So I use several methods to communicate with parents about our classroom activities but i still had trouble getting some parents to "seek" out my weekly update. They were just passive about it. Then one day during snack time, one of my students asked me what I was typing up. I explained that I was sending a message to his parents about what we were doing during the week and what we would be doing the next week. He then looked at me and said, " Can I help?" That blew me away! That was it. Surely I could get parents to seek out the weekly news if their own kids were the ones giving it to them. Now the question was.... how do I get 5 year olds to send out weekly news? I didn't want them to have to write it and then correct it so that it was legible. They would be much better at just verbalizing it. That is when I decided to try weekly podcasting. Each week, we brainstorm the weekly news and announcements as a class. We use shared & interactive writing to compose the news and then I select two "guest podcasters" for the week. They rehearse their readings in small group with me and then I use audacity to record them. When I am finished and have saved the file as an mp3, I upload it to edmodo. The kids are super excited and always go home and get their parents to log in and listen.
If you don't use edmodo, you could always use podbean. A player is available to place on classroom webpages or blogs. Of course, it is always an option to email the mp3 file to parents.
Try your hand at podcasting! It is a super fun way to give your kids a real world application of reading, writing, and speaking.
Cheers,
Ellen
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