Common Sense Media- Easy Way to Preview Media

I don't know about you, but for me as a parent and a teacher it has gotten harder and harder to decide what may or may not be appropriate for children to view.  One thing I love about this website and app is that it not only gives you the rating, but it also tells you WHY the rating was given. 

The following was taken from www.commonsensemedia.org

	Common Sense Media helps families make smart media choices. We offer the largest, most trusted library of independent age-based and educational ratings and reviews for movies, games, apps, TV shows, websites, books, and music.  Our Parent Concerns and Parent Blog help families understand and navigate the problems and possibilities of raising children in the digital age.
	Common Sense Education provides teachers and schools with free research-based classroom tools to help students harness technology for learning and life. Our K–12 Digital Citizenship Curriculum teaches students how to make safe, smart, and ethical decisions in the digital world.  And our revolutionary educational rating system, Graphite, helps educators discover, use, and share high-quality digital products that propel student learning.
	Common Sense Kids Action works with policy makers, business leaders, and other advocates across the nation to ensure that every child has the opportunity to succeed. Kids Action works to drive policies at the state and national levels that ensure all kids 0-5 have access to vital education and health resources; that all children have high-quality digital learning experiences; that their online data and privacy is protected; and that child poverty is reduced in America. With over 65 million Common Sense users, more than 275,000 educators, and potential advocates in every home and school across the nation, Common Sense’s advocacy platform is building a movement dedicated to making kids our nation's top priority.

Why I Love Kidblog

We all know that teachers are rich, right?  Wrong.  So, usually I steer clear of resources that cost money.  However, when it comes to having my sweet students create their own learning portfolios on a blog the $36 annual fee for Kidblog is well worth the money.

The Top 5 Reasons I Love Kidblog
1.  Ease of use- Even for my students who struggle with using technology, one 30 minute lesson was all it took to have them blogging on their own.  It was very quick for me to register my students, and each student got their own page.  Kidblog uses a very simple design and it almost guides the blogger through the posting process.

2.  Management- I can control who can post, what posts, and who can view it.

3.  Safety- Unless I (the teacher) have added you to the blog, you will not be able to see any posts.

4. Collaboration- In reference to #3, if I want to collaborate with another classroom we can link our classes so that they can view and comment.  This is great for global awareness and 21st Century collaboration skills.

5.  Parent Access- A student can send their parent an invitation to "join", but that parent can only see his/her own child's blog posts.

Mentor Texts

I don't know about you, but sometimes I struggle with matching the perfect text to the objective that I am teaching.  So after doing some extensive research  Googling, I came across this blog that I absolutely love.  It is called, Teach Mentor Texts and you can find tons of books with excerpts, suggested paired reads, and writing prompts.  Simply click on the label that matches the objective you are teaching and a list of books with teaching ideas will pop up on your screen!