Poetry Blog for 8th Grade English Students

Author: Darlene Scangarello
Montgomery Middle School teacher
Graduate Student of SDSU's Educational Technology program

Objective: Students can benefit by using weblogs to post their reflections on poetry readings required in the California State Standards. Students will be able to:

• Write at least one paragraph reflecting on the poem they read,


• Include at least one link to the author of the poem,


• Include at least one link to a web site that is relevant to the subject matter of the poem,


• Lastly, comment on other students posts at least two times.

Context: The intention is to implement this poetry blog within the middle school classroom, the computer lab, at home, or in a public library. The users and learners of the blog are my English students participating in the Poetry Unit; however, parents, fellow staff, friends, and family are welcome.

Duration: This blog will be about a month long depending on how often we can access the computer lab as a whole class.

Goals: I hope eighth graders learn to communicate on a higher level with one another through this medium that instantly publishes their ideas, giving them an immediate audience for what they wrote. The standards I will be addressing are:
3.0 Literary Response and Analysis
Students read and respond to historically or culturally significant works of literature that reflect and enhance their studies of history and social science.

Structural Features of Literature
3.1 Determine and articulate the relationship between the purposes and characteristics of different forms of poetry (e.g., ballad, lyric, couplet, epic, elegy, ode, sonnet).

Participants: I am going to leave this blog open for external comments and see if this promotes the audience effect that I am looking for. The students' roles are to reflect on poetry readings, give and receive comments, and provide additional resources to one another via links.

Process: Before students begin interactions within the blog, they will:

1. Bring their signed contract to me.


2. Set up their own accounts to be used within the class blog.


3. Read their assigned poem.


4. Post their reflection(at least three sentences).


5. Search the Internet for an appropriate website about the author and link it.


6. Search the Internet for an appropriate website about the subject matter and link it.


7. Post their comments on two other poem reflections from other students.

Resources: Here are a few web sites to use for this project:
teacherslounge
EmilyDickinson
poetry
PoetryBlog
MorePoetryBlogs

Policies:
What rules do I want to abide by on my personal log?

My expectations for myself and those commenting to my personal log are to refrain from inappropriate language, vulgarity, and links to sites that are not relevant to the focus of the conversations. ...keep it clean and adhere to the subject matter being discussed at the time.

What language do I want my students to use in their blogs?

I like the sample AUP: which discloses the district policy on netiquette and provides a contract for everyone to sign before accessing the Internet at school.
I will use something very similar to this based on my district's policies and modify it accordingly.

Products: Students will be equipped with a better understanding of what it means to take engage in a group process of fluid writing and emerge as better communicators. By conversing with one another on various poems they can learn from one another and share their ideas.Although not tangible products, the process of blogging allows everyone to participate and see other points of view without the anxiety that often accompanies public speaking.

Evaluation: The effectiveness of this poetry blog will be evaluated according to the types of reflections, links, and comments that stem from the project. I will evaluate students using a very basic rubric on a scale of one to four.