Public domain image courtesy of http://www.wpclipart.com/
Davies and Merchant (2009) state, "Blogs are now a well-established and widely recognized form of digital communication, and this alone suggests that they should be taken seriously in educational settings” (p.34)
Blogging is a relatively new concept to me. Personally, my first experience with blogging came with the creation of my Action Research Blog in the Media Literature Research Methodologies course through Full Sail’s Education Media Design and Technology Masters’ degree program. It was relatively easy for me to respond to prompts, and I discovered that I enjoyed using this venue to “think out loud”. I also derived benefit from the comments from critical friends. Now I have created two additional blogs, and was surprised by the simplicity of the process and what little time it involved.
As I look back over my lifetime and think about how communication has changed, I am struck by the fact that the tools that I so commonly use today, and that my own children take for granted, were far beyond my imagination when I was in public school! Although I previously had not given it much thought, the concept of blogging in public education settings is very interesting. Are students more apt to express their thoughts in a blog? Will we as educators gain a greater sense of who our students are? As we strive to engage our students to learn in meaningful ways, we definitely need to change with the times. It is my opinion that keeping an open mind and eliminating “never” from our vocabularies as educators will allow us to grow and prepare our students for the unknown that lies ahead.
“Blogs and wikis are changing who we are as learners, preparing us for a future driven by peer production and networked learning. All you need to get started is a willingness to explore and a sense of the kinds of tools that make this work easy” (Ferriter, 2009, p.38).
The article “Educational Uses of Blogs and Wikis” by Flierl and Fowler provides a number of websites to help educators use these tools in engaging students in digital discussions and creating a workspace for collaborative projects. (Flierl and Fowler, 2007, p.1)
References
Davies, J., & Merchant, G. (2009). Web 2.0 for schools: Learning and social
participation. New York: Peter Lang Publishing, Inc.
Ferriter, B. (2009). Learning with Blogs and Wikis. Educational Leadership, 66(5),
34-38. Retrieved from ERIC database on January 7, 2010.
Flierl, R., & Fowler, H. (2007). Educational Uses of Blogs and Wikis. Phi Delta
Kappan, 89(3), C3. Retrieved from Academic Search Premier database on January
7, 2010.
