The "Winter Break Fun!" post was assessed in two ways: use of effective images and use of vivid verbs. Image assessment: I taught the students about creating and choosing an image that tells a story and the importance of limiting personal information on the Internet. Before we wrote the text, each student image was viewed through the classroom projector and evaluated by the class according to the two criteria listed above. Some students changed their image after the discussion because they felt their image did not tell enough of a story; it was just a posed picture. These students submitted another image that they thought better met the objective of the post. Others students felt that too much personal information was revealed in their jpg and chose to crop or modify the image using Photoshop software. Verb assessment: each child created three sentence that incorporated three or more vivid verbs.

Commenting is an important part of our blog. To teach how to comment, the teacher created a worksheet with several fake comments. Students assessed whether each fake comment should be published or rejected based on several criteria: 1) If the comment came from a student in our classroom, errors in letter form, spelling, and/or grammar were not tolerated and the comment was rejected. 2) If the comment came from someone other than a classmate, errors in letter form were tolerated. Errors in spelling, capitalization, and/or punctuation were accepted, with three errors being the limit. More than three errors and the students felt the comment should not be published, unless there were extenuating circumstances. (e.g. Perhaps we had no way of getting in touch with the commenter, but the content of the comment was worth publishing.) The third graders discussed each comment on the worksheet and decided as a group whether a comment should be published or rejected. Teaching the students how to comment has greatly improved the content of the blog comments. * Students write each post using their wireless AlphaSmart computers. (Purchased through a CTAP grant five years ago.) When a post is ready to be uploaded into the Blogger account, the student uploads it themselves from the AlphaSmart to the teacher's computer. * Student enjoy publishing so much, they frequently use recess or lunch periods to finish a post! * This third grade classroom blog was created for several reasons: 1) to share learning 2) to develop and practice writing skills (expository and narrative) 3) to help students identify and create useful illustrations for their text 4) to develop and practice commenting skills that follow letter writing form 5) to develop and practice interactive learning via blogging and commenting Some of the posts are assigned by the teacher, but many of the posts are generated and written by individual students or small groups of students who want to cover a learning experience. Students who want to write a post must first fill out a brainstorming sheet. The sheet includes information about whether the post is to inform or to entertain. In addition, the students plan what images they would like to use to enhance their writing (a digital camera is available to students) and what hyperlinks they will include to help a reader get more out of the story.