movie reviews, while addressing the concepts of bias and persuasive words. As I looked for reviews for them to read I noticed that many movie websites now have a blog attached for viewers to add their own comments to the critics' reviews. I would like to have my students include part of their review on a blog and then interact with others as they receive comments. This would enhance our goal of publishing their work--making it viewable to others--by letting them see and respond to the people who have viewed and commented on their original review. This would also be a good opportunity for them to use more persuasive techniques in their writing as they try to convince people with a different opinion from theirs.

Keeping up with today's students

Will Richardson warns educators that if we are not staying current and using technology in our classrooms we are "falling more in danger of becoming irrelevant in our students' lives" (2009, p.x). For as long as I can remember, teachers have been encouraged to make lessons real for the learner. The reality of today's learners is that they have grown up surrounded by cell phones, video games, I-pods, and interactive web pages like My Space and Face book outside of school and are ready and willing to embrace any new technology that keeps them networking. The student who can not conjugate a verb to save his/her life is very capable of texting, e-mailing videos, and navigating web pages on a cell phone--even while it's hidden in a pocket! There's a new skill set educators need to tap in to in order to reach today's students.

Although I didn't grow up with it, I, too, enjoy the advances of technology in my personal life and have had a little laugh at the friend who had to send back her Blackberry because she couldn't figure it out. I have been fortunate enough to have many of the latest educational tools in my classroom and use them with ease--most of the time (Gods of the Smart board willing). However, when asked if the technology we use to teach allows us to accomplish tasks differently or to accomplish different tasks, I realize I have a way to go in using technology to its full capacity in my classroom. Reading about things to come has me overwhelmed. Richardson quotes the former CEO of Hewlett-Packard as saying the past twenty-five years in technology have been the "warm up act" (p.10) Wow! What's next? And how will the digital generation who has experienced and expected technology in the classroom from their elementary days react to new innovations? Take them in stride, or stand in awe of human ingenuity? What do young learners predict the new techno tools will be?

Reference
Richardson, W. (2009). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms (2nd ed.).Thousand Oaks, CA:Corwin Press