International Dot Day is coming up on, around, or during the week of September 15-ish.

Every year, millions of students and educators connect on International Dot Day to celebrate creativity, courage, and collaboration.

Getting involved in International Dot Day is easy. It is free, flexible, and open to any classes from all around the world.

This ultimate guide to International Dot Day explains exactly what it is and how to participate.

We’ve put together lots of examples from the educational blogging community and invite you to leave your own ideas in a comment.

About International Dot Day

International Dot Day began when Terry Shay introduced his class to Peter H Reynold’s book The Dot on September 15, 2009.

Since then, this date has been celebrated each year as International Dot Day — a day for classes to explore the story’s powerful themes: bravery, creativity, and self-expression.

About the Book – The Dot

The Dot tells the story of a caring art teacher who reaches a reluctant student in a remarkably creative way.

In Peter’s book, the teacher encourages the student to begin a journey of self-discovery and creativity, starting with a simple dot on a piece of paper. Transformed by this journey, the student goes on to inspire others.

How to Get Involved

Participating in International Dot Day is simple.

1. Visit https://www.internationaldotday.org/welcome Here you can read up on the day, find ideas and check out the resources.
2. Sign up to participate. This is just a simple survey the organizers use to help plan events around International Dot Day.
3. Read the book to your class. If you or your library don’t have the book, you might opt to view a YouTube video or purchase the interactive online version. 
4. Express yourself in any way. This is where you can get creative. Your dot theme can be incorporated into story writing, artwork, songwriting, photography, dance, cooking, performances, or more.
5. Publish! If you have a blog, this is the perfect platform to show the world how you have celebrated the day.
6. Connect. International Dot Day is as much about celebrating creativity as it is about connecting and collaborating. There is a page on the International Dot Day website which has been set up to help you connect with others. There are links to a Google Doc and social media channels. There are many teachers looking to connect their class through their blog or Skype etc. Such wonderful possibilities for your students!
7. Connect. International Dot Day is as much about celebrating creativity as it is about connecting and collaborating. You can connect with the Dot Day community on Twitter or Facebook. There are many teachers looking to connect their class through their blog or tools like Flipgrid or Skype. Such wonderful possibilities for your students!

International Dot Day Ideas

International Dot Day is something you can celebrate throughout your entire school, with your class, or by connecting with other classes around the world.

Here are a few ideas from previous International Dot Days.

1) Shannon Miller’s Resources

K-12 Teacher Librarian, Shannon Miller is a leader in the International Dot Day Community. A post on Shannon’s blog explains how you can connect and celebrate.

She shares a link to a Google Doc where people can add their details, schedules, and make connections. Shannon has also put together some Padlets with resources and picture books, plus a Pinterest board.

Check out Shannon’s post for all the details and links.

Padlet books with dots

2) Group Blog: Connect The Dot Stories

When I was teaching grade 1/2/3 students last year, we connected with 3 other classes in different countries for Dot Day and set up a group blog.

We worked on a range of collaborative activities. One of the most popular was “Connect The Dot Stories“.

Here’s how this activity worked:

• Students got together in small groups and came up with a team name.
• The group came up with one keyword from The Dot story that was written or inferred.
• They then came up with a set of 4 other words (not necessarily from the story).
• The children wrote each of their 5 words on a circular ‘dot’ and had a photo taken of the words.
• These photo story prompts were posted on the blog.
• Individuals/pairs/groups from the other class then came up with a short story that includes each of the words.

This was a fun challenge!
Here’s an example that was posted to the blog by one team. Other students used those word prompts to make up a short story.

Team Polar Bear: Art, opened, draw, empty, polar bear, strong

Other activities we came up with that you might want to explore include:

• Augmented Reality Dots
• What Can You Create With A Dot?
• Copy Our Dotty Pictures!

3) Google Meets

Amy Kincaid‘s elementary students met with a bilingual class via Google Meet. They shared writing assignments about encouragement.

Read more on Amy’s Library Blog.

4) Dot Day Circle Stories

Kevin Hodgson‘s sixth graders celebrated being creative with writing and with art.

They wrote short Circle Stories with either a circular object or a circular theme. They used the words to “paint” the stories into circles (or dots) using a free tool called Visual Poetry.

They collated their Circle Stories in a Padlet.

Find out more on Kevin’s class blog, The Electronic Pencil, and on his professional blog, Kevin’s Meandering Mind. 

5) Kindness Rocks

Inspired by the Kindness Rocks movement, Mrs. Shemansky and her colleague did a rock painting activity with their middle school art classes.

The students ‘made their mark’ by painting two rocks each. One rock became part of the school rock garden and the second rock was hidden and shared with others.

Read more on Mrs. Shemansky’s Class Blog.

6) Dotty Videos

Senior School students at Togher School in County Cork, Ireland put together this great video about Dot Day 2018! Here is their video from Dot Day 2019!

During a collaboration with Linda Yollis‘ class in California in 2017, her third graders made a video to show my students around her school.

Read more about this project on Mrs. Yollis’ Classroom Blog.

7) School-Wide Thinglink

Dot Day was a school-wide affair for Karen Arrington’s students in 2017. The activities involved design thinking, art, augmented reality, Flipgrid, and more.

Karen compiled all of the great activities the students completed in a Thinglink.

Read more details on these activities on Karen’s Tech Tips blog. 

8) Skyping In-Person

Jen Bearden, Rachael Turken, and their first-grade students tried all sorts of things on International Dot Day. There was singing, dancing, artwork, and math.

See what these young students got up to on Jen Bearden’s blog, 20 Something Kids And 1 Kooky Teacher, and Rachel Turken’s blog, im 4 students. 

To share their creations, Mrs. Bearden’s class was going to Skype with Ms. Turken’s class next door as practice for future calls. Technical problems led to them doing ‘in-person’ Skype calls in a fun and creative way.

Check out all the action from their in-person Skype session on this blog post. 

9) A Dotty Day

Becky Versteeg and her Team 2 Eagles students had a busy Dot Day in 2017. After reading the story, they got creative with some artwork and writing.

This video with The Dot author, Peter H. Reynolds, provided inspiration for their dotty creations.

They then tried some dot day math with dominoes and finished the day with some music.

These lyrics are for a song that Peter H. Reynolds and Emily Arrow wrote for International Dot Day. Find the video and actions here.

10) Going on a dot hunt

Karen Arlington’s school has been participating in International Dot Day since 2011 and you can check out some of the creative ways her students have celebrated here. 

In 2017, Karen’s first-grade students went on a “dot hunt” and took photos of dot-shaped objects. Her video is embedded below.

How will you celebrate?

How will you make your mark on International Dot Day this year? Leave a comment and tell us.

If you blog about International Dot Day, be sure to leave the link in a comment!

Since 2008, the Student Blogging Challenge has run twice yearly, beginning every March and October. Thousands of students and teachers from around the world have participated to learn about publishing online while connecting with a global audience.

The 25th Student Blogging Challenge was scheduled to begin in October, however, 2020 has proved to be a year like no other. Due to the pandemic and subsequent changes happening in education throughout the world, the Student Blogging Challenge is on pause for now.

But don’t despair! If you’re a student, teacher, or class interested in publishing online, we’ve got ideas for you.

We’ve taken 10 of the best Student Blogging Challenge prompts from recent years for you to work on at your own pace. Perhaps you could aim to do one a week over 10 weeks, or pick and choose the challenges that suit you.

Don’t have a blog yet or want to start a new one? Easy. Just go to the Edublogs home page and look for the box that says Get a Free Blog.

No registration is required and you don’t have to host your blog with Edublogs to take part in this opportunity.

One of the most popular features of the Student Blogging Challenge was the authentic audience. If you publish a post in response to one or more of the prompts below, just leave a comment with your link. One of our dedicated volunteers will endeavor to visit your post and leave you a comment.

Remember: If you want to share a link to your blog post, make sure your site is public on the web (not password protected). Also, link to a specific post rather than just the home page of your site as explained below:

These challenges have been condensed but you’re welcome to explore the Student Blogging Challenge website for all the previous challenges with full details.

The most important page on your blog is your About page. Many visitors look for an About page when they visit a blog for the first time. It’s a way to find out who’s writing the blog posts, what their background is, where they’re from and so on.

This task involves publishing or updating your About page on your blog.

Some bloggers forget to edit the default “sample page” that appears when you set up a new blog. Or they forget to update an About page that they might have written years ago.

If you’re using Edublogs or CampusPress, click here to find out how to add an About page.

There are many ways to write an About page. Be creative!

You might want to include:

• You first name
• Your approximate location (even just state or country)
• Your age or grade level
• Some of your interests
• What your blog is all about. Tell us what you’ll be writing about

Remember to be safe online: don’t include personal details like your YAPPY as explained below:

Here are some About page examples from previous Student Blogging Challenges:

• Jodie wrote an About page that included some interesting pictures.
• Daniela wrote a poem. Learn about different styles of poetry here. 
• Ms. Mack created a “fun facts” list on her class blog that links to the students’ blogs.
• Rina share 15 things about herself for her About page.
• Commenter Dinah created her A-Z About page especially for the Student Blogging Challenge a few years back.
• Zaprina made a creative post that’s an acronym of her own name.
• Ms. Herring wrote a list of 25 things readers might not know about her.
• Rajyashori prepared a creative interview script.

Comments make blogs come alive!

Comments turn your blog from a static space to an interactive space. When someone leaves a comment they can share new perspectives that help you grow and learn. It can also be more motivating when you have an authentic (real) audience.

How would you like people to write their comment on your blog? This task involves coming up with your own commenting guidelines. 

You can put your commenting guidelines in a post, but they might be better suited to a page (find out how to allow comments on pages using Edublogs).

You can just write your guidelines down as text or make some sort of poster, graphic, or slideshow.

You might make a How To Write A Quality Comment poster like mine below.

If you want to make your own poster, try a tool like Canva, Adobe Spark, Google Drawings, or even PowerPoint. Of course, if you make your own poster, please personalize it and don’t copy anyone else’s exact wording.

Here are some commenting guideline examples from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Evelyn came up with a fantastic “quality commenting” diagram. 
• Mrs. Yollis made a wonderful infographic using Canva and Bitmoji to share her expectations for quality comments.
• Margaret used a rainbow acronym to teach about commenting. 
• “Dr. Hagle” and “Sarah Gold” used Puppet Pals to explain quality commenting using a Fairy BLOGmother!
• Rajyashori used emojis to explain her commenting guidelines.
• Brenton shared some specific examples of what makes a good comment.
• Karl explained a great “3 C and a Q” approach to commenting.
• Miaomiao created a cute comic where a dolphin and turtle learn about quality commenting.

What’s a blog post without images? There are lots of places online where you can find images that you can use freely on your blog but you need to ensure you’re respecting Copyright and Creative Commons. If these are topics you’d like to learn more about, check out our ultimate guide.

Creating your own images for your blog posts is a great idea! You don’t have to worry about copyright and Creative Commons.

This task involves making your own image(s) to share in a blog post. Add your image(s) to a blog post and tell us a bit about the images and how you made them. If you used an online tool, include the link so others can try it.

Click here to find out how to add an image to an Edublogs or CampusPress blog.

You can:

• Draw something and take a photo of it.
• Take a photo of something in your surroundings (don’t use photos of other people without permission and remember not to include personal details like the front of your house).
• Use an app on your iPad or tablet. Here are some recommended apps for different ages from Common Sense Media.
• Use an online tool to make an image such as:
  • Canva
  • Adobe Spark
  • Google Drawings
  • Wordclouds.com
  • MakeBeliefsComix
  • Toy Theatre Art Tools
  • Draw Island

Check out our guide to Google Drawings on The Edublogger for tips on using this versatile tool for making images.

Remember, some online tools have age restrictions.

Here are some examples from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Alicia used MakeBeliefsComix to share a message about the environment.
• Jena made a word cloud.
• Wesley shared an original photo he took for a photography class.
• Sue Waters from Edublogs took this funny photo of something odd she spotted at the supermarket. What can you find in your surroundings that makes you feel surprised, happy, amused, or frustrated?

During the Student Blogging Challenge, participants have always enjoyed sharing a bit about their school life and finding out how it is similar and different from others.

In 2020, school might look very different for you compared previous years. This task involves you telling your readers a bit about your school or experience with remote learning. You could include text, images, a slideshow, a video, or even an audio recording (Anchor is a great tool for making audio recordings).

Remember, it’s important to think carefully about what information we publish online. Check with an adult about including your school name in your post.

Your post might include details like:

• How do you get to school?
• What is your timetable like? Do you have set subjects at certain times?
• Do you have one teacher or many?
• What time do you begin and end school?
• Do you get to choose what you learn?
• What technology do you have at school?
• What is the history of your school?
• What activities are popular at break times?
• How would you describe your school grounds?

Here are some examples from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Kalani wrote a great description of her school day.
• Joel made a Google Slides presentation comparing the normal and “lockdown” school day.
• Farrah asked her parents about how school has changed.
• Van Anh explained how to play a traditional Vietnamese game (it includes an awesome image created in PowerPoint).
• Ben wrote a post about break times at his school.

Many Student Blogging Challenge participants have enjoyed including emojis in their posts.

The great thing about emojis is they’re a universal language. Emojis can help people communicate, even if they don’t speak the same language.

If you’re using a Windows or Mac computer, there is a simple way to choose an emoji as Tony Vincent demonstrates in the graphic below.

Call up an emoji keyboard in Windows 10 by holding down the Windows key and pressing period (full stop). Holding down the Windows key and the ; key also works.

On macOS, hold down Control and Command and press the space bar to make an emoji picker appear.

Both of these keyboard shortcuts require the cursor to be in a text box.

This task involves using an online tool to create a story from emoji prompts.

1. Go to byrdseed.com/emoji2. You’ll see one random emoji on the screen.
2. Press “And then…” to add some more inspiration for your story with new emojis.
3. If you don’t like the emojis, just press “Start over”.
4. Write your story in a blog post. If you prefer, you could make an audio recording or even a video.
5. You could ask your visitors to finish your story in a blog comment if you like.

