Blogging has been a great success thus far. A few interesting comments from some students, but under the notification center (seen below) you can “Hide” comments that do not fit the criteria of the assignment/class.
Victoria commented on my last blog post and asked to see what the teacher side / back end of Fan School looked like.
The teacher view of our “Space” is the same as the student view. We can add an article, image, video, or file to our home page or “Space.”
Under settings, you can dictate moderation of articles and responses, list of students being visible to the public (I have this turned off) and the title of the space. Because of my group of students, I am moderating turned off for posts, but I am moderating comments between students. I originally started moderating posts, but students wanted their posts visible immediately so they could start collecting comments and feedback (sort of like “Likes” on Instagram or TikTok etc.). I have a strong group of students this year and have only caught a couple of ‘iffy’ posts made, and had discussions with those students regarding their conduct. I am assessing the posts so I have been keeping up with reading them as they come in. Comments on the other hand can be a little more heated based on content or whom is commenting on who’s post.
Here is our notification center when I can approve or hide comments, edit the audience students post to (teacher’s cannot make a post more public than a student wants, but can make a post more private … from public to “Space”).
On Fan School, you can also reach out to the social network community. I have not ventured this far, yet.
I am starting to feel like I have taken on a great deal with the blogging and social media scrapbook creation. It is a heavy semester for my students and want to ensure I am using the tools authentically, not just adding on more and more for the sake of doing so. I remember getting some great advice from our Tech Coaches in my division: “Use a few tools really well rather than attempting to use them all”
Thanks for reading!
Dalton Danaher 
Dear Dalton,
Sounds like things are going well with your blogging project and social media scrapbook. Balancing boundaries while building structures to enhance creativity via free range learning is always a challenge for education. It is good to hear you are involving students in the solutions to encourage postitive digital communication- That is so wise as is the safge advice your Tech coaches” Use a few tools really well, rather than attempting to use them all.”
Brenda
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Hey Dalton- good to hear things are going well! I have always been curious of using blogging and online discussion within my grade 8 class, but have been cautious of the maturity of some of my groups. Its encouraging to see that Fan School has tools built in to allow you to hide off topic/inappropriate posts. You’ve gotten me interested in Fan School, and I’m already thinking of how I might incorporate it into one of my upcoming Social 8 Units. I’ll be very interested to read your thoughts throughout the semester!
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Thank you for sharing what the backend looks like! It’s a time like this I really miss teaching the middle grades, I cannot believe there is such a cool platform out there I had not heard of at all before! You live and you learn! I really really like that students can express a certain amount of assent on the platform (you can make their work more private but you cannot make their work more public than they choose). I clearly know a how lot less about the platform than you do but I would encourage you that if you feel the work that is currently happening is already meaningful stay in it – explore that! I think as your learning project develops maybe there will be a natural point where introducing the social network community feels like the appropriate progression.
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Thanks, Victoria. It dawned on me today that even if students do their culminating task (scrapbook) as a hard copy rather than a social media account, students can still share their work on the blog to have their peers comment on it as a final reflection. That way, we still maintain the ‘connected educator’ mentality and the eci 831 class can still view their work as well! Thanks for the comment and support!
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