As someone who spends a lot of time showing teachers how to use blogs it's probably unsurprising that I get hooked up in the technicalities of blogging: how to add slideshows, how to create surveys etc. It's nice when I get a gentle reminder every once in a while that blogging is only a tool and it takes the creative spark of a teacher to make something worthwhile happen.
I had just such a reminder yesterday at the Manchester Head Teacher's Conference. I had been asked to run a seminar with Jack Sloan, a year 2 teacher from Chorlton Park where I have done quite a bit of teaching over the years. It was listening to Jack talking about the wonderful and creative work that goes on in his class that caused me to reflect that yes, his class blog is one of the best Keystage 1 blogs you could ever hope to visit (in my opinion, the best, and I'm proud to host it), but actually it wasn't the blog itself that was so impressive, rather the extent to which Jack has used this very simple technology to create a truly empowering learning environment for his children.
A particular highlight was the traditional tales unit he did using Jack and the Beanstalk as the basis, and you can follow the development of the project from first ideas, design work and peer critique all the way through to the finished movie.
http://yeartwo.chorltonparkblogs.net/tag/jack-and-the-beanstalk/