Don’t forget to take a screenshot of your emojis to add to your blog post so your visitors can check out your inspiration. This article shows how to take a screenshot on any device.

Thank you to Tony Vincent for this great graphic.

Here are some examples from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Evelyn’s story is about a koala.
• Jordan wrote about a city adventure.
• Alivia wrote about writer’s block.

Music is something that can connect people, no matter where you live, what language you speak, or how old you are.

Maybe you like listening to music? Playing music? Writing music? Dancing to music?

This task involves writing a post about music. You’re going to tell us about your favourite artist, group, instrument or style of music. You might even make your post into a guessing game or a quiz.

Find out more about a singer, songwriter, musician, or group, instrument, or style of music you’re interested in.

You can then choose to:

• Share some interesting facts in a post.
• Bring your research to life with an image or video.
• Give your readers some clues as they scroll down the page and have them guess the artist, song, or instrument. You could put each clue on a slide of a Google Slides presentation or in a video. Invite your readers to put their guesses in a comment.
• Quiz your readers about anything music related, for example, facts about artists like the year they were born, or their first number one hit, facts about instruments, music theory, and so on. Google Forms is great for making quizzes but please make sure it’s public.

Did you know, most music is protected by copyright? So you can’t use it for your own digital projects without permission or paying for a special license. You can learn more on our post on copyright and Creative Commons.

Here are some examples of posts about music from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Marissa wrote about the udu drum which is part of her Nigerian heritage. She included a video.
• Liam created a fantastic post about the electric bass guitar that includes some clues and also asks readers for their opinions.
• “Beauty Beatz” shared some lyrics and invited readers to guess the songs.
• Alex made a fantastic video guessing game.
• Colleen used images to make a “guess the song” post.
• Malaika’s post includes a quiz using an online tool called Quiz Maker.
• Ella’s post includes a quiz created in Kahoot.
• Alexa wrote a post about the clarinet and included a picture.

We always have a diverse group of students taking part in the Student Blogging Challenge with lots of different cultural backgrounds represented.

Around the world, people celebrate different holidays and festivals. It can be fun to tell people about our own traditions while learning more about others.

This task involves sharing a holiday, festival, or celebration that’s important to your family.

• You could make a list of your family’s celebrations with a short description for each one, or
• You could choose one celebration to explain in more detail.

Don’t forget to include lots of information about your holiday so your readers can get a clear understanding of this special day/season.

You could include things like:

• The time of year/date it’s celebrated.
• What you do to celebrate? Are there special costumes, decorations, music, lights, food, prayers, etc?
• Do people give each other gifts?
• Who is involved in the celebration? Do you visit other people or host family and friends?
• What special memories do you have?

You might even like to do some research into the origins of your holiday. Perhaps you could include some photos or a video.

At the end of your post, you could invite readers to comment and tell you a bit about a celebration that’s important to them.

Here are some example posts from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Nandini from India used a Google Slides presentation to tell us about the Holi festival.
• Ayyoob explains Ramandan in his post.
• Logan’s post about Christmas includes a poem.
• Mr. Matt told us about Chinese New Year in Taiwan.
• Brady shared a bit about all the holidays he celebrates.
• Satheprincess14 wrote about Holi.
• Mrs. Matveyeva’s class in Kazakhstan wrote about their spring festival called Nauryz.
• Evelyn included some family photos in her holiday post (be sure to get permission if you want to do this).

The world is an amazing place! Many of us enjoy travelling to explore areas local to us or further abroad, however travel is difficult with the pandamic. Let’s explore the world virtually by reflecting on a holiday you had in the past or imagining a place you’d like to visit in the future.

This task involves writing a post about travel.

Here are some ideas for your post:

• Write about a holiday you went on that you really enjoyed. Include photos if you have permission.
• Make a list of the top 10 travel destinations you’d like to go to. Tell us why you’d like to visit these places.
• Create a slideshow or video of your ideal holiday destinations.
• Create an imaginary itinerary if you could travel anywhere and had an unlimited budget.

You might also be able to use some of the fabulous Google tools for this topic like Google Earth and Google Maps.

• Eleni Kyritsis shows us how to create a virtual tour with Google Tour Creator.
• Matt Miller explains how to make a Google Map walking tour with Screencastify.

You might have your own ideas!

Safety Tip: It’s fun to talk about travel, but it’s a good idea to avoid mentioning your specific travel plans online. For example, instead of saying, “I’m going to visit Sydney next Monday” try “I’m planning a holiday to Sydney” or “I’m looking forward to visiting Sydney in the future”.

Here are some example posts from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Aliyah wrote a guide to the Bahamas.
• Stu used Google Tour Creator to show us around his town in the USA.
• Claire used Google Tour Builder to make a tour of North Carolina in the USA.
• Adrienne told us about her trip to Costa Rica.
• Veronica wrote about holidaying in New York.
• Sarah and Jodie worked together on a slideshow about their (separate) family trips to London.
• Hay included lots of pictures in her post about her dream destinations.
• Emily wrote an expressive post about all aspects of travel.

The great thing about science is there are so many different fields and topics. Perhaps there are some areas of science you find very fascinating and others that aren’t really your cup of tea.

This task involves writing a post on a science topic that interests you.

Look around you. What do you wonder? Maybe you’re curious about how the internet works or where rain comes from or life on Mars?

Do some research on a science topic you’re interested in and write a blog post about what you discover.

Alternatively you might present your post as A-Z of science or a particular science topic. You could even leave a few letters blank and ask for suggestions in a comment.

For example…

A is for astronomy: the study of outer space

B is for bunsen burner: a device commonly found in a science lab for heating

C is for carbon dioxide: the gas formed when humans or animals breathe out

D is for data: the facts or pieces of information a scientist uses

Here are some example posts from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Mr. Howie’s class in Serbia created a class A-Z of science.
• Jordyn incorporated her love for animals into a post called What-ology?
• Sophia made an A-Z of science.
• Kaia did some research into the animals that are closest to humans.
• Gab dived into the topic of molecular gastronomy — the study of the science behind food.
• Felix decided to find out if fish can swim backwards.
• Mrs. Moore’s 5th grade class made an A-Z of science words.

Whenever we do the Student Blogging Challenge we have a free choice week where students are welcome to talk about topics that interest them.

This task involves writing a blog post about your own passions, interests, hobbies, recommendations, or curiosities. It’s basically a free choice post to write about anything you like! Your post might include text, images, videos, diagrams, a quiz, a slideshow, or any other sort of media.

Here are some example posts from former Student Blogging Challenge participants:

• Ally wrote about her passion for physics and philosophy of the universe.
• Julia wrote about her cats and included a video.
• Ryder explored the topic of what makes the perfect “surf-able” wave.
• Evey argued why Minecraft and Fortnite should not be compared.
• Ella offered some book suggestions for her readers.
• Quinn reflected on his favorite hobbies: photography, basketball, and skiing.
• Kate reflected on whether cats are smart.
• Emily wrote about her favorite sport: field hockey.

A couple of months back, we published 150 writing prompts for students on The Edublogger.

The prompts and ideas are divided into broad topics:

• Getting started
• Online prompts
• Interdisciplinary and fun
• Art, images, and music
• Reading and writing
• History and geography
• Math and science
• Web tools

We have also created a PDF eBook of the 150 prompts that you can save, print, or share. 

Don’t forget, after you complete one or more of the challenges, leave a comment on this post with the link. One of our Student Blogging Challenge volunteers will try to visit your post and leave you a comment.

Here’s an example of a quality comment that includes more than just the link:

Have fun and if you have any more questions, you’re welcome to leave a comment below.

When I started blogging in 2008, the difference between a blog and a post was pretty clear. A blog was your dynamic website. A post was the article you’d publish on your blog.

Then in recent years I’ve noticed something strange. People have been calling posts, “blogs”.

At first I found this confusing,

“What do you mean you wrote a blog today? You made a whole website? Do you mean you wrote a post?”

Now every time I hear someone say they’re “writing a blog” or they “published a blog” when they mean post I still bristle a little inside. It just doesn’t sound right.

To me a blog is the container and a post is the contents. Calling a blog (post) a blog is like saying you “wrote a book” every time you write a page or a chapter.

Today I had to look up the definition of the noun “blog” in the dictionary for something and I noticed this on Merriam-Webster.

We know the word blog can also be a verb, it always has been. But in terms of nouns, does blog now mean “the contents of such a site (a blog)” as the dictionary advised me today?

I know language does evolve and maybe the noun blog has evolved to have a dual meaning.

Interestingly, I didn’t see the same definition on the Cambridge dictionary or Macmillan.

So, it’s time to ask for your input. What do you call the entry or article that you publish on your blog?

Please take the quick poll below and share your thoughts in a comment. Do you call articles on your blog “posts” or “blogs”? I’d also love to know where you’re from (perhaps it’s a regional thing?) and when you started blogging (perhaps it’s a new thing?).

Scroll down to find the comment box!

First published March 8th 2020. Last updated April 27th.

How would you feel if someone said you need to change your whole approach to teaching immediately? Imagine if, instead of interacting face to face with students in your classroom, you had to create and deliver a virtual program. 

Perhaps you’d feel nervous? Overwhelmed? Excited? Unqualified? Inspired? Or perhaps plain lost.

During April 2020, remote learning became a reality for over 90% of students worldwide. Teachers, students, families, administrators, departments, and whole communities are being forced to respond and adapt quickly.

Referring to COVID-19 (coronavirus), UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay warned,

…the global scale and speed of the current educational disruption is unparalleled and, if prolonged, could threaten the right to education.

The rates of school closures have soared in the last month:

• In mid-February, China was the only country mandating school closures.
• Two weeks later, 22 countries were closing schools.
• As of April 3, 188 countries have implemented nationwide school closures.

If your school is still open, it’s never too soon to calmly plan and prepare. Things are changing rapidly and exponentially. 

Want a live update on school closures across the globe? Check out UNESCO’s tally.

What’s In This Post?

Our guide will give you insights into how educators around the world are approaching school closures.

Thousands of teachers worldwide are currently sharing snippets of their experiences via social media or their blogs. We’ve compiled, curated, and built on some common themes and ideas to create this extensive guide.

Click on the links in the menu below to help you navigate the post. 

• Daily structure options
  • Synchronous Vs asynchronous learning
  • Examples of how video is weaved into the day
  • Example timetables: structured Vs a “to do list”
  • Helping students plan their day
  • How to plan an online lesson
• Setting up a virtual home base or online platform
  • Three step approach:
    • District/state education department
    • School website or school blog
    • Classroom LMS,  blog, or other online community
      • Getting started with blogging
• All about using videos and conferencing in online learning
  • Tools and tips for synchronous (live) video conferences
  • Tools and tips for recording asynchronous videos and screencasts
  • Record a piece to camera
• Free online tools for virtual learning
  • Summary of some popular free tools
• A Note on Students and Books
  • Where to find digital reading material
  • Can I read aloud to my students?
• 10 tips for virtual teaching and learning
• Obstacles and issues created by school closures
  • Students/families
  • Teachers
  • Schoolwide issues
• Planning for a School Closure: Parent Survey
• Planning for a School Closure: Taking Home Resources
• Checklist for Administrators and Educators Facing a School Closure

This post also includes a range of useful graphics to help you that you’re free to use and share. If you use the images in your own work, please attribute our article and link back.

Here’s a sneak peek of some of the graphics:

Let’s dive right in to the resources!

Daily Structure Options

The first question educators might be asking themselves is what does a “school day” look like when it’s no longer happening in a school?

Let’s talk about timetables, hours, and the overall structure you might implement. 

In most cases, your school day will have to be based on technology although some departments, such as New York, are open to the option of mailing out work the old fashioned way. This is a good fallback if technology can’t be used but you may not want to get into the habit of only handing out packets (worksheets) if you can avoid it.

Note: It’s important to find out about students’ technology/internet access at home and we have a Google Form survey you can adapt to survey your parents towards the end of the post.

The old fashioned approach can also work well to complement online learning and is important for younger students. Check out the fabulous “Learning Boxes” staff in Vietnam put together for their young learners. 

We’ll discuss many useful technology tools further on. 

The issue of daily structure and timetables is a major consideration and some schools are constantly tweaking their approaches.

Do you stick to your regular school timetable? You could, but many schools are finding a modified approach is more realistic.

Lessons can take longer for students to complete at home for many reasons including:

• Technology difficulties
• No teacher guidance to keep students on track, engaged, and informed
• A busy household (multiple family members and responsibilities)
• Varying degrees of parent/caregiver involvement (there can be barriers like language, competence with technology and the curriculum, parenting younger children, or trying to keep up with work responsibilities)
• Illness (let’s not forget the reason for the school closures) 

Some teachers are finding what they could get done in one period of class requires two periods when it’s online. 

Consider a “Percentage” Approach

Most teachers who have some experience with online schooling realize that the pace is slower and expectations need to be reduced.

Some teachers provide and expect a certain percentage of the normal student workload. For example, an elementary student might have a 50% workload, although a senior high school student may be given a 90% workload.

Suggesting a percentage might give teachers and families a ballpark if they’re wondering what to expect. 

Synchronous or Asynchronous Learning?

A question that may come up a lot as you plan and tweak your approach to online learning is whether your program will be synchronous or asynchronous. That is, whether it will be conducted in real-time or whether students will complete tasks according to their own schedules. 

Here’s a quick comparison:

You might find a mix of both is a useful strategy. Your own unique situation, including your students’ age, might have a big impact on this decision too.

For some families, asynchronous learning can be more convenient: if parents are working, they may have more time to support/supervise student learning outside of business hours. 

Other schools are finding synchronous learning is a powerful way to keep the class connected. 

If your teaching and learning program involves video then you’ll once again face the question of synchronous (e.g. live conferencing) or asynchronous (pre-recorded videos or screencasts). 

