Using Blogs in the classroom

 

I realize that the title of my blog is online games/tools to enhance learning but the more I dive into tools and games to enhance learning the more I am drawn away from the games to enhance learning.  Each game site that I have started reviewing has just left me feeling flat, like I was reviewing a filler for the classroom.  The type of educational game sites that I was reviewing may have been o.k. for reviewing a concept you already knew but they didn't seem to hold a candle to what some of the social tools could do to really showcase a students learning and ability.  As such I have moved away from looking at games to enhance learning at least the type of games I was looking at.  If anyone has a great online game site that will do more than just quick factual recall then please add a comment and I will look into it.

For now I will look at the use of Blogs in the classroom, specifically with Blogger.  I have only started using blogs in my masters courses and I am finding them to be a great tool as a replacement or enhancement to a discussion board.  In my school we use Moodle to deliver our online courses.  It is not that I dislike Moodle, but I find the layout to be very institutional and it takes a lot of time to click back and forth throughout each students assignments, there is a lot of wasted time clicking from one item to another.  This is where I see blogs coming into play.  If I have each student create their own blog and then post their assignments to their one blog, I would be avoiding having to click on multiple assignment tabs to mark and comment on students assignments.  So this is purely from a selfish point of view, but I see Blogs as saving me time in marking student assignments.

Another benefit of using Blogs in the classroom is that the students could show others their work.  Their learning wouldn't have to be such a private entity.  I am concerned; however,  about privacy issues:  What if a 'creeper' happens to come upon my students blog and then leave inappropriate comments on their blog?  Would a student share a personal reflection as deeply if they knew the post was public?

Which is where, as a first time user of blogs in the classroom, there would have to be a lot of information on how to use social media effectively:

• Don't put your e-mail address on your blog to avoid creepers and spam.
• Don't put full names or pieces of identity that might give information about yourself or others that would be available to the public.
• For a class blog have the students set the privacy setting so that the blog is not available to anyone on the web.  This would depend on your school's policy and what you were using the blog for.  If a student was creating a blog to get out information to the public on a certain topic then perhaps the privacy could be set to public.  Whereas if a student were posting personal reflections on a particular topic then having more privacy settings would be better.
• Make sure that parents are aware of the social media that is being used.

 Benefits of using Blogs in the classroom:

• Having a class blog lead by the teacher will allow students and parents to keep up with homework and what is going on in the class.
• Providing the students the opportunity to write and reflect on their thoughts will improve their writing skills.
• Students can see improvement in their work through out the year.
• Provides an opportunity to create a portfolio of their work.
• Provides an opportunity for students to see each others work and comment to other students as well.
• The students or teacher could invite family members to the students site to post comments for the students as a way to give positive reinforcement for their learning.  

I have noticed from reading other teachers uses of Blogs that they are using them much like a discussion board.  For my school I am not sure this is what I would use them for since discussion posts can be a bit more personal in nature and the LMS system that we use, Moodle, would provide a more intimate setting for discussions.

Some setting that may help teachers when using Blogger in the classrooom:

Under the comments tab:

• Who can comment?
  Teachers can change this so that only members of the blog can comment.  This does limit the global learning that can occur through blogs but may be useful for privacy issues.
• Comment moderation?
  Clicking Always will allow the author of the blog to review and approve all comments before they are published.  Reviewing and approving posts can be done through e-mail or directly from the Blogger post.

Under the Email and Mobile tab:

• A teacher could add up to 10 e-mail addresses to people to let them know when new posts are created.  This is limited to 10 so if you have a small class then you could send each student an e-mail each time you create a new post.

Under the Permissions tab:

• You can add up to 100 Blog Authors.  This would be handy for creating a class blog so that you could have each student be able to create a full post rather than just posting a comment.
• The Blog Readers section will allow you to select anyone, only people you choose, or only blog authors.  Choosing only blog authors will ensure a private blog just for use in the classroom and using the 'only people I choose' button would allow others, such as parents, to be able to view the blog site.

Resources:

Here is a link to a study called Lessons Learned from Blogging with Elementary and University Students    It provides a wonderful summary of what can happen when 5th graders blog including all of the 5th graders blogs.

Excellent Blogger Agreement. This site also has great tips for how to use blogs in the classroom.

Blogs in Education.