My Experience with Educational Blogging

Blogging has been a recent endeavor by society. Since 1994, blogs have been platforms to post short writings and the author's thoughts on the chosen topic. Posting snippets of one's thoughts and opinions on specific issues has become popular, especially within the last two decades: this post will specifically focus on the popularity of Educational Blogs. Educational blogs serve an educational purpose - typically written by students, teachers, administrators, or education researchers. 

A person creating a blog post.

From the teacher's point of view, educational blogging allows instructors to increase professional development and exchange their experiences and thoughts for improving education with other academic personnel. If used in the classroom, teachers can also provide resources for their students and update students, parents, and guardians about happenings in the class. From the student's point of view, educational blogging allows students to express their voices and practice communication with others who may have different opinions. Student blogging for a class also increases their analytical thinking skills and improves student creativity, which may be a secondary focus in classes. Despite the plethora of educational blogging benefits, there are also a few challenges. Blogging can take away from classroom learning time, students may struggle to stay on topic, and interactions have the potential to become disrespectful if opinions differ. 

My Educational Technology class has allowed us to create blogs to share information related to academia, which we are passionate about. Amanda Curran's "Mental Health Care for Teachers" post focuses on tips and tricks to prevent teacher burnout. As I touched on in my post titled "The Importance of Mental Health Care in K-12," advocating for student mental health resources should be a top priority of the school system. However, our students are not the only ones facing mental health challenges. In Curran's post, she shares that teacher burnout is a massive issue across the education community due to being overworked, underpaid, and have little to no time to care for their family. Some tips she shares for teachers are focusing only on what one can control, setting boundaries for your classroom, and staying in touch with loved ones. These tips are the first steps in advocating for teachers' mental health. Just like students, providing mental health resources for teachers should also be a top priority for the school system. Because like Curran said, how can we expect our teachers to take care of their students if they do not have adequate time to care for themselves? Meghan Thorton's "Mental Health Awareness in Education" post also focuses on mental health advocacy for the students from the teacher's perspective. Thorton mentions that one in five people have a mental illness, meaning that many of our school-age population live with one. As she notes, since our children spend most of their day in class, they need access to mental health resources, including their teachers. Although I do not believe our teachers should have to handle all students' mental health problems, I agree with Meghan that training our teachers to recognize student distress and hardship could save lives. Finally, Katerina Scott also addressed advocating for our students, specifically our neurodivergent population, in her post titled "Diverse Neurotypes in the Classroom." Scott mentions that schools provide screening for different neurotypes; however, educators can do more to provide a welcoming environment for these students. She recommends giving visual supplements for instruction and allowing students to express their creativity on tasks more freely to help enhance the overall classroom environment for all. 

Though my experience with blogging has been short, I have enjoyed all of it. Being passionate about many different things and having an outlet to express my opinions has been relaxing and fun. I can see myself continuing to blog throughout my teaching career, showcasing my passions, student work, and as a way to communicate with parents and guardians. 

The Importance of Mental Health Care in K-12

Mental health is an individual's overall well-being involving emotional, psychological, and social aspects. Individual mental health affects the way one thinks, feels, and acts. Mental health can fluctuate over time due to internal and external factors. If faced with several, it can result in poor mental health, impacting how one responds to stressful events, grades, and making healthy choices. Within the last ten years, all indicators of poor mental health have increased steadily amongst our adolescent population. From 2011 to 2021, the percentage of students that experienced persistent sadness or hopelessness, considered suicide, planned to commit suicide, and attempted suicide all increased. The increase in the percentage of students that experienced steady sadness or hopelessness was the starkest of them all: there was a 21 percent increase for females and an 8 percent increase for males. Though these statistics include the entire K-12 population, some groups were found to be more heavily affected by poor mental health than others. The above indicators were more common in LGBTQIA+, female, and minority communities. 

The rising rates of poor mental health in adolescents have also been tied to the COVID-19 pandemic and the struggle for racial justice in minority communities. In 2020, suicide became the second leading cause of death among 10 to 14-year-olds and the third for 15 to 24-year-olds. As previously stated, mental health affects how one thinks, feels, and acts. Poor mental health can lead to increased drug use and violence as a way to cope with internal and external factors. With our youth spending most of their day in the classroom, our education system must continue providing mental health care to our students. 

Both my middle and high schools had staff trained to assist students in times of need. In middle school, each grade had one assigned counselor we would report to when we needed to talk about things happening. Counselors and social workers were assigned in high school based on the student's last name. Both sets of staff were equipt to help students with their problems, but the social workers spoke to the mental health facilities in the area and student families when problems became more severe. I never experienced anything throughout my schooling that required me to talk to my counselor or social worker. However, I had someone close to me rely on their social worker for three of their four years of high school. Had it not been for the mental health support we were afforded in our education, I am not sure they would have ever reached out for the help they needed. 

Teachers can not be expected to handle all of their students' problems; frankly, they are not equipped to do so. With mental health rates on a steady incline, it is crucial to continue to provide our students with mental health care in schools. Adolescents spend over half of the year in school, and if their mental health is not doing well, we can not expect them to perform at their highest level in class.

A school counselor meeting with a student.

Aside from learning, student well-being should be the school's top priority. After the outbreak of COVID-19, many school counseling services were halted, pushing the weight onto parents and guardians, all while students' mental health continued to decline. 