We’ll dive in to the video options further on, however, let’s take a quick look at how some teachers are weaving conferences and recorded videos into their weekly schedules:

Examples of how Video Conferences are Being Used:

• A 10 minute video conference to begin the day.
• A whole class video conference at regular times during the week (e.g. 30 minutes every Monday and Friday afternoon). 
• A whole class video conference to introduce important lessons or projects. 
• A video conference to check in with each individual student each week. 
• On-demand video conferencing — students can sign up during a teacher’s “office hours” if they want to book a session.
• Small group video conferences for students with similar needs. 
• Optional “live recess” to allow students to connect and hang out. 

Examples of how Screencasts or Recorded Videos are Being Used:

• A video introduction or screencast for key lessons (might not be possible for all lessons).
• A short welcome video each morning and/or reflection video each afternoon.
• A screencast to offer feedback on student work and progress.
• Student created screencasts to demonstrate learning. 

Let’s look at some specific options for daily timetables. 

More Flexible Option: Distribute a Daily “To Do List”

When schools decide on expectations, they often need to consider whether they should give lesson guidelines that can be completed at any time, or stick to a traditional structure.

For example, if you were offering a flexible program, you could build on a checklist like this:

Today you need to complete:

• 30 minutes reading
• 30 minutes writing
• 30 minutes science
• 30 minutes math

It’s optional whether you give an actual time requirement (e.g. 30 minutes) or just a task, however, a time suggestion can be helpful so students don’t spend either all day working, or not enough time on task. 

More Structured Option: Distribute a Timetable

Alternatively, students might be issued with a structured timetable that all students will complete at the same time, e.g.

• 9am – 9:45am reading
• 10am – 10.45am writing
• 10.45am – 11.30am recess
• 11.30am – 12.15pm science
• 12.30pm – 1.15pm math
• 1.30pm – 2.15pm lunch
• 2.30pm – 3.30pm catch up/specialist subjects

Factoring in time for catching up seems to be proving extremely useful for many schools. You might schedule learning activities in the morning and leave the afternoons free for catching up and offline pursuits. Alternatively, you could schedule one day a week for completing unfinished work or even have a weekly “screen-free” day. 

Here’s an example of a weekly screen-free day from Shekou International School in China. 

#Grade4SIS has implemented a device free day each week during #onlinelearning… & I had so much fun creating this week’s choice board for our learners! #choice #learnerprofile #SISrocks #ISSedu #flipclass #disted #mlearning #elearning @SISGeckos @ISSCommunity pic.twitter.com/tNoKEIzjjn

— Mr. Peter Damroth (@PDamroth) March 25, 2020

Rather than a daily approach, some schools are taking the whole week into account and giving projects or assignments that need to be completed or worked on over 5 days. Based on progress, a new plan might then be made for the following week.

Example: Kindergarten

Ashley in the middle east is not doing any live teaching via video conference due to cultural and religious reasons. 

Ashley’s team sends a weekly plan to the parents of their kindergarten students along with a suggested timetable. There are no expectations that the timetable is followed exactly due to parents working and a variety of family situations. 

The planners are given out two weeks in advance to help families plan ahead. The links to learning tasks go to YouTube videos and Ashley’s Office 365 cloud account of activities or readings. Ashley’s kindergarten class also uses Flipgrid. 

Example: 5th Grade

Laura Faulk at ASIJ (American School in Japan) is a 5th grade teacher who has recently started teaching online.

Her team created a daily planner using Google Docs. They share it each morning on a website that was created for their new distance learning program. 

They are currently surveying families to find out whether they’d like to have the planner in advance. 

The Google Doc planner has links to all the students’ classroom and specialist work. The students are given a guide as to how long to spend on each activity. 

The ASIJ team adapted their ideas from the work of Hong Kong International School (HKIS have a fantastic home learning website that is worth checking out too!).

You can follow Laura and her team on Twitter (@asij_g5).

Example: Google Slides

Some teachers put their planners on a Google Doc, or Sheet. Google Slides can be another awesome way to send out a daily plan and work (but even better if these Slides presentations are added to a blog, LMS, or website so they don’t get lost).

• You can include text, links, and videos of yourself teaching to a Slides presentation amongst other things.
• One major benefit is you can copy and edit your planner so you don’t have to start from scratch each day. 
• Check out this post by Alice Keeler for more advice on using Slides in remote learning.
• We also have a beginner’s guide to Google Slides on The Edublogger for a broader overview. 

Here’s an example from US kindergarten teacher Megan Peschke @MeganPeschke). Don’t be put off by the age group. This idea could be adapted for any age!

Click here to view the Google Slides presentation in a new tab. 

Instructions for Editing and Using Megan’s Google Slides

1. Click on this link:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Bl534rtloR0AjD2wgfLPVrJs2Q6BDS9DEz2G2m9Fzgs/copy

2. You will be prompted to make a copy (screenshot below).

3. The Slides will be saved in your Google Drive.

4. You can edit the Google Slides to suit.

SlidesMania have also published a fantastic free weekly planner template that can be used in Google Slides or PowerPoint. Find it here. 

Help Students Plan Their Day

Some teachers, especially those who are giving out ongoing assignments or projects, encourage their students to plan out their own days. You could give them ideas or a template.

Here is an example which you’re welcome to copy and adapt,

People seemed to like the student planners a non-twitter teacher created for our #continuouslearning students, so here is blank version. Feel free to make a copy and make your own! https://t.co/3ZzKKpUA2F

— Rebekah Madrid (@ndbekah) March 5, 2020

Instructions for use:

1. Click here to open the Google Doc
2. Go to File > Make a copy
3. Type a name and choose where to save it
4. Click Ok
5. You’ll then find an editable copy of the Google Doc in your Google Drive

How do you Plan an Online Lesson?

Once you have ideas on how your school day will be structured, you might start zooming in to the planning of actual lessons.

What do lessons look like when they’re online rather than face to face?

Despite being physically distant from your students, you still want to be as present as possible virtually. Online teaching and learning isn’t a “set and forget” situation. 

Like all lessons, you may want to start with learning outcomes, and possibly success criteria (your school might already have a framework for this). The delivery of the lesson will be the part that might just look a bit different.

Remember, there’s nothing wrong with keeping your lessons quite simple, and in many cases they’ll be similar to what you’d do in the classroom, perhaps with more autonomy and technology. 

For example, your normal lesson structure might involve a warm up, revision, an explanation, student activity that aligns to outcomes, then reflection. The same sort of structure is possible with virtual lessons. 

Easily Adapting to Virtual Lesson Planning

Timothy Malan (@timothy_malan) is a middle school science teacher at an international school in Spain. He has created a detailed video to explain how a regular classroom lesson can be transformed into a virtual lesson. He reassures teachers that it doesn’t have to be overly complicated!

The first 12 minutes of the video goes through the framework, and then Timothy dives in to an example lesson. 

5E Model for Creating Online Lessons

Have you heard of the 5Es framework? It’s an instructional model that’s been around for 20+ years. Using the model, teaching and learning progresses through five phases: Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate.

Author and educator, Catlin Tucker has published a post called, Tips for Designing an Online Lesson Using the 5 Es Instructional Model.

In her post, Catlin provides a simple framework that shows how the 5Es can be used to create online lessons. Catlin has also recorded a video for each “E” that explains the model further. 

While the 5Es approach is far from the only way you can go about designing online lessons, it may be a useful framework for those who don’t know where to start. 

Catlin also shares a good tip about using Google Docs to share lessons with students. Google Docs are easy to copy and edit. That means teachers can create different versions of the same lesson with minimal work. Any suggested videos, readings, or activities can be differentiated to meet the individual needs of learners. 

Useful Online Tools

For some teachers, the technology part of virtual learning will be the scariest obstacle. Before we dive in to useful options, take a deep breath and remember:

• Less can be more: you don’t need to be using a huge range of different tools.
• Start with tools students and teachers are already familiar with: there are probably some technology tools, apps, or platforms you’ve used in class that can be useful.
• Remember, despite technology being a crucial tool for most closed schools, teaching and learning isn’t about the technology. Try to focus on the core business of schools: relationships and learning.

Virtual Home Base or Online Platform: 3 Step Approach

There are some awesome tools out there for learning and creativity but first consider what you’ll be using as your home base. When your classroom and school assembly halls aren’t in use, your virtual hubs are more important than ever.

What will communication look like and where will learning take place? Here are three common steps you might see:

1. Communication will probably begin with information from the school district or state education department.
2. Then a school website might provide an overview of your plan for the whole community. (Need a better school website? CampusPress can help with that!). 
3. From there, you could have individual class blogs or other approaches like a learning management system (e.g. Moodle, Canvas, or Google Classroom), a Facebook group (for older learners), Slack, or Seesaw.

Read on for more information and examples of this three-step approach. 

1) District/State Education Department

Let’s zoom out for a moment. When a school is to be closed and learning is transitioning to online, the first step is often clear communication from the top level — your district or state education department (if your school falls under one of these authorities). 

Here’s an example from Northshore District School in Washington state. They published a blog post on their district website to inform everyone in the school community of school closures.

It’s an honest and dynamic announcement as they’re still figuring out arrangements. The beauty of blog posts is you can keep publishing as more information is made available.

Of course, a blog post or website update may be followed up with a direct notification to families to ensure the news is received (e.g. SMS or email). 

2) School Website or School Blog

A school website (or temporary site) can be an important next piece in the puzzle. It can provide an overview of your plan for the whole community to ensure everyone is on the same page, knows what to do, and knows where to seek help. 

Website Example: YIS Continuous Learning Plan

Yokohama International School (YIS) in Japan has been closed since early March. They’re becoming leaders in the community of global educators scrambling to find out how to approach school closures.

YIS has created a website to communicate a clear approach to their changed schooling format,

Although campus is temporarily closed, “school” continues as we engage students with experiences that continue the planned learning program and help them to stay connected with teachers and classmates. These learning experiences offer authentic opportunities to focus on key concepts, knowledge, and skills. They emphasize interaction and creativity, and involve a balance of on-screen and off-screen tasks that help connect to previous learning and the current curriculum.

Vice principal, Rebekah Madrid, explains the choice of the term “continuous learning”,

For the first day, people weren’t sure what we meant by “continuous learning”. But now it makes sense for us. We didn’t want online (because not always online) and we didn’t want distant (because that’s not the vibe we wanted). So continuous worked for us.

— Rebekah Madrid (@ndbekah) March 3, 2020

3) Classroom Hub: Blog, LMS, or Other Online Community

The third step is an online hub where you can distribute student learning tasks, share resources, gather feedback, and keep everyone in the loop.

While you could just email out assignments to students, there may be better options (emails can be better for one on one communication; they can get lost and can be hard to refer back to.).

You might already be using a learning management system or other platform (e.g. Seesaw, Sensei LMS for WordPress, Google Classroom) at school that you can continue to use after your school closes. If so, there is probably no need to reinvent the wheel! Go with what you and your students know. 

But maybe you don’t have a place set up already where you can post learning tasks and resources that students can use on a daily basis. 

Google Classroom is a popular choice. If you want to learn more, check out this demo from Alice Keeler and Vicki Davis. This cheat sheet from Ben Cogswell also goes over the basics. 

Consider a Blog For Your Classroom Hub

A blog is a free, basic, and flexible tool that acts as a classroom hub and more. 

Here are some reasons why you might consider a blog as your online classroom while your school is closed:

• A blog is a space you can own (you don’t have control over some online spaces like social media).
• It’s a place where all the bits and pieces you create and explore in the online and offline world can be housed.
• Blogs aren’t just text and images, you can include videos, slideshows, infographics, podcasts, posters, polls, charts and more. Here are just six tools that allow you to create interactive learning content for your blog (online worksheets, games, and so on). 
• Blog content can be organized in a systematic way and searched for as needed. 
• Comments and forums allow two-way interaction.
• Blogs can be public or private (learn more about the pros, cons, and options in this article). 

We have a post that compiles some examples of class blogs from a range of age groups and locations. You’ll notice that there is a lot of flexibility in the way blogs are used. 

Team 2 Eagles Blog Example

Becky Versteeg is a wonderful grade two teacher in Canada.

She is using her class blog to share daily ideas. Her posts include videos, printables,photos from students and fun ideas to try at home. 

Take a look!

Class Blog And/Or Student Blogs?

You might be only interested in having a class blog to share learning resources and so on. Alternatively, you might want all students to use their own blog to complete learning tasks, publish online, reflect on their experience privately, or even connect with the world. 

• Learn more about the different approaches to student blogging and digital portfolios
• Read about student blogs in the middle and high school classroom
• Explore an example of grade two students using individual blogs

My Class is a free management tool from Edublogs that brings a class blog and all your student blogs/accounts together. It makes it easier for teachers to set up and monitor their classroom blogging program.

Learn more about My Class in this post.

Example: Art Blog

Here is an example of a fantastic blog with lessons for home art activities by Chris Gadbury.

One of the great things about the blogging community is you cannot only make your own blog but benefit from other educators’ blogs as well!

Want To Start Blogging But Not Sure How?

Check out our Blogging 101 page. It includes a 15-minute tutorial video and all the help guides you’ll need to get going!

Educators and students can set up as many blogs as they need using Edublogs for free (no ads or time limits). Compare all the features here. 

Videos And Online Learning

You can come up with fantastic tasks for students to work on at home but your program will run so much better if students can still feel your presence as a teacher. Videos are such an important part of online learning and a great way to maintain relationships.

Your familiar face will grab students’ attention while building engagement and understanding. 

Nervous about being on camera? Don’t worry! Just start small. It will be worth it. Many teachers are nervous to start and want to re-do their video over and over (some students are like this too!). It won’t take long for you to realize your videos don’t have to be perfect and students will appreciate your efforts.

Let’s take a look at some options. 

Note: If you want to look at using video more deeply, check out our new Educator’s Guide to Using Video in Teaching and Learning. 

Synchronous or Asynchronous Videos

There are two main options for sharing videos with your learners:

Synchronously: That means real-time streaming. It could be a live stream (like on YouTube) or an interactive video conference (like on Zoom).

Some synchronous videos can be recorded so they can be viewed again at a later date. This is useful if students can’t attend the live stream, they have technology issues, or need to revise the content. 

