Using Blogs Safely in the Classroom

Blogging has so much potential to be used in the classroom. I can use this powerful tool to share information with parents and students. I can communicate assignments, share daily classroom activities and provide links to other sites that will enable my students to explore and learn outside the classroom.

The virtual world of the internet has opened up so many windows of learning opportunities for our students today. They are able to learn from so any different sources, some reliable and others not. Students are able to learn about any subject they are interested in just by typing into a search engine, like Google, NetTrekker, or Quintura. How reliable or safe are these sites? I suspect that Google is probably the most widely used search engine. But I have "Googled" words or phrases and the search has (sometimes) revealed websites and images that are inappropriate for children, especially young elementary age children. NetTrekker and Quintura have screened websites and when searched, reveal sites that that are age appropriate and information appropriate for students.

I believe that as educators, we need to expand the world of our students, but we also need to monitor the resources that they access for reliable content and age appropriate information.