PE4_Edublogs

The Web 2.0 tool that I am using for my Relevant Innovative Learning Scenario (RILS) is Edublogs. Edublogs is a safe and secure blogging tool to use in schools. Because of the education content that is on Edublogs, this site is typically not blocked by schools, making it an easily accessible tool to utilize in the classroom. I am in the learning stage of Edublogs, trying to figure out all the ins and outs of the site. Since this is the first time I am using it, I created and set-up each students' blog myself. With an educator account, a teacher can create as many student blogs as needed. As I created each account, I had the ability to make myself a co-administrator of the blog so I could manage inappropriate content or simply change the settings within each blog.

My educator dashboard allows me access to every student's blog.

The next step was particularly time consuming for me, which was linking each blog together so students could view, comment, and critique each other's blogs. I think that because my school has a premium account, any site I create is private; therefore I had to go into each student's settings and add every student as a subscriber, THEN create a link for every student's blog under their "links" category. I also had to check their "discussion" setting to make sure comments were enabled and automatically approved. I'm not sure if there is an easier way to accomplish off of that. In the future, after I create each blog, I will have the students adjust their own settings to save time. In order for my RILS to run smoothly and timely, I wanted to make sure the blogs were up and working properly.

Part of the discussion settings - the default was set to have to approve every comment before posting.

Now that every student's blog is up and running, we can focus on the purpose of the blog - to act as a portfolio of student's musical compositions and for classmates (and maybe eventually the world) to listen, comment, and critique.  I can't wait to see the results of this RILS!