Asynchronously: That means you record videos that can be viewed (and reviewed) when it suits the student. Your videos could be a simple “piece to camera” or a screencast.

Screencasting is where you narrate a video recording of your computer screen. Sometimes it’s just audio and sometimes you can see your face in the video as well.

The benefit of asynchronous videos is there are no time pressures, however, the connections that can be formed in synchronous video conferences can’t be underestimated. 

Popular Tools for Synchronous (Live) Video Conferences

There are many tools out there that allow you to connect with students via video. This can really help to unite the class. 

Four of the most popular video-conferencing options for teachers and schools include:

• Zoom — Robust software designed exclusively for video conferencing.
• Google Hangouts Meet — The evolved version of classic Hangouts that’s part of G Suite.
• Microsoft Teams — Communication and collaboration platform that’s part of Office 365.
• WebEx — Cisco tool for video conferencing, online meetings, screen share, and webinars.

These tools all allow video conferences with screen sharing capabilities.

• The teacher can start the conference and share the access link with the students.
• Students can access the conference at the specified time using any device (e.g. laptop or tablet).
• Some users like to use external microphones, headphones, or webcams, however, the camera and microphone attached to your device are probably fine for getting started.

Here is a quick comparison of the free/free education plans for Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Hangouts Meet, and WebEx Meetings:

Notes on Live Video Tools:

• Safety comes first! Your school or district probably has advice about which video conferencing tool you should use and which settings should be employed. As an example, Zoom has released some best practices in this PDF. 
• Zoom, Meet, and Webex temporarily upgraded their free plans for educators but these offers have now ended for Meet and Webex. If your school Zoom account hasn’t already been upgraded, you can apply here to remove the 40 min time limit.
• Some teachers are also experimenting with live streaming on YouTube. For teenagers, it’s a platform they’re often already familiar with and they can comment in real-time.
• Mix it up: Principal at International School of Dongguan, Todd Brink, suggested that, “One-on-one, small group, or whole group sessions are a must. Just like the classroom!” Video conferencing software allows these sorts of options. 

Example Video Conferences From Teachers

Teachers at American International School of Guangzhou are doing a fantastic job of setting up engaging video conferences using Zoom.

Here are two examples that were recently shared on Twitter, 

Using #zoom_us to create a collaborative story this morning … once we had our order, can we work together to build a story one word a time? A myth about an earthquake that goes with our #unitofinquiry #howtheworldworks ? Even better! #AISGZ #onlinelearning #virtuallearning pic.twitter.com/W4EvYnGK2B

— Katie Robbins (@krobbins84) March 5, 2020

Another #zoom meeting with second graders. I think they only come to see a mess I make doing my science experiments. Today there were beans spilled all over my coffee table and the smell of vinegar is overpowering. Science #onlinelearning is still fun. #aisgz #pypchat #sciencefun pic.twitter.com/XSjc19ltCQ

— Inga Bela (@inga_bela) March 5, 2020

Jennifer Wathall is a teacher from Hong Kong who began teaching online earlier than most of the world. She shares her tips for teaching online, most of which apply to synchronous video conferences. 

John Sowash shared these tips for running a virtual lesson on Google Meet (they can apply to other video conferencing tools as well). 

Popular Tools for Recording Asynchronous Videos and Screencasts

There are a number of tools available to record screencasts. Like many online tools there are free plans and paid plans. 

Let’s compare four of the most popular screencasting tools teachers are using for recording lessons. 

• Loom
• Screencastify
• Screencast-o-matic
• Zoom

This chart compares the features of the free plans (paid plans have more features). 

Note: As of March 12, Loom Pro is now free for teachers and students forever. The chart below has been updated. 

Notes On Screencasting Tools

• I’ve written a blog post specifically about Loom if you want to learn more. There are no age restrictions so students can use Loom if you want them to make screencasts. 
• You’ll remember that Zoom is a popular tool for video conferencing. To record a screencast using Zoom, you start a meeting with yourself as the only participant and record the conference. You can’t record if you’re using the Zoom iOS app.

Record a Piece to Camera

Your videos don’t have to be part of a video conference call or a screencast. You can record a simple piece to camera using your phone or webcam.

That is, a video of your happy self teaching and talking!

In our Educator’s Guide to Video on The Edublogger, we outlined ten tips for recording a piece to camera. Read the full post (you’ll find a PDF copy to download) or check out the summary below. 

Video Editing

Made a video and want to edit it? Maybe it needs trimming, captions, or other effects?

For quick video editing on my phone, I love two free apps from GoPro called QuikStories and Splice. QuikStories puts everything together for you with music, transitions, and other cool effects. Splice is handy if you want to make more manual edits and don’t necessarily want too many effects.

Try not to get carried away though, it can be a lot of fun creating videos but a raw edit is fine!

We have more advice about editing and other video tools in our Educator’s Guide to Video in Teaching and Learning. 

Example Videos from Teachers

This year 1 teacher from Tokyo International School demonstrates a wonderful reading lesson,

@Ms_SarahVaughan nurturing ‘reading as thinking’ remotely. #distancelearning keeping @tcrwp as alive as possible during this #peskycoronavirus @holleytcrwp @clemenkat pic.twitter.com/cWeCWnUBIX

— TokyoIS (@TISlearns) March 5, 2020

For older students, here is an example from two creative art teachers. 

E-learning commenced today @TISLearns worried that Middle School Art & Design teachers Sara and @mandurubell Andrew might ‘make it’ as the next celebrity YouTube stars! If they earn their fortune and leave us what would happen to our Arts department and staff room giggles?! pic.twitter.com/ZQYpvpTLvR

— Christopher Frost (@FrostChrissy) March 4, 2020

For more tips on using live or recorded video in your online teaching program, check out this article from Richard Byrne. He has some great suggestions such as keeping your webcam on, using check-in questions, and using a $20 whiteboard. 

Other Online Tools to Consider

So you have your home base set up, you’ve considered recording some videos to share with students, now what other online tools can you use to engage students and fuel their learning?

Here are some suggestions with a very brief summary of each. This list is far from exhaustive Leave your own ideas in a comment!

Kahoot!

Create fun learning games for your students called Kahoots. Classes can play live against each other or students can complete the quiz at their own pace. 

*Premium features are currently free for schools facing closures. Learn more. 

Quizlet

A free tool that allows students to study information via learning tools and games (flashcards, quizzes etc). A new individual mode has just been replaced so students can play together while they are physically apart. The free account has advertising. 

*Learn how to use Quizlet for remote learning here. 

BrainPOP

These short educational videos are fantastic for online learning. There’s also BrainPOP Jnr. for K-3 and BrainPOP ELL for English language learners. 

*Currently free for educators affected by coronavirus school closures. Learn more. 

Canva for Educators

Online tool that allows you to make all sorts of graphic designs (perfect for communicating with students and families). Learn more about Canva in our guide on The Edublogger. 

*Educators can get a premium account for free (not just during school closures). 

Edpuzzle

A popular tool to create interactive YouTube videos to check students’ understanding. Basic plans are free for teachers and students. 

Pear Deck

Design lessons with interactive questions, polls, quizzes, and formative assessments. Works with Google Slides. 

*Pear Deck Premium is free for 90 days for schools affected by closures. Learn more. 

Anchor

Anchor.fm is a popular free service for recording, hosting, and distributing podcasts. Check out our guide on The Edublogger to learn more about using podcasting with students. 

Flipgrid

Create grids to facilitate asynchronous video discussions that are very engaging for students. This tool is totally free. 

Padlet

Padlet is an online bulletin board where you can display text, images, video, and more. Padlets can be embedded in blog posts. It used to be free but now there is a limit of three Padlets before you need to upgrade. 

Students at the International School of Buscan recently used Padlet for a virtual art show!

Today’s Grade 3 Virtual Art Exhibition on @Padlet is brilliant! #ISBlearning pic.twitter.com/rqJqwiN5Nt

— Simon McCloskey (@SimonJMcCloskey) March 5, 2020

Book Creator

Simple tool for younger students to create books or learning journals that combine text, images, audio and video.

*Schools that are closed for COVID-19 can get 90 days free of the premium plan. Learn more.

WeVideo

Cloud based video editing tool that allows students and teachers to get creative. Students could have fun responding to some of learning tasks as a video and can collaborate with peers on projects. WeVideo have also recently introduced screencasting.

*WeVideo For Schools free for schools affected by COVID-19. Learn more. 

Newsela

Real world texts at different reading levels with built-in activities. 

*Free for schools affected by COVID-19 closures until the end of the 2020 school year. Apply here. 

Wakelet

A curation tool that allows you to save, organize, tell stories, and share content from around the web. See the example Wakelet embedded below. 

Read all about how to use Wakelet in this post. 

More Ideas for Online Tools

To stay up to date with more useful online tools that teachers are using as they switch to online learning, follow this Wakelet by Erin Flanagan (@erintegration). 

There’s also a huge list of education companies offering free subscriptions due to school closings by Amazing Educational Resources that is updated regularly. You can check it out here. 

A Note on Students and Books

What’s a classroom without books! If you’re going to be teaching virtually you might be wondering where to find reading material for your students. Some students might be lucky enough to have a lot of reading material at home. No doubt, many will not. 

Here are a few ideas for sourcing digital reading material:

Modern books/interface

• Local libraries often offer free access to eBooks and audiobooks (e.g. OverDrive, Tumblebooks, Libby, BorrowBox etc.). Find out what your local library offers and tell families how to become members if they’re not already. 
• Newsela — Real world texts presented so that children can access the same text at different reading levels (currently free for schools). 
• Rivet — Free app that families can download with thousands of modern leveled readers. 
• Epic — Digital library of modern books aimed at children under 12. Always free for teachers and librarians (and students can access it during school hours).
• ReadingIQ — Similar to Epic. There are thousands of modern digital books for readers under 12. Access is free for closed schools — learn more here.
• Oxford Owl — 100 free eBook readers for young children. Free but you need an account. 
• Story Shares — American not-for-profit group who shares stories online, that are aimed at older students who read below grade level.

Less Modern books/interfaces 

Don’t be put off by the “old school” designs of these websites. Many allow access to older works with expired copyright that can be ideal for classroom use. 

• International Children’s Digital Library –– A collection of international books for children aged 3-13 presented in 59 languages. 
• Project Gutenberg — 60,000+ eBooks that can be downloaded for all ages (most are older works with expired copyright). 
• Faded Page — 5000 plus eBooks that are completely free to download. Not designed for children but there are many classics for older students (like Project Gutenberg they are mostly older works with expired copyright). 
• Open Library — Catalogue where you can borrow books for free (lots of options for older students). 
• Lit2Go — A free online collection of stories and poems in MP3 (audiobook) format with accompanying text. Includes many classics with expired copyright. 

Sue Waters has written a post that shows exactly how to find and read eBooks. This is a helpful guide for both educators and students. 

Can I Read Aloud to my Students?

This question is being asked over and over by the online education community in recent weeks. 

Many teachers are keen to read aloud to their students using video, however, remember there may be copyright issues.

• If you’re in the USA, you should be covered by “fair use” as outlined by EdSurge.
• Some publishers are now allowing teachers to read books to their students during school closure. Kate Messner explains here. 
• Pernille Ripp and Kate Messner have both written about other places to find online read alouds.
• My favourite site for free read alouds (by professional actors) is Storyline Online.
• Some authors are hosting their own online storytimes during the pandemic. Find the details in this post. 

10 Tips for Virtual Teaching and Learning

Transitioning to online schooling is a learning journey for everyone. While everyone’s circumstances are different, these tips might offer you some food for thought. Chime in with your own tips in a comment!

Here’s a summary and read on for lots of ideas and examples:

1) Encourage Fun, Play, and Activity

In the traditional classroom setting, many teachers plan physical activity breaks for good health and productive learning.

Many PE teachers are leading the way, sharing their creative approaches to get students moving. If you follow the hashtag #HPEatHome on Twitter, you’ll find a plethora of movement activities. Many are being added to a Google Drive of resources that you’re free to access. 

These PE teachers in Vietnam are sharing daily “Get Up and Go” videos with students. No doubt students love seeing their teachers on screen.

A PE teacher in China is using Flipgrid to teach dancing. Great to see parents getting involved too!

This made me smile. Mother and daughter working together on @flipgrid to learn the dance. It is great to see her mum supporting her during this unique e-learning time. note: this video has been posted with permission from both dancers #aisgzhpe #physed #elearning #movementmatters pic.twitter.com/KGqjx8Hky3

— Adam Tomassen (@AdamHPE) February 28, 2020

Well known Australian P.E. teacher Andy Hair has made up an easy game that his students can play while in lockdown at home. 

If you haven’t yet tried GoNoodle or Cosmic Kids Yoga (free on YouTube) I highly recommend them for elementary-aged students. 

The only problem is, they still involve technology so you probably want to consider some options that give students a break from devices. 

Minimizing screen time is becoming a big concern for parents and teachers. 

Perhaps you could publish a daily challenge to keep students active and off screens? Take it a step further by asking students to send in a photo of their experience. 

Here are some ideas. You’re welcome to use this resource however you see fit. 

Download a PDF copy of the poster

Many teachers are also trying to set learning tasks that are offline (such as “hands-on” math for younger students — baking, measuring objects, shape hunts and so on). 

British International School in Hanoi ran a LEGO Challenge and asked students to send in photos of their creations. What fun!

This teacher asked her students for their own ideas of how they like to spend their time offline.

Grade 4 came up with ideas to stay balanced and get offline sometimes during these days of #virtuallearning. They connected their tips to the #pyp #learnerprofile. They were thoughtful, funny, realistic and relevant. Thanks for the idea @ALMcCloskey #isblearning pic.twitter.com/fe2g4K56kE

— Laura-Claire Corson (@LauraClaire_C) March 3, 2020

2) Communicate Clearly and Frequently

When the school community is scattered, clear and ongoing communication is essential!

Ensure everyone knows how messages will be communicated and what channels they should be checking in on (e.g. email, LMS, blog, school website). 

