Saturday, September 15, 2007

Back to Work

School is back in full swing and it's time to get back to my research project. I have written a few questions for my class blog discussion, which I want to center around the book we are reading, Lord of the Flies. I'm hoping to get that new blog up and posted sooon with the questions I have already written.

From my inquiry group I am hoping to get some feedback about the questions I have already written, and hopefully generate some ideas for additional questions. I think that it's essential for this first discussion to have good topics and questions to discuss.

The next step will be to have the students write and post their own prompts for a second discussion, this one centering around Macbeth. For the final blog discussion of the semester I will have my sophomores write prompts for my ninth graders to respond to. I'm excited about this last step because it will give me some communication and discussion between classes and grade levels, one of the unique features of a blog discussion. I see this as sort of a precursor to the kind of work that Jason Malone is getting going with his students having discussions with classes from around the world.

So my question is, what can I do to improve the questions I have, and what additional questions or topics could I post for my students to respond to?

2 comments:

smb said...

I think any time you can create a community of learners, you're headed in the right directions. Interesting you begin with Lord of the Flies in tenth grade. We have it as third quarter for ninth graders...

steph said...

i love lord of the flies! i only got to teach it twice! i think there is so much to do with that book/history/message/subject!!!! i also like the idea of the older kids almost mentoring, in a way, the younger kids about school stuff!

i wonder how to get the best comments/questions from the kids...maybe using models of each for them to critique? maybe in your blog, you could give them a great question/comment and see what responses they give you and then do the same with a not-so-great question/comment or post???

hmmm...i like the whole idea of it, but the tough part, i would imagine, would be quality...