1. Using Blogs

This paper discusses the strengths and weaknesses of blogs, the kind of instruction used to get the students started, the use of rubrics and other practices used for blogging in a community college English class. I am currently using blogs in two sections of English 2 (composition and critical thinking) at Hartnell College.

2. Why use blogs?

I have been asked by colleagues and others why I would choose to use a blog at all (or any other technology for that matter), or why do I not just use a chat room or a discussion board. To answer the first question, I believe that reading and writing are the only ways that students actually learn composition and that technology is just one means to facilitate that. A journal or some other regular writing practice is essential to my teaching. I was tempted to use a blog when I realized that blogs were free and that I would not have to carry thirty journals around. It is also harder to lose an online journal than a paper one. I ask the students to write their blog postings in MS Word and to then cut and paste it to the blog. A paper journal can be lost, but this method insures that postings will be lost only if blogger.com goes down and their computer crashes. Typically a blog is seen as an online diary or journal; that is how average users utilize blogs. My assignments, however, ask the students to use the blogs to post and to comment on another person’s blog (this is typical of online asynchronous bulletin board discussions). The students are also asked to write posts that link to other articles that support their research. As Anderson (2004) has noted “the capacity for students to create their own learning paths through content that is formatted with hypertext links is congruent with constructivist instructional design theory that stresses individual discovery and construction of knowledge.” I believe that this process is even more empowering for the students when they are creating the links.

3. Strengths

In a typical classroom discussion, the shy students sit in the back, the bolder ones sit nearer the front where they can tend to dominate the discussion. In the sometimes free-for-all exchange of ideas it is easy for some students to get side-tracked or distracted from their chain of thought. A blog allows for careful reflection upon an answer to a question. Shy students are freer to “speak” in a blog. Class discussions can be continued remotely. If a student feels strongly about a topic but he or she is not comfortable sharing in class, or as a class, we need to move on to the next topic, that student has a place to be heard.

There are unique features to blogs that ordinary online discussion tools do not have. We use the free blogs at www.blogger.com. That blog has a “BlogThis!” button you can put into your web browser. This is important for my classes because I have the students share research. The “BlogThis!” button allows you to select a paragraph on the webpage and when you click on “BlogThis!” in the menu bar of your browser, it opens a window that is a mini-posting window; it contains the title of the page, the URL, and the text that you selected. The student can also write a note (why the information is useful) and then click on “post” to publish the information to his or her blog.

Because students sign up for the account themselves, and the blog is completely customizable, there is a sense of ownership to the page, and the knowledge, that can’t be found in a discussion board. A blog is not just putting up a webpage, but it is the fulfillment of the original idea of the internet -- that it would be a truly read/write environment, as Lowe and Williams (2004) observe,

"Student hypertext projects expand the concept of the public audience to include the entire web. Yet, weblogs as a social, public genre can have equal if not more appeal to a generation who enjoys seeing the private made public on Survivor and MTV’s Real World, while also fulfilling the pedagogical goal of expanding audience outside of the classroom."

The students know that others will read this writing, that others will comment on their writing, and that they in turn, will respond to their comments.

4. Weaknesses

Blogs are a little more difficult to set up than an e-mail account but not much more. Some students will have trouble signing up and using the blog. It took a couple of weeks to get every student signed up. There are students who do not use the blog just as there are students that don’t do homework or write in paper journals (no matter what the point value of the journal may be). Not all students have computers at home, but since the college has a computer lab, this is not a problem.

Some students in my class expressed concern that blogs are less private than other kinds of online discussions, but the blogs at blogger.com will allow you to control access to blogs. A student can limit access to a select class or class members.

5. How to get the students started

The important thing to remember about using blogs is that even though all of your students may have e-mail accounts, that, and limited word processing skills, may be all the technical skills they have. Your instructions have to build on those skills. The students need to know the terminology of the particular blog you are using; “saving” a post is different than “publishing” a post. Make sure that you test your instructions on different computers (especially your school’s library computers). Make sure the buttons look the same in different web browsers

6. Creating a community

Blogs make ideal class journals, certainly a solitary experience for the student. At the community college, where a student may work multiple jobs and have a family to take care of, giving the student a journal assignment where he or she must reflect is always beneficial. But the students also need to make connections between what they are learning and the experiences of the other students. As Ferdig and Trammel (2004) point out, “knowledge construction is discursive, relational and conversational in nature. Therefore, as students appropriate and transform knowledge, they must have authentic opportunities for publication of knowledge.” Learning requires a social context. How do we bring all of the blogging experiences together online?

A central blog for the class acts not only as a model for blogging but as a linking point for the students. This central blog acts as a course webpage and is a classroom hub. It is used to post assignments and solutions to problems that come up in class or online. It also contains useful links to the textbook webpage and research materials. It also contains a class roster with a picture of each student. The picture is then linked to that student’s blog. This helps the student (and the instructor) remember the names of the students and makes it easier for others to visit the blogs of other students.

7. Preparation is the key

Rubrics are another essential component to the successful use of blogs. Rubrics allow students to understand what is expected of their postings and how they will be assessed.

The instructions for the students should also have clear posting etiquette guidelines. For my classes, these have not been necessary but that could be because they were provided before hand.