Future Literacy Blogging

How learning to use a technology like this fits with (or not) my current conceptual understanding of literacy, and my ideas of effective literacy instruction:

I believe that learning this blogging technology fits nicely with my ideas of effective literacy instruction. I do however have some concerns about the ages at which my students would be and if this type of technology would be more of a frustration versus and positive learning experience. I believe that upper elementary students that have basic knowledge of computers would be able to create and carry out a blog of their own, but if I were to do this with my desired grade level which is lower elementary, I believe that it might be more beneficial to chose another technology. This would be something that would have to be done as a class and it would take much practice to perfect. If time and space in planning allows, I would love to give this a try with younger students, but if time and resources are not available, I am not sure how I would really see that this would benefit younger students.

For those older students that have basic computer knowledge, I believe that a blog opens up a new opportunity of communication among the students. I view a blog as more of a type of journal and I feel as though students would become very intrigued if they were about to post about topics that interest them or that they are passionate towards. Students could then learn from one another by reading and/or responding to one anther's blog posts. For those students, I would really like to see what types of things they come up with and what extra features they choose to investigate. As always I will be teaching my students a new technology as well as learning from the results they are producing. This offers a new and exciting way of exploring literacy and if given the chance, I would enjoy carrying this out with my students during literacy explorations.