95 Reasons...

While searching for educational blogs, I came across Spotty Banana Homeschool. The blog is attractive and well done. It offers perspective on educational news, and acts an incredible source for learning that can take place in the traditional classroom, outdoors as well as in the home. Teachers and families would find this site useful, it shows how the activites that you do, and the many places you go, can provide valuable learning opportunities. The blog has ideas for lessons, links to current topics in education and tips from people who devote their time to teaching chilldren.

Under the links at Spotty Banana, one name caught my eye, Little Blue School. This mom is homeschooling her two children, and captures these experiences in a way that will leave you inspired. She is ORGANIZED, and has a major list of lessons and activities for children. Her latest "95 Reasons I Love T-Bone" post was great! I can see sharing this example with students, and asking them to complete similar statement, "95 Reasons..." This could be used in all subject areas, during holidays or special occasions: THiNK: Valentine's Day, Mother's Day-Father's Day, elections, favorite/particular: season, book, food, color, activity, on and on and on. Causing students to find 95 ways to represent their statement would create an expansion of thought, use a great deal of vocabulary and act as a a great means of getting to know your students.

As I was creating this blog, a friend of mine began one as well. The premise of The Staggering Lummox is political. He finds an article and provides his take on the situation via the blog. The ability to research a topic, including images, video, song, newspaper, etc, and then describe, support, elaborate would be a great method for students to organize a subject studied. I can see this being used for an on-going student inquiry on a topic of their choice, (or a set topic). Specific Tasks or Expectations would be provided along the way to guide the process, but the final outcome would be largely up to the students. The blog would act as a journal, as a a visual representation of the topic and as a source for communication at multiple levels including: teacher to student- student to student- and student to experts around the world.