Preparing Teachers for 21st Century Skills: Using Blogs to Support Students in Learning Math and Encourage Teacher-Student-Parent Communications

Blogs are used to support future P-12 students in learning math and to encourage student, parent and teacher communication outside of the classroom. In this paper, valuable online resources are identified plus literature is summarized that documents the opportunities that blogging can bring to the educational setting. There is definitely a need for tech support and training to assist pre-service teachers on how to use social media and blogs. Most importantly, the pre-service teachers need support in using social media technology to plan for communications between generations. Educators need access to resources and tech support that will help them to reach out to parents and increase their involvement in their student’s success in the classroom. Summary recommendations included using one of the free blog resources and ensuring guidance is provided to the students in the teacher education program regarding the need to plan the purpose of the blog, timeliness of communications and post, the navigation and organization of the blog site, plus their need to make a plan on how to develop and maintain their blog site for the most effective use (i.e., 2-way communication) between teachers and their students/parents