Does anybody have any advice for good sites to hold student blogs? I'd like to use them in one of my courses this summer, but I am unsure of what to use. I've heard of edmondo.com, edublogs.org; and of course we could use the blogs on Blackboard or even Blogger. I'd really like something easy, user-friendly and share-able (with people outside of the class). Thoughts? Suggestions?
Have you ever used blogs in your class? Do you have any recommendations? Dos and Don'ts of classroom blogging? I would love to hear your advice. I will be doing some research on this soon, so I will also share what I find. And of course, I will be blogging this summer, so you can read about my successes and (hopefully few and far between) failures in implementing this medium in my class.
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Natalie is using them now in a class. She might have some ideas. I'm actually using them in 690 and I'm doing it all wrong, so I can tell you about that. :-)
ReplyDeleteI was hoping to use them to replace the message boards in 690 because I only have a small group (3 students). I asked each of them to create a blog.
It hasn't really been working. Or maybe I should say it really hasn't been working. They update irregularly, and they don't comment much. It's three people talking into a vast silent internet.
(Sort of like real blogging.)
Given my goals, I wish I had done a single group blog rather than three individual blogs -- I think that would have helped. That's what Nat is doing, and I think it's a good move. Everyone has one place to go rather than three, a central, shared gathering place. Of course, it's hard to be sure whether my experience here is relevant -- it'll depend on your goals. But if one of your goals is to encourage students to interact on the blogs, I would recommend a shared blog.
Of course, if you want any discussion to develop in the comments section, I think it would have to be mandatory that students subscribe to updates to posts, etc. I've noticed that while I do post comment on blogs, I don't tend to follow up to see whether anyone has responded to my comments. In that case, a social network (like a Google+ circle) might work better. I haven't tried that one, though.
Monty Dobson (of the School of Public Service and Global Citizenship) has been using twitter. That's much shorter and burstier, with no room for more extensive comments. It's good for conversation-like, shorter exchanges though and especially good for sharing links. Again, it all comes down to your goals, I think.
Thanks for your comments, Rich. I like the idea of a whole-class blog. I think one of the former ELI teachers did that while reading a novel, and she had some success with that. I also like the idea of required comments. I actually do that with discussion board posts; it encourages student-student interaction and gives them a reason for posting online, rather than just submitting a written assignment to me directly. Great advice... Thanks again!
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