Sue Waters

Blogging isn’t publishing text!

And if your blogging program only involves students publishing posts with text or images — you’re implying to your students blogging is about writing when it isn’t.

It’s about sharing your learning and engaging with readers.

Blogging should include a media rich environment to engage readers, create opportunities for interaction, and should encourage students to express their creativity.

With maybe the occasional cat/dog joke?

Technology Task Challenges For Teachers

Stuck for ideas?  Check out Ron Burke‘s Technology Task Challenges for teachers courtesy of Laura Moore.

I’ve embedded Ron’s Technology Task Challenges for teachers Thinglink below. Each image on the Thinglink links to a different Technology task PDF.

Click on the Image or hover your mouse over the image then click Read More to access the PDF.

I’ve embedded Ron Burke‘s Padlet Challenge below so you can see what his Technology Task Challenges look like.

Web tools For Posts

The Thinglink, the Cat joke and the Padlet PDF are all examples of media from other websites being embedded into a post.

These are just simple examples.  There are a gazillion online tools that you can use to create slides, videos, comic strips, quizzes, polls and more which you can embed into posts and pages.

I’ve listed popular tools used by educators by activity type to help get you started here.    Each tool has been embedded into the post so you can see how the tools works.

I’ve added my section on Padlet from the post below so you can see the type of information shared for each tool.

Padlet

Padlet, originally known as Wallwisher, is an online notice board creator.  Padlet’s popularity is how fast and easy it is to create engaging activities to use with students.

You can read more about using Padlet with students here.

Widgets For Your Sidebar

You can also engage readers using Widgets in your sidebar.

I’ve assembled a list of popular and most useful widgets used on class blogs, student blogs and personal educator blogs which you can check out here.

Many of the widgets have been embedded in the post to show how they work.

Below is a small sample of my section on clocks and calendars so you can see the type of information shared for each widget.

Clocks and Calendars

Clocks are great for displaying the time in your location which helps when you are trying to develop connections with classes in other countries.  They also help younger students learn about time and time zones

Clock Link – 100’s of different and unique clocks of all types.

What Else?

Not all online tools are designed to be viewed on mobile devices.  Compare my Cool Tools to Embed post and my 40+ Popular widgets for your blog post in the web browser on your computer with how these posts look on a phone or tablet.

Subscribe to Laura Moore blog!  Laura provides great tips and trick for using technology with students.

Leave a comment below if I’ve missed your favourite tool in my Cool Tools to Embed post.

This post was written in response to Free Web Tools: #EdublogsClub Prompt 5.