Make sure students and parents know how they can contact teachers for learning support and how they can get tech support. Some teachers are holding “office hours” (e.g. I am available for email support from 10am to 2pm daily; or “I am available for Google Hangouts Meet sessions from 12.30-1.30pm each day”). 

You might err on the side of overcommunicating to ensure everyone feels connected, supported, and confident. 

Make instructions as clear and concise as you can. Effective communication will really pay off. 

3) Seek Feedback Regularly

On the flipside of communicating, it’s important to also seek feedback from students and families.

The team at Google recently made a suggestion that many closed schools are already trying out,

Using Google Forms, create mood check-ins for students to share their emotional state on a daily basis. Within the Form, students can request a conference with the teacher if they need extra support.

Jennifer Findley has created some great Google Form check ins that you’re free to copy and use. There are forms for the start and end of the day. 

This situation is new for most schools and families. Engage in a cycle of continuous improvement and refinement based on feedback from families, teachers, and students. 

Check out our Google Form later in the post that can be sent to parents if planning for a school closure to find out about their devices, confidence, resources etc. 

4) Give Choices

There’s never been a better time to empower learners and offer choice. Online learning can offer a lot of flexibility so it’s a great idea to take advantage of that.

By giving students some choice in the demonstration of their learning, you can also naturally differentiate and cater to a variety of learning styles and needs. 

You’ve probably heard of a choice board? It’s a graphic organizer that allows students to choose different learning activities. They’re set up in a grid, perhaps with a choice of 9 activities. Some teachers like to include one mandatory activity. 

Kim from Seoul Foreign School created this photosynthesis choice board for her 8th grade students. 

US teacher Pernille Ripp created a “Choose Your Own Adventure” two-week exploration.

This, hopefully, continues the honoring of their individual needs and desires, while still helping them with their growth. There are different levels of independence for them to choose from, as well as choices for recording or writing their responses. There are different levels of teaching involved that will unfold once they select their choice.

Check out Pernille’s post for more details.

In his post on online learning, John Spencer presented an amplified version of choice boards.

John’s variation goes beyond choosing topics or activities and allows for some student ownership of the learning targets and resources. 

Something else to think about as you move forward and become more confident with online learning. 

5) Set Up Guidelines

School guidelines are an important part of the transition process to online learning. These guidelines can be established even before your school has closed.

Not sure where to start? Check out this advice and examples from International Schools Services. You’ll find online learning policies, parent guidelines and more. 

Guidelines for students are also important but for a lot of students, a simple PDF with slabs of text won’t be an effective way to communicate. 

Yosef Tewolde in China shares a clear overview in a student friendly format. 

VS basic ⁦@ncpa_china⁩ . Sending out tips for students each day in our VS daily bulletin. #onlinelearning #issedu #pulaoproud pic.twitter.com/R8bkTeZOHo

— Yosef Tewolde (@YosefTewolde) February 12, 2020

American International School of Guangzhou shared this appealing resource on Twitter about videos. 

Here’s another great example from teachers at Seoul Foreign British School,

#virtuallearning guidelines for primary students collab with @emcslack and Becca Cook. https://t.co/XCoRPuWNq7 #onlinelearning #sfs1912 @SFBritishSchool pic.twitter.com/zVH2jvtV1W

— Jill Zappia (@JillZappia) March 5, 2020

6) Ensure Teacher Wellbeing

This meme inspired by teacher Nancy Breau sums up online teaching pretty well,

It’s crucial to consider teacher wellbeing. Teaching is hard enough in the traditional sense but moving online with minimal preparation or planning can be very stressful. In addition, some teachers are also trying to teach their own children whose schools have closed. 

Effective leadership and communication are key. As a teacher, try to take care of yourself. Go offline at the end of the day, take breaks, keep moving, eat well, drink water, get fresh air… you know the drill!

Perhaps you could set up a little routine for yourself at the end of the day, This checklist for health care workers in the UK might give you some ideas.

Will Arnold is a teacher in Guangzhou, China, who wisely told me via Twitter, 

My perspective from week 6 is that “how will teachers/staff be supported” should move to the top of the list. It’s like putting your own oxygen mask on before you help others.

Touche, Will, touche. 

7) Consider Student and Family Wellbeing

Switching to an online schooling program presents many challenges to students and families. Listening to families and sharing tips to ensure their wellbeing is very important. 

There are many ways to go about this. You might be able to get the help of school counselors or welfare officers. Or, you might invite students and families to share their own tips on what they’re doing to stay happy and healthy during this challenging time. 

The International School of Busan shared a short video on their Twitter account with basic tips for families. 

Staying healthy in a virtual learning environment. #ISBlearning pic.twitter.com/HdcwWWlxol

— International School of Busan (@ISBLearning) February 29, 2020

It’s also important to remember that it can be hard to predict which students might struggle with the virtual school program. For example, students who generally thrive in the classroom may find the adjustment very difficult. Keep the lines of communication open and don’t make assumptions!

Rebecca Barrett-Fox wrote an article called “Please do a bad job of putting your courses online” (hat tip: Raymond Rose in the comment section below). Rebecca does a great job of stressing that students and teachers are currently facing enormous and diverse pressures. The article is designed for higher ed but can definitely be extended to K-12. Show as much empathy as possible and keep things as simple as possible.

Tips For Parents With Young Children 

In terms of helping families switch to teaching their children at home, check out my post with 10 tips for teaching younger children — many of these apply to older students as well.

This is a guide that you can share with families for practical help and ideas. 

You’ll also find a sample home schedule (there is a blank version that can be downloaded as well). 

8) Embrace the Online Community

School closures are fast becoming a global issue. You might have a million questions racing around your head but you’re not alone. There has never been a better time to connect with the online communities of teachers who are keen to offer tips, support, and examples.

Facebook 

There is a Facebook Group set up by Kirsten Durward that is very supportive and helpful. It’s called Educator Temporary School Closure for Online Learning.

Click here to find the Facebook group and remember to answer the questions that pop up when you request access.

Also, use the search function or click here to find a breakout Facebook group. Due to the huge growth of the group, there are now many breakout groups that are regional, subject specific, year/grade specific. 

No idea how Facebook groups work? We have a guide that will help!

Twitter

You’ll also find some fantastic posts from community minded teachers on Twitter. Many teachers are using the hashtags #schoolclosures #virtuallearning and #onlinelearning. At this stage it looks like #schoolclosures is the leading hashtag?

New to Twitter? Check out our Ultimate Guide to Twitter to get started. It’ll be worth it!

9) Keep Your Class Connected

Keeping your class connected can be a challenge when students are scattered around the community (and around the world in some areas). 

As we’ve mentioned, video conferences are a good way to overcome this. While most video conferences would be lessons, consider adding in some fun conferences that are either structured (e.g. play a game together) or unstructured (e.g. live recess where students can just hang out).

If you’re not using conferences, consider a tool like Flipgrid where students can respond to each other with short recorded videos. 

You might be able to come up with ways for students to work on group projects together. This can add a layer of stress for students who might be struggling so of course, you’d gauge whether group work is a positive option. 

Librarian ‎Jen Caressimo (@Zenkenjen) runs Virtual Spirit Weeks to bring the school community together. She invites you to check out her Google Drive of examples. 

Camps and field trips are a great way to bring your class together. Did you know your class can also take virtual school trips. Check out this list of ideas from Freedom Homeschooling or this one from Mrs. Fahrney. 

Maybe you can hold virtual assemblies for your whole school or year level, just like these folks in South Korea,

Today’s virtual learning highlight – The PYP Assembly! Puppet shows, dance-offs, jokes and shoutouts. The PYP team broadcasting live to the Elementary School. What a fabulous way to end the week! I’m lucky to work with so many wonderful educators. #ISBlearning pic.twitter.com/JHFu0SA0zX

— Simon McCloskey (@SimonJMcCloskey) March 6, 2020

10) Keep it Simple

The message you’ll hear over and over from school leaders and teachers who have been at this for a while now is clear: keep it simple!

Don’t overthink things and create complicated lessons. 

Don’t invest in expensive technology or reinvent the wheel. 

Don’t expect that you will be able to cover as much as you would in the classroom.

Just do your best. That is enough!

Obstacles and Issues Created by School Closures 

The rapid school closures we’re seeing across the world raise concerns for teachers, parents, students, and the wider community. 

Some issues that are currently being navigated include:

Students/Families

• Do all students have access to devices and the internet?
• Who will look after students who are home from school? Are some students being left home alone?
• How can parents manage their own careers? Do their employers allow them to work from home or have time off?
• What about students who rely on getting free or subsidized meals at school? How can they be supported? What are the ramifications for farmers and food suppliers if orders are suspended?
• Are there concerns with excess screen time and lack of physical activity?
• How can students stay connected to peers?
• How can students with disabilities or additional learning needs be catered for?

Teachers

• How can educators juggle teaching if they have their own children home from school?
• How can teachers maintain work-life balance?
• Can teachers work from home or do they need to be on campus? Are teachers trusted and supported to work remotely?
• Do teachers need PD? Can the transition to online learning happen immediately or does there need to be a bridge (for example, students are provided with work/a packet for a week while teachers set up the online learning program)? 
• What role will non-teaching staff take on? 
• Who will take classes if teachers become ill?
• Will teachers continue to get full pay during ongoing school closures?

Schoolwide issues

• Will testing and report cards need to be delayed? What other assessment and reporting concerns are there?
• How is attendance monitored? For some, attendance or class numbers are linked to school funding.
• Should teachers/administrators chase up students who aren’t participating?
• What will non-teaching staff do during school closures?
• How should the school day be balanced with synchronous and asynchronous learning that’s both online and offline?
• How can individual students be catered for and work be differentiated?
• How can you prevent all the student work from becoming a scattered mess? Are they going to publish items on a digital portfolio (e.g. blog) or something similar?
• Will you face copyright issues if you try to use learning materials online (e.g. replicating textbooks or reading picture books aloud?)
• For private schools with longer closures, will parents continue to be charged full fees?
• What will the transition back to online schooling look like?
• What sort of “gaps” may need to be filled if students miss out on essential learning or assessment?
• Are their implications for senior students graduating and moving on to tertiary education?

Schools, teachers, and families may also face different issues depending on whether they are part of an international school, private school, or public school. Each situation is unique and throws up so many different variables. 

As you can see, these issues are broad and complex. Perhaps at this stage there are more questions than answers. 

Planning for a School Closure: Parent Survey

No matter where you live in the world, it’s highly unlikely that you can now rule out the possibility of your school closing in the future. 

Now is the time to plan. If you don’t need that plan, great! However, many schools around the world are closing suddenly with minimal preparation. Teachers and staff end up scrambling to get their virtual learning programs together. 

The first step in planning for a possible school closure may be to survey your parents and families. It’s important to find out what technology, child care, and other resources they have available. 

We created an example survey in Google Forms. You’re welcome to use it or adapt it for your own school. You’ll find instructions on how to make a copy under the Form below. 

Instructions for Editing and Using the Google Form Survey

1. Click on this link:

https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1viFs7kqOmJOBs-vzVX6pCbhd8rgSda0K-00LAjqruLM/copy

2. You will be prompted to make a copy (screenshot below)

3. You can edit the Google Form to suit your own school

Google Forms Tips:

• Don’t know how to edit a Google Form? It’s pretty intuitive. This document will help.
• When you have your Google Form ready, you can send the link to your community or embed the Form on your blog or website. Find out how to share your Form here. 
• When people fill out your Google Form, the results go to a Google Sheets spreadsheet. Learn more about that here. 

Planning for a School Closure: Taking Home Resources

If your school hasn’t closed yet and you’re planning for an upcoming closure, you might be thinking about what you should take home with you. 

Every situation is different but in some schools, no one is allowed on the campus once the school is closed. In other schools, teachers are actually required to work from the school (while students are at home).

If you’ll be working remotely, you might think about taking home some of the resources listed on the graphic below. 

Checklist for Administrators and Educators Facing a School Closure

This post has covered a lot of information and offered a lot of ideas and options. 

The following checklist might be a useful starting point if your school is beginning to discuss an upcoming or possible school closure. 

Of course, this is just a very simplified checklist for schools that are beginning to think about transitioning. 

Click here to download a PDF copy of the checklist

Over to You

We’d love to keep this post updated with practical information. Please leave a comment if you have any tips, questions, or examples. We want to hear from you!

The 24th Student Blogging Challenge begins on March 15 and registrations are now open!

Since 2008, the Student Blogging Challenge has run twice yearly, beginning each March and October.

Why take part in the Student Blogging Challenge?

• Help your students learn how to publish on the web safely and effectively
• Increase student motivation for writing by engaging with an authentic audience
• Reap the benefits of global collaboration by connecting with other participants around the country and world.

Sound good? Read on to find out more!

Challenge Summary

The next Student Blogging Challenge begins on March 15, 2020.

The challenge is made up of a series of 8 weekly tasks all designed to improve blogging and commenting skills, while connecting students with a global audience.

The weekly schedule is published on the Student Blogging Challenge website.

This experience is totally free and open to students and classes aged between 8 and 16.

Many teachers appreciate the fact that they don’t have to be the expert or bring the ideas or audience. It’s all done for you.

The challenge is also flexible — you can participate every week, every second week or choose a time frame that suits you. You can also adapt tasks to meet the needs of your own class.

Quick links

• Find out more about the Student Blogging Challenge
• Register to take part as a class
• Register to take part as a student
• Volunteer as a commenter

Why Take Part In The Student Blogging Challenge?

Last year, I made a short video with insights from past participants to give you an overview of what the challenge is all about.

Take a look and please share it with others who might be interested.

You might also want to read 8 Reasons To Take Part In The Student Blogging Challenge which breaks down this infographic.

How Do I Register For The Challenge?

Interested? You can follow the steps below to register or check out the FAQs if you want to read more about the challenge before registering.

Step One: Join Our Mailing List

If you haven’t already, sign up for our Student Blogging Challenge mailing list to stay in the loop!

This isn’t a registration form but you’ll want to be on the mailing list to keep up to date with all the challenge news.

Step Two: Decide How You Want To Register

There are three ways to register:

1) Register As A Class

This means teachers and students participate together and students don’t need to have their own blog (although they can).