To help our students grow, we must provide them with resources, including mental health services. Counselors and social workers can help students feel comfortable talking about what they are going through, but implementing support groups can also curate bonds between students and students with adults. The first step to a successful student is providing them with the means to care for themselves physically, mentally, emotionally, and socially. 

Cultivating Diversity and Inclusion in the Classroom

Equality in the classroom is something of a recent feat. In a broad scope, equality is treating all people the same and giving them equal opportunities. In 1954, the landmark decision in Brown v. Board of Education stated that school segregation was unconstitutional. From this point forward, schools were to be of equal opportunity for everyone, regardless of racial background. Cultivating equality in the classroom, however, is more than just integrating racial backgrounds into the same classes. 

Diversity and inclusion are two more modern terms that go hand-in-hand when discussing equality in schools. In the classroom, diversity and inclusion mean that every student has equal access and opportunity to thrive, there are open conversations about student concerns, and steps in place to handle difficult situations. Of course, all three of these practices are easier said than done. Every year, educators get a new group of students who walk into the class with different backgrounds and beliefs each year. These beliefs may include prejudice and bias that students and teachers may have picked up from family, neighborhoods, and social media. These biases cause certain students to feel unsafe in their classrooms. As previously stated, equality is treating all people the same: if students from different backgrounds feel at risk in their classes, how are our schools promoting equality? To cultivate a diverse and inclusive classroom, teachers can model respect for all, foster belonging for all students and their families, and instruct through a lens of diversity. 

For 18 years, I grew up in a town with a population of about 27,000, with less than 15 percent being of a non-white background. My school system, however, is less than four percent multiracial—the background that I identify with. Though I felt safe in my classes, I cannot recall one that focused heavily on promoting diversity or inclusion. In high school, especially, I started to feel like an outcast in my community. Rather than foster equal belonging for all students by integrating all aspects of school, minority students were often singled out and given different opportunities. Being singled out at a mere 14 years old made me feel ostracized from where I called home, and if I had to guess, I am not the only minority student that has experienced similar situations. 

Students celebrate the diversity of
cultures they have in their school.

Creating a diverse and inclusive school system helps eliminate these feelings that minorities may have, ultimately cultivating a more positive learning environment for all. Out of all necessities in the classroom, I put diversity and inclusion in the top five. If students do not feel welcome in their environment, it will eventually affect their grades and learning abilities, and classroom management will begin to falter when tensions arise between students. We should educate teachers on how to actively engage with students from multiple backgrounds and model what they learn. In that case, their students, in turn, can take what they know and apply it to their everyday lives—ultimately creating a learning environment that allows all types of students to thrive while teaching each other about other cultures different from their own. Allowing students to express their concerns, having group discussions about what they are going through, and group work with individuals from various backgrounds help promote critical thinking and creativity, all while fostering a safe environment for all students. 

Restorative Justice in the Classroom

Creating a safe environment for students in a place that they are required to be is step one to building community within schools. For years, these systems would implement suspensions and office referrals to discipline students when there are more effective ways to manage incidents that also curate a safe environment.

Students and community members
engaging in a Restorative Justice meeting

Restorative Justice is a system that has started to be utilized in the classroom to repair the damage done to the school and the greater community so students can focus on learning. Schools implementing Restorative Justice will hold meetings that include the offending student, those they harmed, and sometimes community members to fix this damage. These meetings aim to hold the offending student accountable for their actions and provide those they did harm with a safe environment to express how the events impacted them. Schools across the country are vastly different and face different levels of severity regarding behavior problems. Restorative Justice training teams recognize these differences and help schools develop a plan specific to the needs of their students and community. Some schools that have created a Restorative Justice plan have found that they can better foster an inclusive, social-connected community while managing classrooms that don't take away from learning opportunities. 

I had never heard of Restorative Justice until three weeks ago. My K-12 experience relied heavily on going to the Principal's Office and receiving in-school suspensions for acting out while in school. I never understood either option's point because it was just a way of preventing the student from being able to learn with the rest of their classmates. The students that faced in-school suspensions typically continued to get them throughout the rest of the school year because they got out of sitting in class. However, the more they receive in-school suspensions, the farther behind they fall in class. The system clearly doesn't work if students continue to receive in-school suspensions and never truly learn from their actions. A broken system is one of the factors in non-100% graduation rates, poor classroom management, and a lack of parent/guardian involvement in the school. Restorative Justice, I believe, is the key to combating all three issues. 

Many students who lack connection with their school, community, and family find themselves acting out to cope with their feelings. Many teachers and psychologists can pick up on cues as to when students may act out, but by that point, it may be too late. Restorative Justice training can help establish procedures to prevent poor behavior before it reaches that point. The type of students mentioned above only continues to feel distance from their school and community the more time they have to spend away from the classroom. Restorative practices eliminate the need to take students away from learning time by hosting meetings outside of the school day: students and parents/guardians who are occupied during the day can partake in conversations to repair relationships. Communication is vital to fostering relationships, and allowing students to express their feelings is the first step to creating their community. I believe that Restorative Justice programs are beneficial not only for the students in school but also for their parents/guardians. Keeping guardians in the loop about their student's behavior in school--a place they are required to be--will help them strengthen their relationships and keep them involved with the greater school community.