Context

The World Cup, 2006 provided the context for this project which was carried out with two Year 6 classes in Michael Faraday Primary School - a multicultural, inner-city school. A team from the English Education department at Roehampton University worked with the class teachers, teaching assistants and children for the six week duration of the World Cup.

They introduced a range of English activities including:

• immersion in a variety of texts (non-fiction, magazines, newspapers, poetry, novels and picture books);
• discussion about the language of football commentary
• writing individual journals (designed by the team and including structures for a range of writing)
• drama and role-play
• posting entries on a web-log (blog)

Aims & principles

The overall project aimed to explore how far children’s interests in an international sporting event could be a springboard for enhancing and developing their language skills. The project was driven by these questions:

• Where, in the current primary English curriculum, is there space for children’s own interests and voices?
• Drawing on Luis Moll’s notion of ’funds of knowledge’, what are the language affordances of a world sporting event for the primary classroom?
• To what extent can these affordances act as a vehicle for informing approaches to language and literacy in the classroom?

Summary

In this case-study the focus is on one element of the project: the web-log (blog). This was set up by the team using the TypePad website which offers guidance on setting up a protected site for blogging. As well as the opportunity for regular writing, the Michael Faraday blog site also included hyperlinks to other relevant websites (e.g. World Cup Poets).

http://www.typepad.com/

Key aims of the blogging element of the project were:

• using blogging as way of opening up new opportunities for children to write
• harnessing the national interest in the World Cup to stimulate the children’s language use.

This case study demonstrates the vibrancy that can be captured in children’s writing when sporting interests are brought into the classroom.
It also shows hoe effect home school links can be made using new technologies and that this provides further opportunities for practising writing that has been introduced and developed in school.

In Practice

This is how the blog worked:

• After each match match reports were posted
• The matches were discussed and children were encouraged through teacher comments and questions so there was plenty of talk before writing
• initially children posted their contributions in a session in the school’s computer suite
• For the duration of the World Cup the children added to the blog at home and school voluntarily
• Analysis of their blog entries showed the children spontaneously using language in many different ways: discussing, reflecting, speculating, describing, questioning, entertaining and chatting to each other.

Partnerships

The project was funded by a small grant from one of Roehampton University’s research centres (Centre for International Research on Creativity and Learning in Education, CIRCLE).

• Four researchers from the English Education team, Roehampton University
• Teachers, teaching assistants and children from Michael Faraday school

Outcomes

The outcomes of this project are best articulated through the children’s voices.

Enthusiasm and motivation

The blog is the best part because you can put your own opinions into it and you don’t need your friends to do anything, you can just put your own opinions on.

This child’s reflection at the end of the project highlights the enthusiasm that was generated by the blog.

‘Voice for the voiceless’: the reluctant writer

I think that if England are winning comfortably then I would put on Theo so he can get past the tired defenders. But, if England were chasing the game, then I wouldn’t put him on because it puts a lot of pressure on him and he’ll get frustrated and lose the ball.

The phrase ‘voice for the voiceless’ came from one of the teachers in her reflections on the blog at the end of project. This blog entry was written by a boy who was enthusiastic, knowledgeable and vocal about football but a most unwilling writer. The confident and sophisticated way in which he manages his speculations as to whether Sven Goran Erikson should use the young player, Theo Walcott, is quite uncharacteristic of his writing output.

‘Voice for the voiceless’: daring to speak out

Watching TV is better than football. I would watch Tom and Jerry. My best opinion on football is football is boring as snoring. If there were no rules, I would watch it. I think football is a waste of time!!!!!!!!!  What is the whole point of football?
Not all the children were football fans. Here one dissenter feels sufficiently empowered by the blog to vent her feelings.

Home-school continuity

I do it [the blog] by myself. I watch the matches and after that I write about it. Sometimes in half-time I write about it, and then again after the match.

As blogging took off, children began posting entries from home as well as school. There seemed to be a blurring of boundaries here as they readily carried out ‘school’ work at home.

‘In-the-moment’ language of football commentary

Cracking goal
Classic match
Defence was sleeping
He skills-up most of the team
Great pace and first touch
Best clearance
Bicycle kick
Clinical finisher

Particularly striking was the children’s use of what the team have called ‘in-the-moment’ language of football commentary.

These specialised, vivid phrases were to be found in many blog entries and contributed to its overall energy and dynamism.

An early focus of the project had been on the features of sporting language but how far this had an impact we cannot really say given the exposure many of the children had to football commentary during the World Cup.

Resources

Setting up a blog
http://www.typepad.com/

Teachers’ TV
Inspirations: Blogosphere
http://www.teachers.tv/video/167

Background reading

Burnett, C. et al (2006) ’Digital connections: transforming literacy in the
primary school’, Cambridge Journal of Education, 36, no.1, 11-29
Safford, K., F. Collins, A. Kelly & D. Montgomerie (2007) ’Language &
Sport: Exploring the Field’, Primary English Magazine

Children’s books

Fantastic Football Clive Gifford (non-fiction)
I Love You, Football Tony Bradman (poetry)
The Ice Warrior Robin Chambers (sci-fi short story)
Wicked World Cup Michael Coleman (non-fiction)
World Team Tim Vyner (picture book)

Summary

What did we find out?

Blogging:

• encouraged a link between home and school
• provided a different way of developing literacy in the classroom that excited and stimulated the children and teachers
• motivated the children to write creatively and for different purposes
• offered a new literacy space for children’s voices and interests

Questions for staff development

Have you ever visited a blog or blogged yourself?

Is blogging just the same as writing a diary?

In what ways is blogging a new or different kind of writing?

Could blogging offer new opportunities for writing in the primary classroom?

Could blogging work in your school?

Could blogging be used in different curriculum areas?

Would it work with all age-ranges?

Should the school have a blog?

Should the staff be blogging?

Could an afternoon club be used to encourage blogging?

What policy decisions do we need to make (e.g. monitoring the content of blog entries, allowing [or not] children to make blog entries freely without being hampered by transcriptional worries)?

Contacts

Fiona Collins / Roehampton University
Alison Kelly / Roehampton University

---

Comments on Children blogging: Exploring the Field

There are 1 comments Read comments | Post a comment