Student work will be published on the class blog as a post or series of posts. Or the teacher might publish a post and invite the students to comment.

2) Register As An Individual Student Blogger

Students with their own blogs can take part by publishing posts in response to the weekly challenges (these challenge are published on the Student Blogging Challenge site).

As well as publishing on their own blogs, students can comment on other students’ posts.

3) Register To Be A Volunteer Commenter

Commenters need to be approved by our commenting team leader, Sue Wyatt. They need to be involved in some field of education — e.g. teaching, working with children, studying education, retired teachers etc.

If you know someone who might like to volunteer, please ask them to consider registering and joining our mailing list! 

Commenters are asked to visit five blogs per week and you can make a big difference in the lives of young people by just dedicating one hour a week for 8 weeks!

Step Three: Get Ready

While participants will learn about blogging through the challenge, it can be very helpful to start setting up your blog before the challenge begins.

These two self-paced courses will be helpful if you want to be walked through the process of setting up your blog:

• Student Blogging Bootcamp (for students) — This course guides students through the process of setting up and using their own blog. Some teachers like to assign all/parts of the bootcamp to their students before the challenge begins.
• Blogging With Students Teacher Challenge (for teachers) — We walk you step-by-step through the process of setting up a class blog and blogging with students. You can also sign up to complete this challenge over 30 days if you wish. 

Join Our Facebook Group

We’re very excited to be launching a Facebook group for educators involved in the challenge this year. This group will be the ideal way to find connections for your students, ask questions, share tips, and stay in the loop.

This is a private group so only members can see who’s in the group and what they post.

The group is only for challenge participants and is for educators. Older student participants may join if they are old enough. Remember, Facebook has age restrictions (13+ and even older in some areas) so the group is not for young students.

How To Join The Group!

To join the group, just go to https://www.facebook.com/groups/StudentBlogging

Alternatively, search for “Student Blogging Challenge March 2020” on Facebook.

Click on “Request to join” and answer the three questions so we know you’re a challenge participant. When your request is approved, go ahead and introduce yourself!

I’ve Registered As A Participant. Now What?

Fantastic! Perhaps you’d like to add the challenge badge to your sidebar or About page?

Every week on a Sunday (starting March 15), we’ll publish a new post on the Student Blogging Challenge website.

If you’re subscribed to the email list, you’ll get a reminder about this via email. Otherwise, you can just check the Student Blogging Challenge site when it suits.

Then there are four steps to follow each week:

1. Read: Teachers can read through the post that’s on the Student Blogging Challenge site with their class, or assign the post to their students to read. Alternately, teachers can summarize the information on their class blog.
2. Task: Students will complete one (or more) task and publish it on their individual blog or class blog.
3. Form: Participants need to enter the URL of their blog post in the Google Form that will be at the bottom of each weekly post. This is so commenters and others know about their post and can visit.
4. Connect: The last step involves visiting other participants’ blogs. Leave a comment and strike up a conversation.

If you can’t complete a task every week, that’s fine. You’re also welcome to adapt tasks to best meet the needs of your class.

Find out more here. 

I’ve Registered As A Commenter. Now What?

Our commenting team leader, Sue Wyatt, will contact you to let you know if you’ve been accepted as commenter. She’ll also email in the lead up to the challenge explaining the process if you’ve been accepted.

Sue will support you as a commenter throughout the challenge. She’ll send you weekly emails with instructions and tips, and you’ll be able to contact her to ask further questions.

There’s also a badge for commenters that you might like to display on your own site if you have one.

More Questions?

We’ve created a PDF document of Frequently Asked Questions. Click here to save a copy to your computer.

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Anything else you’re not sure about? Leave a comment and we’ll get back to you! Alternatively, you can send us an email via this contact form. 

Remember, the Student Blogging Challenge only happens twice a year, so don’t miss out!

Whether your blog is for other teachers, families, or members of the wider education community, there are people out there who want to read what you’re writing.

Remember: just because you publish something online, doesn’t mean it will be seen.

Social media is a great place to share your blog posts, but there are problems. Algorithms and the “pay to play” model are changing the landscape of social media. Your loyal followers may not end up seeing all your updates.

Having an email newsletter is an excellent way to build and serve your community.

Our last post explained how to send out emails automatically to your readers using RSS and Mailchimp.

This post takes things a step further. You’ll learn about the benefits of creating a handcrafted newsletter using Mailchimp. We’ll help you plan for success and get started.

The Benefit Of Creating Emails Manually

We know it’s definitely a good idea to have some sort of option available for readers who would like to receive an email when you publish new blog posts.

Most people check their email every day and it’s more of a sure bet than sharing your posts on social media and hoping for the best.

Our last post explained the two choices for sending out emails when you publish new blog posts.

1. You can create an automated service using RSS. This is a good option if you’re time-poor and need a quick “set-and-forget” method.
2. You can create a handcrafted newsletter that really helps you build relationships with your readers. This can take a little longer but the emails might be better received by your audience. You also have more flexibility with design and content.

Here’s a summary graphic of your two choices:

Remember to check out our previous post if you want to learn how to set up RSS.

How To Set Up Your Email Newsletter

This guide takes you through 4 steps to getting your email newsletter set up:

1. Planning
2. Register And Set Up Your Mailchimp Account
3. Create An Email Campaign
4. Design Your Email

Part One: Planning

Before you begin, it pays to take a bit of time to consider your plan.

Here are 5 key questions to consider. Scroll down for a printable planning worksheet.

#1 What is your goal?

Creating an ongoing email newsletter can take a little work but there are rewards. Consider why you want to build your following and community through a regular newsletter.

This isn’t information you need to make public but it’s good to keep in mind.

• Perhaps you want to network and enjoy future career opportunities (a new job, promotion, or speaking engagement?).
• Maybe you want to form a strong relationship with the parents of the students you teach. We know how powerful that is.
• Perhaps you want to build your PLN so you can learn from and with other educators across the globe.

This goal is probably related to the reason you set up a blog in the first place.

#2 Which email marketing platform will you use?

This tutorial uses Mailchimp. We have no affiliations with Mailchimp but have used it for 10+ years and it’s one of the most popular platforms out there.

Importantly, Mailchimp is free if you have under 2000 subscribers. It’s fairly intuitive to use (drag and drop) and their help documents are excellent.

If you’re interested in comparing different email platforms, check out this guide from ProBlogger or comparison chart from PC Mag. We encourage you to find the provider that works best for your needs.

#3 How will you collect email addresses?

Obviously, you have to do this legally. You can’t just start emailing people without their permission.

When you set up an account with a platform like Mailchimp, you’ll have access to a URL with your sign-up form.

For example, this is what our sign-up form looks like for the Student Blogging Challenge:

https://studentchallenge.edublogs.org/stay-in-the-loop-with-student-blogging-challenge-news/

You want to make it as easy as possible for people to know about your newsletter and how they can opt in.

Here are some key places to consider sharing your sign-up form:

• On your blog (on the sidebar, on your About page, and/or at the bottom of your blog posts). Some people also like to have pop-up notifications.
• In social media posts or in your bio
• As a link under your email signature
• Email the link to your sign-up form to your contacts who might be interested

#4 What will you include in your emails?

The main thing you probably want to include is your latest blog post(s).

Some people copy and paste the whole blog post into an email but a more popular approach is to summarise it and include a link for subscribers to keep reading.

Some people also like to include other information in their newsletters such as:

• Other great posts you’ve read
• Online tools you’ve come across
• Podcasts or videos you’ve enjoyed
• Classroom or personal anecdotes
• Pep talks or inspirational quotes

Your content could basically be anything you think might be of value to your readers. Are you aiming to educate, entertain, inspire? Perhaps a mix of all three?

It pays to consider the needs of your audience and stick to the topic(s) you’re known for e.g. edtech, social studies, English teaching etc.

Also, consider whether you want an image-heavy email or a simple plain text newsletter? There are pros and cons but simple does work for some people.

Here’s an example from well-known SEO blogger Brian Dean who has hundreds of thousands of subscribers. Brian uses a very simple image-free design with text that’s friendly yet to the point.

#5 How frequently will your emails be sent out?

You don’t have to tell people how often you’ll be sending out emails but it can be a good way to stay committed to your blogging goals.

For example, if you say you’ll be sharing a new blog post every two weeks or every month, you’ll have the incentive to do it! Your readers will be waiting to hear from you.

This printable planning PDF will help if you want to jot down your ideas before moving on.

>>Click here to download a PDF copy.

Part Two: Register And Set Up Your Mailchimp Account

This part is fairly straightforward although we recommend Mailchimp’s getting started guide if you’re unsure.

The three most important steps to explore are:

1. Set up your account: You need to enter your name and email address to register. This only takes a couple of minutes.
2. Set up your audience: These are the email addresses you’ll be sending to. Your audience could be very small to begin with but don’t worry. It will grow! The free version of Mailchimp only allows you to have one audience group.
3. Customize your sign-up form: Setting up a sign-up form is essential so you can start collecting email addresses that will be part of your audience. You can customize the look and feel of this form and your form will have a URL that you can share with others.

Registration tips:

• You don’t need to submit any payment. Mailchimp is free until you have over 2000 subscribers. When you do hit the 2000 mark you can decide about payment options although the best first step would be to “clean up your list”. This means you archive subscribers who aren’t opening your emails or no longer want updates.
• You’re legally obliged to provide a physical address. This address will show up automatically in the footer of your emails. You probably do not want to use your home address! We recommend using a work address or PO Box.
• Which email address do you want to use? Even though you’re sending your emails out through Mailchimp they still come “from” your email address. So, if you have both personal and work email addresses, consider what would be the best to use for this project.

Part Three: Create An Email Campaign

1) Login to your Mailchimp account

Click on “Campaigns”.

2) From here click “Create Campaign”

3) You’ll be presented with a range of campaign options

Click “Email”.

4) Click on “Regular”

Type a Campaign Name (subscribers won’t see this) and then press “Begin”.

5) Fill out your campaign information

You are now presented with four important steps to create your campaign.

• To: This is the audience you’re sending the email out to.
• From: Enter your email address. Make sure this isn’t an email address you need to keep private.
• Subject: Subscribers will see this when your email lands in their inbox. Make your subject line specific and interesting to encourage them to open it!
• Content: This is where you design your actual email. We’ll explain this more below.

As each of these four tasks are completed, a green checkmark will appear.

If you scroll down further you’ll see an option to personalize your campaign link. This is the URL for the email that you’ll be able to share online once you send your email (perhaps on social media). All users can edit their campaign link but you have to be a paid user to include your website domain. Click here to read Mailchimp’s help guide on campaign links.

If you need more assistance filling out the to, from, or subject field, check out this help guide from Mailchimp. 

Let’s take a closer look at designing the content of your email…

Part Four: Design Your Email

The final step involves putting the content of your email together.

1) From the campaign builder page, click “Design Email”

2) Select your template

The free version on Mailchimp only includes the basic templates. This is fine.

If you’re not sure what template to choose, stick with the basic “1 column” template. You can always change it over time.

4) Design Your Email

It’s now time to design the look of your emails. If you’re new to Mailchimp, you can definitely keep this simple!

Here are the most important steps:

a) Add an image to the top of the email

Hover over the word “Logo” and click on the pencil icon. Follow the prompts to upload an image that represents you and your website.

(If you don’t want an image just click on the trash can icon in the Logo box).

b) Edit the text

Hover over the block of text and click on the pencil icon. You’ll write the text of your newsletter on the right-hand side using the familiar editing tools to format (bold, italics, link etc.).

You might start by introducing your new blog post and then add the link to your blog so subscribers can read the full post.

If you have any other interesting information to share such as other useful links or tips, add this underneath.

Tips for writing your newsletter:

• Make your newsletter easy to read with bullet points, lists, short sentences/paragraphs, bold words, and headings.
• Use lots of white space and keep your text short.
• Write like you’re talking to an individual person, not a group of people (e.g. use the word “you”).
• After you send out a few email newsletters, take note of which ones received the most opens and clicks. What was different about these? Interesting subject line? Unique layout? Perhaps the time of day you sent the email worked well?

c) Add an image to the body of the email (optional)

There are different schools of thought about whether you should use images throughout your newsletter.

Some people like images to break up the text and illustrate the content. Plain text emails are also very popular and some people find a very simple email is better received.

If you do want to add images to your email, drag over an image block from the right-hand side to the work area on the left-hand side. You’ll then be prompted to upload your image.

There are different choices available. You can drag over a simple “Image” block or “Image Group”, “Image Card”, or “Image + Caption”.

Learn more about designing your email in this help guide from Mailchimp.

d) Test your email

A final helpful tip is to preview what your email will look like and/or send a test email to yourself or someone else who can offer you feedback.

You’ll find these options at the top of the page under “Preview and Test”.

“Open Link Checker” is another very helpful tool if you use multiple links in your email. It helps you double-check they’re all correct!

Select “Save and Close” in the bottom right-hand corner of the page when you’re ready to move on.

5) Confirm and send

Once your email is all set up, you should see a green checkmark next to the To, From, Subject, and Content sections of the Campaign Builder.

You can check your details and then use one of three options:

• Finish later: This will save your draft which you’ll be able to access under Campaigns in the future.
• Schedule: You can choose a time you want your email to be sent out (you can experiment with sending times as you get going).
• Send: Your email will go out straight away.

Save Time In Future: Replicate Your Email

We’ve mentioned that creating a handcrafted email does take a little bit of extra time than the RSS option, however, you don’t have to start from scratch every time.

You can replicate a campaign to create a copy of any campaign in your account.

All you need to do is:

1. Log in to Mailchimp and go to Campaigns
2. Click the drop-down menu for the campaign you want to copy and select Replicate.

Follow the prompts to edit your campaign details. Check out Mailchimp’s guide to replicating campaigns for more information.

Another option is to create your own template which you can use when writing new emails. Mailchimp’s help guide walks you through this process.

Bonus Tip: Create An Opt-In Offer!

