In this story I am including a short story that I wrote with my grade 3 Foundational English Language Learners. I would like my students to join the SoLSC classroom challenge in April, so I am setting them up with an account through Kidblog. I am not sponsored by Kidblog in any way, and I will be paying out of pocket to try it, but I thought I would mention that it seems like a really easy to use, fun and safe tool to get the kids blogging.
Yesterday I signed up my grade 3 students (I teach 3/4/5/6 beginner ELL students). I asked them to log in, find a post I wrote to all of them, and then figure out how to comment on my post. Once they figured out what to do,they went BANANAS with excitement. I was quite shocked by how much they loved commenting. It got a little over stimulated.
Eventually, I asked them to put their iPads away so I could show them how to create a new post. I also used the opportunity to write a model text for them (with a little input from them). On Friday I will write a shared text with them and then give them the opportunity to write their own post independently. Then on Monday we will begin our daily blogging routine!
Below is the “model” text I wrote (not sure it’s the best model, but it’s good enough for modelling a blog post). We just finished a unit on narrative writing (with fairy tale examples) and we looked at things like character traits, dialogue, different words for “said”, past tense and problems/solutions.
The Talking Circle
“Hey, listen up!” said Ms. Julie. “It’s time for the talking circle!”
“Hooray!” cried the students! They were so excited!
“I want to talk about my new dog!” said one kind girl from Korea.
“I want to talk about my sleepover party!” shouted a happy girl from Canada.
“I want to talk about my friends!” said a strong boy from Japan.
“That sounds so fun!” replied the teacher, smiling at all the beautiful children. “I can’t wait to hear them. Let’s start with you.” and she pointed to the bouncy little girl from Israel.
“But don’t forget me!” said the boy from Spain. “I have the best story!”
“That’s what you think!” said the sweet girl from Belgium. “My story is amazing!”
“Me first, me first!” said the boy from Turkey. “I can’t wait to share!”
Suddenly, the door opened.
“Sorry I’m late,” whispered the funny boy from Iceland. “I was buying popcorn for everyone.”
“We were just waiting for you!” explained Ms. Julie. “Come on in!”
Learn Through It 
This is a great way for ENLs to share their stories. I applaud you for having them be creative thinkers and writers.
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Thank you! I’m so excited about it!
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What a great way for ELLs to practice written language! We have too much testing happening to make it public blogging work for my students, but I will try our class blog during our poetry unit. P.S. I teach secondary ELLs.
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Hello ELL teacher!! Woohoo! I’m lucky that they moved it to April this year as March is my crazy busy month. I like the idea to blog during a poetry unit! I hope you try it!
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Congrats, Julie, on finding a new avenue to excite your students. It looks like they will really enjoy writing and sharing their stories with each other. I do hope your school gets on board with reimbursing you for our efforts to find a tool that works well for students.
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Thank you. I just hope they don’t get stressed when I tell them about blogging after I’ve started it. I’m going with an “ask forgiveness, not permission” model this time.
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I love how excited they are. I keep thinking about trying this with my reluctant learners and I keep picturing one particular child’s scowl. Ahem. I can only imagine what his comment would be. Hahaha. You know what though, maybe I should just do it anyway – I love your students’ enthusiasm. And you model text is cute as buttons.
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If you do want to join, on Kidblog you get the first month free, so you can do the April challenge for free! If you decide to join later, let me know because I have a 25% off discount code.
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I love that they went bananas over it. Sounds like you’ve got an amazing April of writing ahead of you.
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