Putting the Blog into action in the classroom

Today my purpose was to investigate how I would set up a blog for my classroom, insure I had a safe environment for student access and design some sort of activity for them to get started.  I discovered the blogging site for teachers called 21publish.com.  At this blogsite you can set up community pages for any type of group.  You designate who can access your website either by inviting them through email, or providing them with their own log in information.  If you allow the server to run advertising on your blog than you can set up a simple free blogsite for up to 100 community members with 2MB memory for each blogpage.  Your page runs in two layers...the first layer consists of the administrators (or teachers) page, posts, news, etc. that only the administrator can post new items on.  Members or students can comment on this page for all postings.  The second layer allows students to create their own individual blogs which can be useful for them to post their own interesting links, digital portfolios (post on these to follow), or submit projects.  Each person in my group should have received an invitation to join my community in the wou.edu email account.  If you did not receive this, please let me know!  If you are not in my group and would like to be a member please let me know and I will set you up so you can see the site.  At this point, it isn't fancy...many of the features are not available with the free membership.  But I have posted a link to an interactive math game which you can access and then comment back on.  This type of blogspot can be a useful tool in assessing student abilities.  It fosters a sense of community because no one student has any advantage over another and all students can participate in a non-intimidating environment.  Teachers can post homework, interactive games, extra credit activities, projects and can communicate with parents.  Use is restricted solely to the group.  Teachers can manage these type of pages easily as once the class has completed, the pages can be deleted in order to make room for your next class.  Postings can be archived to keep a record at hand of past activities.