If you want to get really serious about building your email list, do what the pros do: offer an opt-in or freebie for subscribers!

Offering your readers an opt-in offer or “content upgrade” is a proven way to grow your email list. An opt-in freebie is simply a free downloadable file.

Your readers might be on the fence about signing up for your newsletter or they might not even realize you have a newsletter.

An incentive might be all they need to hand over their email address and join your community. Then surely they’ll like what you offer and stick around!

What can you create as an opt-in offer? Here are some ideas:

• A printable PDF version of a popular post
• A cheat sheet or summary of something you’ve written about
• A checklist
• A list of resources
• A printable that can be used in the classroom (worksheets, planners, displays)
• An eBook covering a topic in more depth

Where would you design your freebie? Two popular free design tools are Google Drawings and Canva. We have guides to both of these tools:

• Check out our guide to Canva
• Learn how to use Google Drawings

If you’re using Mailchimp, this guide explains how to send a file (freebie) to new subscribers.

You’re putting the effort into writing your email newsletter, so you want as many people as possible to enjoy it, right? An opt-in offer could be the solution you need to grow your list.

The only thing to remember is if you grow your list too rapidly, you’ll have to pay to use your email platform. For example, Mailchimp is free until you have 2000 subscribers. Remember to clean up your list before paying!

Conclusion

It’s an excellent idea for all bloggers to offer readers a chance to be notified of new blog posts via email.

If you’re short on time, you can set up RSS emails using a platform like Mailchimp.

However, you might find your emails are better received if they’re more personalised. You’ll need to invest a little time into the process but the rewards might be greater!

Remember, some bloggers also like to use a combination of RSS and personal emails. For example, you could set up RSS so emails are sent out every time you write a new post. You could also write a monthly summary email.

Find out what works for you and enjoy the benefits of building a community around your blog.

Any tips or questions? Leave a comment below. We’d love to hear from you!

Related Reading

You might also enjoy:

• A Plan For Writing A Weekly Blog Post In 10 Minutes A Day
• Resources To Introduce Edublogs To Others
• 5 Ways To Share And Market Your Teacher Blog
• 12 Tips For Maintaining Momentum With Blogging

You might have put together a fantastic blog post and felt satisfied as you hit the publish button, but your job is not done.

Just because you publish something online, doesn’t mean it will be seen. People won’t know about your post if you don’t share it.

One of the most effective ways to share your blog posts is to email it directly to people who are interested in reading it.

This post explains how to send out emails automatically to your readers. Our tutorial shows you how to use RSS using a free program called Mailchimp.

(We also have a tutorial showing you how to create a handcrafted email newsletter. Find that tutorial here).

What is an email list?

Whether you’re a serious blogger, or just dabble with publishing occasionally, it’s an excellent idea to build an email list.

This is simply a list of people who have opted in to get an email notification when you publish a new post on your blog.

It’s not a good idea to send out emails from your own personal email account. You’ll need to use a (free) email marketing platform (such as Mailchimp).

This software will help you collect email addresses, organize them, and send out emails. You’ll also be able to do more advanced things if you wish, like segment your list or analyze statistics to see who’s opening your emails and what they’re clicking on.

How can people join your email list?

Many bloggers have a box on the sidebar of their site where people can enter their email address. There are other places to put these opt-in or sign-up forms too.

You might:

• Put the form at the bottom of all your blog posts
• Add a form to your About page
• Share the link to your sign-up form “landing page” on social media
• You can also write a blog post to tell readers about your email lists. Here’s an example from Larry Ferlazzo. He includes a link to read his latest newsletter online.

Why Set Up An Email Subscription?

Many bloggers like to share their latest post on social media after they hit publish.

Great idea!

Sharing your work with your community can be a nice way to build your audience and start generating conversation.

Social media is a great way to share but here are a few thoughts to keep in mind about the power of offering an email subscription:

• Having an email subscription option is going to allow your most loyal and valuable members of your community to stay in touch with you.
• There are no guarantees that people in your network will see your posts on social media. You can’t control that. Offer your readers a channel to make sure they don’t miss your content.
• Email is much more personal than social media. Your readers can hear directly from you and it can help with relationship building.

As well known marketer Michael Hyatt says, a website/blog and an email list are more valuable home bases than social media:

Should You Send Emails Automatically Or Manually?

So we’ve established that it’s definitely a good idea to have some sort of option available for readers who would like to subscribe to your blog via email.

Now you have two choices:

1. Do you want to use an automated service?
2. Or do you want to create a handcrafted newsletter that you email out on a regular basis?

This post explains how to set up an automated email subscription via RSS using Mailchimp. This is a good option if you’re time-poor and need a quick “set-and-forget” method.

Our next post goes through creating handcrafted emails. This is a good option if you want to step up your relationship building and really create a community around your email list.

Which Email Software Should You Use?

There are many email marketing platforms out there and many are free to use until you reach a certain number of subscribers.

If you’re interested in comparing different email platforms, check out this guide from ProBlogger or comparison chart from PC Mag. 

I’m writing this guide about Mailchimp because it’s the provider I’ve used myself for almost a decade.

Note: We have no affiliations with Mailchimp and encourage you to find the service provider that works best for your needs.

Mailchimp Tips And Information

Mailchimp is one of the most popular email service providers.

• It is free to use if you have up to 2000 subscribers.
• Mailchimp uses a simple drag and drop editor and offers a range of different templates for the design of your newsletter.
• There are also different options for creating sign-up forms (e.g. widgets, embedded forms, and landing pages with their own URL).

Check out the Getting Started With Mailchimp guide for more information.

What Is RSS?

RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication. It’s a way to have information that you’re interested in delivered to you.

Instead of you having to check a blog regularly to see if there is a new post, RSS can do that for you.

You can access the new content using a news aggregator (like Feedly). Or it can be delivered straight to your inbox!

When an RSS feed is updated with new blog posts, Mailchimp can pull that content into an email and send it to your subscribers. It will be sent according to the schedule you choose (e.g. daily at 9am or every Sunday at 6pm).

It’s now time to learn how to set up your emails in Mailchimp using RSS.

Let’s get started!

How To Set Up Your Automatic Emails

We’re going to go through four steps to getting your RSS emails set up:

1. Register for Mailchimp and set up your account
2. Create an RSS campaign
3. Choose your feed and timing
4. Finish designing your email

Part One: Register For Mailchimp And Set Up Your Account

This part is fairly straightforward although we recommend Mailchimp’s getting started guide if you’re unsure.

The three most important steps to explore are:

• Set up your account
• Set up your audience
• Customize your signup form

Registration tips:

• You don’t need to submit any payment. Mailchimp is free until you have over 2000 subscribers. When you do hit the 2000 mark you can decide about payment options although the best first step would be to “clean up your list”. This means you remove subscribers who aren’t opening your emails or no longer want updates.
• You’re legally obliged to provide a physical address. This address will show up automatically in the footer of your emails. You probably do not want to use your home address! We recommend using a work address or PO Box.
• Which email address do you want to use? Even though you’re sending your emails out through Mailchimp they still come “from” your email address. So, if you have both personal and work email addresses, consider what would be the best to use for this project.

Part Two: Create An RSS Campaign

1) Login to your Mailchimp account

Click on “Campaigns”.

2) From here click “Create Campaign”

3) You’ll be presented with a range of campaign options

Click “Email”.

4) Click on “Automated”

5) Select “Share blog updates”

6) Enter a campaign name and select your audience

You would have started setting up your audience when you set up your Mailchimp account. Don’t worry if there’s only one or two people on your audience list! It will continue to grow over time.

Click “Begin”.

Part Three: Choose Your Feed And Timing

You’ll now be asked to enter the feed of your blog and select when you want emails to go out automatically.

1) Type in your feed:

• If your blog is through Edublogs, the RSS feed will be yourblog.edublogs.org/feed
• If your blog is hosted through CampusPress, the feed will be your blog URL with /feed on the end.

2) Select your email frequency and times

You can choose the time you want your emails to go out (daily, weekly, monthly) by using the drop-down menus and checkboxes. Note that an email will only be sent if there’s new content on your blog.

• If you choose the daily option, an email will only go out if you’ve published something in the last day.
• If you choose the weekly option, an email will only be sent if you’ve published a post (or posts) in the last week.

3) Choose whether you want images to be resized

There is also a box to select if you want Mailchimp to resize the images in your feed to fit your template. This will help prevent stretching.

Part Four: Finish Setting Up And Designing Your Email

The final step involves clicking through the menu bar at the bottom of the page to complete the RSS campaign.

1) Select your audience that you’d like the emails to be sent to

You will have chosen your audience when you started setting up your campaign. You can change it here if you need to (free accounts can only have one audience).

You can also segment your audience so it only goes out to certain people on the list (e.g. parents or colleagues) but this is more of an advanced feature.

2) Fill out your campaign information

Type in campaign details:

• Campaign name: Recipients won’t see this so make it something that makes sense to you.
• Email subject: This will automatically pull in the title and date of your blog post but you can test an email to make sure it’s working correctly.
• Preview text: You might want to write something like, “The latest news from x…”
• From name: This should be your name or a name the recipients will recognize.
• From email address: Make sure this isn’t an email address you need to keep private.
• Checkboxes: These are more advanced features such as using conversations to manage replies, personalizing the “to” field (you would need to have collected correct first names to do this), or track opens and clicks.

3) Select your template

If you’re not sure what template to choose, stick with the basic “1 column” template. You can always change it later.

4) Design Your Email

It’s now time to design the look of your emails. If you’re new to Mailchimp, you can definitely keep this simple!

Here are the most important steps:

a) Add an image to the top of the email

Hover over the word “Logo” and click on the pencil icon. Follow the prompts to upload an image that represents you and your website.

b) Edit the text

Hover over the block of text and click on the pencil icon. Write a short generic introduction that people will see before the contents of your latest post.

For example,

“Thanks for subscribing to my email updates. Here’s what I’ve been writing about this week…”

c) Drag in the RSS blocks

You’ll now need to drag in the RSS components from the right-hand side. This will ensure your latest posts appear in the email.

Hover over “RSS items”, click on it and drag it to your email underneath the text.

Using the drop-down menu on the right-hand side, you can select whether you want the full post or just an excerpt to be shown in the email.

There are two schools of thoughts here:

• Some people want traffic to their website so would rather show an excerpt and have people click through to read the full post on the blog.
• Some people want to present their readers with the most convenient option for reading the post, hence they like to display the full post in the email. Readers don’t need to visit the blog to consume the information.

Select “Save and Close” when you’ve made this choice.

d) Test your email

A final helpful tip is to preview what your email will look like and/or send a test email to yourself or someone else who can offer you feedback.

You’ll find these options at the top of the page under “Preview and Test”.

Select “Next” in the bottom right-hand corner of the page when you’re ready to move on.

5) Confirm and send

Once your email is all set up, you can check your details and then press “Start RSS” in the bottom right-hand corner of the page. Your first email will go out automatically at the time you selected (as long as you have published something new on your blog).

If you don’t want to start immediately, press “Save and Exit” in the top right-hand corner of the page and you can come back to it later. You’ll find the draft when you go to Campaigns.

Conclusion

Whether you write a blog for teachers, students, colleagues, or members of the wider public, there is a group of people out there who’d love to keep up to date with your new posts.

If you’re short on time, one of the easiest ways to send out your new blog posts to your loyal readers is through RSS using a platform like Mailchimp.

In our next post, I’ll explain how to set up a hand-curated email newsletter using Mailchimp. It takes a little bit more time as you’ll be sending emails manually, however, you might find there are greater rewards to enjoy! Click here to read the next post.

Some people also like to use a combination of RSS and personal emails.

Any tips or questions? Leave a comment below. We’d love to hear from you!

Related Reading

You might also enjoy:

• A Plan For Writing A Weekly Blog Post In 10 Minutes A Day
• Resources To Introduce Edublogs To Others
• 5 Ways To Share And Market Your Teacher Blog
• 12 Tips For Maintaining Momentum With Blogging

Do you want your students to learn how to publish on the web safely and effectively?

Perhaps you want to increase their motivation for writing by engaging with an authentic audience?

Would you like your students to look beyond the four walls of your classroom and connect with other students from around the world?

The Student Blogging Challenge can help and registrations are now open!

Since 2008, the Student Blogging Challenge has run twice yearly, beginning each March and October.

The next challenge begins on October 6, 2019.

The challenge is made up of a series of 8 weekly tasks all designed to improve blogging and commenting skills, while connecting students with a global audience.

This experience is totally free and open to students and classes aged between 8 and 16.

Many teachers appreciate the fact that they don’t have to be the expert or bring the ideas or audience. It’s all done for you.

The challenge is also flexible — you can participate every week, every second week or choose a time frame that suits you. You can also adapt tasks to meet the needs of your own class.

Quick links

• Find out more about the Student Blogging Challenge
• Register to take part as a class
• Register to take part as a student
• Volunteer as a commenter

Why Take Part In The Student Blogging Challenge?

Earlier in the year, I made a short video with insights from past participants to give you an overview of what the challenge is all about.

Take a look and please share it with others who might be interested.

You might also want to read 8 Reasons To Take Part In The Student Blogging Challenge which breaks down this infographic.

Finally, be sure to check out this insightful post by 3 high school students who reflect on what they got out of the Student Blogging Challenge.

The students made this video about their challenge experience.

How Do I Register For The Challenge?

Interested? You can follow the steps below to register or check out the FAQs if you want to read more about the challenge before registering.

Step One: Join Our Mailing List

If you haven’t already, sign up for our Student Blogging Challenge mailing list to stay in the loop!

This isn’t a registration form but you’ll want to be on the mailing list to keep up to date with all the challenge news.

Step Two: Decide How You Want To Register

There are three ways to register:

1) Register As A Class

This means teachers and students participate together and students don’t need to have their own blog (although they can).

Student work will be published on the class blog as a post or series of posts. Or the teacher might publish a post and invite the students to comment.

2) Register As An Individual Student Blogger

Students with their own blogs can take part by publishing posts in response to the weekly challenges on the Student Blogging Challenge site.

They can also comment on other students’ posts.

