Student Blogs in NEISD

Mrs. Miller, 2nd grade teacher at Northwood Elementary, uses her blog to keep parents informed about campus events, grade level excursions, and engaging lessons that make learning fun. She recently created blogs for each of her students that you can access on the sidebar. Visit Mrs. Miller's blog for more ideas on how to create everlasting elementary memories.

Mr. Trevino is the 6th grade Tech Apps instructor at the STEM Academy located at Nimitz Middle School. He has ALL of his students blogging and sharing with the world the wonderful projects created throughout the year. The students are able to demonstrate self expression through their choice of template design and have embedded multimedia projects such as Glogster. Feel free to leave comments on their blogs as you navigate through Mr. Trevino’s site. *Requires NEISD login

We'll take a look at each blog example. We'll talk about what we like and want to adopt in our own blogs. We'll talk about what changes we would suggest. We'll talk about digital citizenship-are these students blogging safely? And we'll leave a comment to encourage these awesome student bloggers!

Why Blogs? This unit is all about empowering students by providing freedom. The blogs add a maker mentality, stirring the imagination to create, design, and tinker. No longer must they be told what to write and how, submitting to another's power and authority. Blogs provide choice and independence, allowing them to own the learning experience.

This is a place for us to talk about books, share ideas and get suggestions for what to read next!

April Gastinger’s students at Bradley Middle School provide the campus with a constant stream of student created book reviews with their blog, The Bradley Book Review. The students utilize Google Docs to submit their book reviews prior to publishing on the blog, then use the comments feature to provide feedback. Mrs. Gastinger even takes it a step further by embedding a class Twitter feed in her sidebar that announces when new reviews are published. There’s even a section for student created video book trailers! This is certainly a campus that loves to read.

Mrs. Lasher’s G/T students (grades K-5) are the contributors and stars of her blog that showcases the various projects completed throughout the year. If that’s not impressive enough, more than 33,000 visitors from all over the world read and comment on the numerous projects her students share. Check out Garrett’s Lego stop motion video he created over the summer. Mrs. Lasher posted this video on School Tube (not blocked by our filter) and easily embedded it in her blog. Check out some of her other projects!

I am so excited to be teaching 4th grade again this year. 4th grade is my favorite grade to teach, and this year I am lucky to have such a nice class!

My class is full of smart, funny kids. Yesterday we had a visit from author Gretchen Bernabei. She came to talk to our class about writing, and one of my students made her laugh. Alex wanted to share what important things need to go in someone’s writing, and what he said was, “Writing needs lots of precipitations in it.” Mrs. Bernabei thought Alex was so funny, and she even asked him to sign her journal.

Not only do I have a great class this year, but I have something exciting going on too. My husband and I are expecting our first baby and he is a BOY! Baby Mason will be here in May. My class can’t wait to meet him.

Here are the links for my students' beyond amazing student blogs! They did everything themselves! Hopefully everyone will eventually get to make one. I'm starting with students who have shown exemplary behavior and responsibility. Having a blog online takes a lot of responsibility!