Starting a blog as a teacher can seem impossible. You already have countless responsibilities and may not feel that you have enough time. However, you could be missing out on opportunities to build valuable connections with students, parents, and fellow professionals. Thankfully, creating a teacher blog doesn’t have to be time-consuming. Once you’ve set everything up, you may discover that web content can help you showcase and grow your skill set while developing an engaged audience.
In this article, we take a look at the benefits that come with running a teacher-focused blog. Then, we offer some tips to help you launch one. Let’s get started!
4 Benefits of Making a Teacher-Focused Blog
Adding more work to your list of responsibilities may not be ideal. However, running a teaching blog could pay off over time and prove worth the effort. Here are four reasons to consider starting one.
1. It Can Improve Your School’s Online Visibility
One of the first benefits we’ll discuss is related to your school as a whole. When you post online content regularly, you’re actually providing your institution with more opportunities to appear in search engine results for various education-related topics.
In today’s digital world, having a web and social media presence can bolster enrollment rates for private schools and universities. By curating a teacher-focused blog, you may extend your institution’s online visibility.
In fact, many students base their decision to apply to a university solely on the school’s website. It may seem startling, but they often won’t reach out to directly contact the institution. Instead, they’ll use whatever information they find online to form their opinions.
The newest generation of students is particularly tech-savvy. They’re on all forms of social media and know how to quickly find information they need. Of course, that applies to schools. If they want to know more about your institution, then a teacher-focused blog could be an excellent means of getting their attention.
However, a well-maintained blog doesn’t just potentially benefit your school’s enrollment rates. Through it, you may also pique the attention of other teachers looking for work. If you’re showing your institution in a positive light, you’ll likely paint an attractive image to other educators.
2. Your Content Can Increase Parental Engagement
Having a teacher-focused blog can also be an opportunity to increase parental engagement. Through your content, parents can gain valuable insight into how you teach, the challenges you and other educators face, and additional general developments related to their students.
Ultimately, higher levels of parental involvement can benefit students – and thereby schools and educators – in a multitude of ways, including:
- Higher grades and test scores
- Improved student behavior
- Increased likelihood of students continuing their education
- Better-developed social skills
One way you could accomplish this is to incorporate a comments section on your teaching blog. This can offer parents an avenue to actively express their opinions. By having extra time to think about what they want to say, without the pressure of face-to-face conversations, you can create an inclusive environment.
Parents may also get a candid look at what students are really working on, and how they behave at school. Along those lines, this could encourage them to connect with and genuinely praise their children, which can be excellent for your pupils’ self-esteem.
Additionally, parents can use a teacher-focused blog as a means of better understanding the challenges you might face as an educator, such as large class sizes or lack of supplies. This can provide opportunities for parents to become your allies and help you tackle these issues through donations and public support.
3. Blogging Could Create Opportunities for Professional Networking
As with many careers, educators can benefit from using blogs as a platform to network with other professionals. When you build up relationships within your field, you can find other teachers with whom to exchange ideas, share resources, and offer each other support.
A professional teaching network could also help you further your goals by providing new knowledge and perspectives. You may apply them immediately to your current role, or otherwise develop and hone skill sets that you can utilize throughout your career.
For example, if you write a post about how you’re struggling in a specific area, another teacher may leave a comment offering a solution. With their own professional history and experiences, they may be able to provide you with a different perspective to help you see things in a new way.
Your blog could also help you come up with new teaching methods through collaboration. You’ll not only be able to look at how others work, but you may be able to discuss what techniques they’ve found to be successful, and why.
Additionally, you can use your blog as a means to help other teachers build their own online presences. By inviting experienced educators to guest post on your blog, you might give them an outlet to share their unique experiences and approaches too.
4. A Blog Can Boost Your Resume and Showcase Your Teaching Accomplishments
If you decide that you need to move to a new school or want to try applying for an administrative position, a blog could give you a much-needed boost. It can be hard to stand out among other applicants, but your site may be just the thing you need to draw attention from hiring committees.
With a blog, you can showcase your achievements, actively demonstrate your teaching capabilities, and detail your knowledge and expertise. These, by themselves, can be beneficial for nurturing relationships and affirming your own credentials by documenting your career, as well as your day-to-day as an educator.
In fact, your blog can act as a supplement to your resume and CV. After all, what better way to show off your real-world experience than through a collection of articles on teaching methods and education-related issues?
The more you put into your teaching blog, the more content you’ll have to show when you need it. As such, you may want to include a section on your blog for lessons you’ve created over the years, or projects you’ve come up with that you’ve found to be successful.
Your blog can also be a vehicle to display your teaching philosophy. With your own online platform, you’re free to dig into the details of why you educate the way you do, and what motivates you to remain in your field.
On the other hand, if you ever decide to leave education and pursue a different career, your blog could still prove useful. Running a site and producing quality web content are key skills in a wide variety of positions. You can include them on your resume as relevant experience.
How to Create a Teacher-Focused Blog
Your very first step to creating your teacher-focused blog is to pick your Content Management System (CMS). This is simply the platform you’ll use to build your site so you don’t need to do all the work from scratch.
WordPress is a popular choice for a new blog, as it comes with many benefits and features. It’s fairly easy for beginners to pick up, but simultaneously offers advanced options for experienced users.
You’ll also need to select a hosting provider. This is the company that will store your website on a server so readers can access it.
If you do pick WordPress as your CMS, consider a host that specializes in the platform, such as Edublogs. It’s a WordPress-based provider with a focus on educational blogs. It offers a selection of high-quality plugins alongside student and class management features:
All of this can help make setting up your site much easier. Given Edublogs’ experienced support for educators and students, it will be able to provide expert insight to meet your specific needs as a teaching blogger.
The right theme can also make starting out simpler. Fortunately, Edublogs allows you to preview various options through their website. They can be filtered by category so that you can quickly find one that is accessible, mobile friendly, and aesthetically pleasing.
Next, you may want to develop a plan-of-action to guide your blog’s growth. To start, you could map out your short and long-term goals. This can help you with developing a content strategy and planning future posts by guiding your decisions, keeping you motivated, and focusing your attention on key areas.
Of course, Edublogs has a complete guide to setting up a WordPress site, which could be a helpful reference. Combined with your thoughtful planning, you can start your blog on the right foot.
Conclusion
Setting up a teacher-focused blog can help you build rewarding relationships with other professionals, students, and parents alike. By doing so, you can share your knowledge and document your achievements as an educator.
Let’s take another look at four of the benefits of starting your own teaching blog:
- It can improve your school’s online visibility.
- Your content may encourage increased parental engagement.
- Your blog can create opportunities for professional networking and growth.
- A professional blog can showcase your accomplishments when you’re job hunting.
Do you have any questions or thoughts about making your teacher-focused blog? Ask away in the comments section below!