Responding to Blogs (for Module 1)

Below you will find my review of the sites given as an assignment for Module 1. Several of the blogs are no longer active, so you will find some personal suggestions listed below. 

http://willrichardson.com

In 2011 Will Richardson decided to move over from his blog to a website listed above.  His new site is a great place for conversations. He did leave his old site up, along with his extensive data base of bloggers.  One downside is that since this list hasn’t been maintained many of the bloggers are either no longer linked corrected, or are no longer blogging.  I found on Will’s current site that he has a more untraditional blogging system by including what seems to be many guest bloggers.  I do appreciate their thoughts and allow for a more diverse collection of opinions, but don’t assume that everything on his site is from him.  Many of the article are politically motivated, but in a time when there’s a lot of “heat” going through education regarding different policies and such, I can’t really be surprised that those political messages are woven throughout the writing.

David Warlick

David Warlick is an avid and frequent blogger.  His site is up to date with many recent posts. He seems to have more posts about big picture/political ideas, but again, I can’t be too surprised with the current state of education.  This is a site that I could easily get lost in reading his musings.  One piece that somewhat frustrated me is that I could find much of anything about him.  I find the author’s background important to understand their true perspective. 

Hambrick’s- This site hasn’t been updated since 2007 with the birth of his son. I did not bother reading much further in as the content is 6 years old now and rather out of date for my purposes.

Rosenfeld- Emmet Rosenfeld’s last post was in 2009 when he was discussing why he would no longer be blogging for Eduholic.  His new position as an administrator had essentially removed him from “the trenches” and his writing had moved away from the teacher centered musings. I read through many of his last posts and I had to agree with his editor that his writings were lacking much appeal to teachers looking for ways to incorporate technology into their curriculum.

McNeil- Blog no longer there

Richard Byrne Free Tech for Teachers http://www.freetech4teachers.com

Wow- what a wonderful site.  It is just packed with so many great ideas and suggestions for technology in the classroom.  The author, Richard has so many different posts about iPad apps, YouTube, Google Tutorials, Android phones in the classroom and so much more.  I could very easily get lost going through these different ideas.  I did go and Pin many of them to later explore.

Another interesting blog is Mindshift at: http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/about/

Instead of this being one person’s experiences, it appears to be run by an editor with postings being equally spread across Mindshift writers and other contributors.  It is current and diverse in education topics.  The topics run from Games and learning, to big picture ideas, to teaching strategies, to kids and media. Since this site uses various authors, you get different writing styles and opinions on the topics presented.

While scanning the 2012 Edublog winners, I found EduTech4Teachers . http://edutech4teachers.edublogs.org

This blog was the winner of the new Blog category and I can tell why.  The author of this blog has an extensive amount of information about being a 21^st century teacher and emphasizes being a connected teacher.  She’s included many videos, visuals and discussions on using these tools in classrooms.