3) Register To Be A Volunteer Commenter

Commenters need to be approved by our commenting team leader, Sue Wyatt. They need to be involved in some field of education — e.g. teaching, working with children, studying education, retired teachers etc.

If you know someone who might like to volunteer, please ask them to consider registering and joining our mailing list! 

Commenters are asked to visit five blogs per week and you can make a big difference in the lives of young people by just dedicating one hour a week for 8 weeks!

Step Three: Get Ready

While participants will learn about blogging through the challenge, it can be very helpful to start setting up your blog before the challenge begins.

These two self-paced courses will be helpful if you want to be walked through the process of setting up your blog:

• Student Blogging Bootcamp (for students) — This course guides students through the process of setting up and using their own blog. Some teachers like to assign all/parts of the bootcamp to their students before the challenge begins.
• Blogging With Students Teacher Challenge (for teachers) — We walk you step-by-step through the process of setting up a class blog and blogging with students. You can also sign up to complete this challenge over 30 days if you wish. 

Our Blogging With Students course currently comes with a free upgrade to Edublogs Pro. Find out more here. 

I’ve Registered As A Participant. Now What?

Fantastic! Perhaps you’d like to add the challenge badge to your sidebar or About page?

Every week on a Sunday (starting October 6), we’ll publish a new post on the Student Blogging Challenge website.

If you’re subscribed to the email list, you’ll get a reminder about this via email. Otherwise, you can just check the Student Blogging Challenge site when it suits.

Then there are four steps to follow each week:

1. Read: Teachers can read through the post that’s on the Student Blogging Challenge site with their class, or assign the post to their students to read. Alternately, teachers can summarize the information on their class blog.
2. Task: Students will complete one (or more) task and publish it on their individual blog or class blog.
3. Form: Participants need to enter the URL of their blog post in the Google Form that will be at the bottom of each weekly post.
4. Connect: The last step involves visiting other participants’ blogs. Leave a comment and strike up a conversation.

If you can’t complete a task every week, that’s fine. You’re also welcome to adapt tasks to best meet the needs of your class.

Find out more here. 

I’ve Registered As A Commenter. Now What?

Our commenting team leader, Sue Wyatt, will contact you to let you know if you’ve been accepted as commenter (via the email or Twitter handle you provided). She’ll also email in the lead up to the challenge explaining the process if you’ve been accepted.

Sue will support you as a commenter throughout the challenge. She’ll send you weekly emails with instructions and tips, and you’ll be able to contact her to ask further questions.

There’s also a badge for commenters that you might like to display on your own site if you have one.

More Questions?

We’ve created a PDF document of Frequently Asked Questions. Click here to save a copy to your computer.

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Anything else you’re not sure about? Leave a comment and we’ll get back to you! Alternatively, you can send us an email via this contact form. 

It’s back to school season in the Northern Hemisphere and for many teachers, this means considering a virtual space for your classroom.

Perhaps you’ve always wanted to have a class blog or get your students publishing online but you don’t know where to start?

There’s no better time to begin than right now! Up until the end of October, we’re offering a free Edublogs Pro subscription to all educators who complete our Blogging With Students course.

Blogging With Students is part of our Teacher Challenge series of free self-paced courses. It’s a great way to learn about getting started with blogging whether you’re interested in having a class blog and/or student blogs.

Here’s the deal…

• When you start the Blogging With Students course, you’ll get a one month subscription to Edublogs Pro.
• If you complete the course (and leave a meaningful comment on each post), you’ll get a 12 month Edublogs Pro subscription.

Simple as that!

This offer is for first-time users who don’t already use Edublogs Pro and is available until October 31, 2019.

How do I get my Pro upgrade?

Organizing your upgrade is simple. All you need to do is start the Blogging With Students course and have your free Edublogs site set up. You can get your free blog by signing up on the Edublogs homepage. 

Once you’ve done these two things, simply email the Edublogs Support team with your blog URL. An example of a URL would be, http://morrisclass2019.edublogs.org

Our email address is listed below or click here to fill out a contact form.

Someone will upgrade your blog within 24 hours.

Email again when you have finished the course and we’ll extend your Pro subscription for 12 months. Make sure you’ve left a meaningful comment on each post in the course.

Everyone who completes a Teacher Challenge course also has access to a certificate and badge.

What Does Edublogs Pro Offer?

A free blog is great for getting started but there are a few advantages of using Edublogs Pro.

• You can embed video and HTML code in your posts, pages, and widgets. This allows you to integrate all sorts of third-party tools into your blog like Padlet, visitor tracking widgets, Google Slides and Docs, and more.
• You can allow your blog to be indexed by search engines like Google if you wish.
• You will have 50GB of storage rather than 1GB. This allows you to add more photos, videos, files, and audio to your blog.
• You can access visitor statistics in your dashboard and set up an email subscription for your readers.
• You can use your own custom domain if this interests you.

Check out the features of our blogs at a glance in this comparison table. 

As you probably know, Edublogs is powered by WordPress which is the tool of choice for the majority of people who publish to the web in 2019 (both in and out of education). Curious to find out more about why WordPress is the best choice for student publishing? This post will help.

While Edublogs remains committed to offering free blogs for everyone, a Pro subscription is usually worth $39.95/year. This new offer is a win-win — free PD and a free virtual space for your year ahead.

About The Blogging With Students Teacher Challenge

This free, self-paced course guides you step-by-step through the process of setting up a class blog and blogging with students.

Maybe you want to just have a class blog, or perhaps you want to mainly focus on setting up blogs for your students.

This course covers both options from the start and you don’t need any prior knowledge. We start from scratch, so as long as you can navigate the internet, you’re good to go.

Each step in the course includes links to class blogs being used by educators to give you ideas and inspiration.

The activities can be completed at your own pace and in any order!

Visit the Blogging With Students home page or use the menu below to check out individual steps:

• Step 1: Set Up Your Class Blog
• Step 2: Set Up Pages
• Step 3: Write Your First Posts
• Step 4: Teach Quality Commenting Skills
• Step 5: Add Widgets
• Step 6: Help Parents And Students Connect
• Step 7: Images, Copyright, And Creative Commons
• Step 8: Embed Content In Posts
• Step 9: All About Video
• Step 10: Connect With Other Classes
• Step 11: Set Up Your Student Blogs

Workbook

We know some teachers like to have a concrete guide to help them work through our online courses. We’ve put together an optional PDF workbook that will help to keep you on track and focused as you work through the 11 steps.

Read through the workbook below to find out more about the challenge.

Scroll down and click on the ‘download’ button under the document to save it to your computer.

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Up For A 30 Day Challenge?

Want some support and reminders as you work through the Blogging With Students Challenge?

Sign up for email reminders!

We’ll pop into your inbox every few days for 30 days and present you one step at a time. We’ll show you exactly what you need to do and offer reminders as well.

To sign up, simply enter your details in the embedded form below, or click here to open the sign-up form in your browser.

You can start at any time.

Tip: Please add support @ edublogs. org to your email contact list to make sure our emails don’t end up in your junk/spam folder! This is how to add a contact in Outlook and in Gmail.

More Free Courses For Teachers And Students

Currently, we have three professional development opportunities on our Teacher Challenge site with more to be added in future.

For students, the Student Blogging Challenge website is home to the supported bi-annual Student Blogging Challenge and the self-paced Blogging Bootcamp.

Here’s an overview of our key professional learning opportunities for teachers and students.

All our professional learning opportunities are free and open to anyone and everyone!

Any Questions?

Leave a comment below and we’ll get back to you!

Have you heard of International Dot Day? It’s BIG! This year, over 14 million students and educators in 181 countries will be celebrating.

International Dot Day is coming up around the week of September 15-ish.

This annual event is all about celebrating creativity, courage, and collaboration.

Getting involved in International Dot Day is easy. It’s free, flexible, and open to any classes from all around the world.

This updated ultimate guide to International Dot Day explains exactly what it is and how to participate.

We’ve put together lots of examples from the educational blogging community and invite you to leave your own ideas in a comment.

About International Dot Day

International Dot Day began when Terry Shay introduced his class to Peter H. Reynold’s book The Dot on September 15, 2009.

In the decade since, this date has been celebrated each year as International Dot Day — a day for classes to explore the story’s powerful themes: bravery, creativity, and self-expression.

About the Book — The Dot

The Dot tells the story of a caring art teacher who reaches a reluctant student in a remarkably creative way.

In Peter’s book, the teacher encourages the student to begin a journey of self discovery and creativity, starting with a simple dot on a piece of paper. Transformed by this journey, the student goes on to inspire others.

Don’t own the book? You can find the story being read on YouTube.

How to Get Involved

Participating in International Dot Day is simple.

1. Visit www.thedotclub.org/dotday Here you can read up on the day, find ideas, and connections.
2. Sign up to participate. This is just a simple survey the organizers use to help plan events around International Dot Day.
3. Explore the handbook. Once you’ve signed up, you can browse through the Dot Day participation handbook. This PDF guide has lots of ideas and a certificate for your students.
4. Read the book to your class. If you or your library don’t have the book, you might opt to view a YouTube video or purchase the interactive online version. 
5. Express yourself in any way. This is where you can get creative. Your dot theme can be incorporated into story writing, artwork, songwriting, photography, dance, cooking, performances or more. Remember, there are lots of ideas in the handbook and in this blog post.
6. Publish! If you have a blog, this is the perfect platform to show the world how you have celebrated the day.
7. Connect. International Dot Day is as much about celebrating creativity as it is about connecting and collaborating. You can connect with the Dot Day community on Twitter or Facebook. There are many teachers looking to connect their class through their blog or tools like Flipgrid or Skype. Such wonderful possibilities for your students!

International Dot Day Ideas For 2019

International Dot Day is something you can celebrate throughout your entire school or just with your class. You can keep things simple or amplify your projects by connecting with others around the globe.

We looked back at how some classes celebrated International Dot Day over the past two years to provide you with some inspiration for your 2019 activities.

Here are 8+ ideas from primary (elementary) and middle school classrooms worldwide.

You can find these ideas and more on our Pinterest board.

1) Group Blog: Connect The Dot Stories

When I was teaching grade 1/2/3 students last year, we connected with 3 other classes in different countries for Dot Day and set up a group blog.

We worked on a range of collaborative activities. One of the most popular was “Connect The Dot Stories“.

Here’s how this activity worked:

• Students got together in small groups and came up with a team name.
• The group came up with one key word from The Dot story that was written or inferred.
• They then came up with a set of 4 other words (not necessarily from the story).
• The children wrote each of their 5 words on a circular ‘dot’ and had a photo taken of the words.
• These photo story prompts were posted on the blog.
• Individuals/pairs/groups from the other class then came up with a short story that includes each of the words.

This was a fun challenge!
Here’s an example that was posted to the blog by one team. Other students used those word prompts to make up a short story.

Team Polar Bear: Art, opened, draw, empty, polar bear, strong

Other activities we came up with that you might want to explore include:

• Augmented Reality Dots
• What Can You Create With A Dot?
• Copy Our Dotty Pictures!

2) Google Hangouts

Amy Kincaid‘s elementary students met with a bilingual class via Google Hangouts. They shared writing assignments about encouragement.

Read more on Amy’s Library Blog.

3) Dot Day Circle Stories

Kevin Hodgson‘s sixth graders celebrated being creative with writing and with art.

They wrote short Circle Stories with either a circular object or a circular theme. They used the words to “paint” the stories into circles (or dots) using a free tool called Visual Poetry.

They collated their Circle Stories in a Padlet.

Find out more on Kevin’s class blog, The Electronic Pencil, and on his professional blog, Kevin’s Meandering Mind. 

Padlet books with dots

4) Kindness Rocks

Inspired by the Kindness Rocks movement, Mrs. Shemansky and her colleague did a rock painting activity with their middle school art classes.

The students ‘made their mark’ by painting two rocks each. One rock became part of the school rock garden and the second rock was hidden and shared with others.

Read more on Mrs. Shemansky’s Class Blog.

5) Dotty Videos

Senior School students at Togher School in County Cork, Ireland put together this great video about Dot Day 2018!

During a collaboration with Linda Yollis‘ class in California in 2017, her third graders made a video to show my students around her school.

Read more about this project on Mrs. Yollis’ Classroom Blog.

6) School-Wide Thinglink

Dot Day was a school-wide affair for Karen Arrington’s students in 2017. The activities involved design thinking, art, augmented reality, Flipgrid and more.

Karen compiled all of the great activities the students completed in a Thinglink.

Read more details on these activities on Karen’s Tech Tips blog. 

7) Skyping In-Person

Jen Bearden, Rachael Turken and their first grade students tried all sorts of things on International Dot Day. There was singing, dancing, artwork, and math.

See what these young students got up to on Jen Bearden’s blog, 20 Something Kids And 1 Kooky Teacher, and Rachel Turken’s blog, im 4 students. 

To share their creations, Mrs. Bearden’s class was going to Skype with Ms. Turken’s class next door as practice for future calls. Technical problems led to them doing ‘in-person’ Skype calls in a fun and creative way.

Check out all the action from their in-person Skype session on this blog post. 

8) A Dotty Day

Becky Versteeg and her Team 2 Eagles students had a busy Dot Day in 2017. After reading the story, they got some creative with some artwork and writing.

This video with The Dot author, Peter H. Reynolds, provided inspiration for their dotty creations.

They then tried some dot day math with dominoes and finished the day with some music.

These lyrics are for a song that Peter H. Reynolds and Emily Arrow wrote for International Dot Day. Find the video and actions here.

Shannon Miller’s Resources

K-12 Teacher Librarian, Shannon Miller is a leader in the International Dot Day Community. A post on Shannon’s blog explains how you can connect and celebrate.

She shares a link to a Google Doc where people can add their details, schedules, and make connections. Shannon has also put together some Padlets with resources and picture books, plus a Pinterest board.

Check out Shannon’s post for all the details and links.

How will you celebrate?

How will you make your mark on International Dot Day this year? Leave a comment and tell us.

If you blog about International Dot Day, be sure to leave the link in a comment!