Educational Bloggingand Pedagogy

Peter Rawsthornepeter@rawsthorne.org

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Workshop Objectives

Upon completion of this workshop the participants will ….

• be able to describe blogging

• be able to identify the attributes of an effective blog

• be able to discuss the educational uses of the blog

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Introductions

• Introduce yourself and the faculty you belong

• Describe your familiarity with blogging

• Share with the group one question you would like answered from this workshop

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What is a blog?

• Is a journal or diary (Blog, 2006)• Usually displayed in a reverse chronological

order.• A commentary or news on a particular subject• blogs are primarily textual…

– they sometimes contain;• photographs (photoblog)• videos (vlog)• audio (podcasting)

• Are part of the social network / media

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What is blogging? DEMOS

• Text based http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/

http://www.ictlogy.net/

• Rich media based http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.com/

• Academic Publishing http://elgg.net/csessums/weblog/8119.html http://terrya.edublogs.org/ http://critical.edublogs.org/

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Add a post: DEMO

http://criticaltechnology.blogspot.com/

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What is blogging?

• The act of creating, editing, and adding posts to a blog

• Can be a stream of consciousness• Are used for academic publishing ???

(not peer reviewed beyond the comments)

• Blogging is the act of creating new content or referencing existing content.

• “Never has so much been written to be read by so few” (Unknown)

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Blogs vs. Webpages

?think pair shareFrom what you have learned so far;

Think about how a blog and a web page differPair up with someone next to youShare your thoughts about the differences

You have 5 minutes to complete this activity

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?How do blogs differ from webpages

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?How do blogs differ from discussion groups

It depends on ownership

Blogs are author owned and timeless

Discussion groups are owned by all participants and “disappear” once the discussion (course) is over.

Think about online discussion groups

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Parts of a blog1. Browser window

2. Header

3. Posts

4. Search

5. Calendar

6. Additional pages

7. Archives

8. Categories

9. Blogroll

10. Administration

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A good blog is concise• Is active with posts and comments

• Is current

• Is linked to an author profile

• Is organized with categories

• Has a well understood theme

• Has related blogrolls

• Has good aesthetics

• Has concise post titles

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Quality posting is important• A good post;

– Has a concise post title

– One or two paragraphs only

– References other web information

– Is a complete idea

– Has an author

– Does not duplicate another post

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Encourage thoughtful comments

• A good comment;– Will add to the

original post– Should NOT be

anonymous– May include a web

reference– Will avoid being

just a personal comment

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Activity

• Identify a theme in your discipline that would encourage student posting on a course blog.

think pair shareFrom what you have learned so far;Think about a blog post that would fit your identified theme. The post

should have the attributes of a quality post.Pair up with someone next to youShare your blog post, and how the post content is reflected in it’s title

• You have 5 minutes to complete this activity

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Educational uses of blogs

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Writing

• Simpson (1999) states, “One of the best ways of entrenching one's knowledge is to explain it to others…”

• Hutchings (2002) credits Shulman with the notion of publicly sharing one’s work for critical review that became accepted as an integral element of the scholarship of teaching and learning.

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Beyond Constructivism

• Social ConstructivismSocial constructivism is a variety of cognitive constructivism that emphasizes the collaborative nature of learning.

• Progressive Inquiry; Rahikainen (2001)

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klogging

Hall (2002) considers, “K-logs are weblogs used specifically for the purposes of sharing / documenting knowledge and/or sharing the process of knowledge-making".

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Using blogs within a courseSCENARIO:• ED3484 – Computers

and Learning Resources

• K6 - Newfoundland Labrador curriculum

• Course blog: http://3484w06.blogspot.com/

• An example blog: http://docdwarf.blogspot.com/

RESULTS:• 36 Blogs• Different parts of the

K6 Newfoundland Labrador curriculum

• blogroll: http://www.rawsthorne.org/bit/medit/gpt/blogroll.htm

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Using blogs within a course

STUDENT SYTHESIS:

• A good way to compliment classroom activities

• Have the students build their own blogs

• Is engaging and a lot of fun

• Helped with overcoming technology fears

• Social Constructivism happens

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Activity

• Groups of four

• Brainstorm uses for blogs within your

respective courses

• Write your ideas on the paper provided

• Be prepared to present your ideas

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Thank-you

peter@rawsthorne.org

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ReferencesBlog. (2006, September 10). In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved September 11, 2006,

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blog

Hall, S. (2002). Blogs and Klogs. Retrieved on Aug. 30, 2006 from http://radio.weblogs.com/0106698/2002/10/26.html

Hutchings, P., Clarke, S.E. (2004). The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning: Contributing to Reform in Graduate Education. In D. Wulff, A. Austin, and Associates (eds.), Paths to the Professoriate: Strategies for Enriching the Preparation of Future Faculty. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass

Rahikainen, M., Lallimo, J., & Hakkarainen, K.(2001). Progressive inquiry in CSILE environment: teacher guidance and students' engagement. In P. Dillenbourg, A. Eurelings., & K. Hakkarainen (Eds.), European Perspectives on Computer-Supported Collaborative Learning. Proceedings of the First European Conference on CSCL (pp. 520-528). Maastricht, the Netherlands: Maastricht McLuhan Institute. Retrieved on Aug. 30, 2006 from http://www.helsinki.fi/science/networkedlearning/eng/delete.html

Simpson, E. (1999). The role of graduate studies in a comprehensive university. The Aldrich Memorial Interdisciplinary Lecture. Retrieved on Aug. 30, 2006 from http://www.mun.ca/sgs/aldrich/aldrich_1999.php

(n.d.). Theories of learning: Social Constructivism. Retrieved on Sept 19, 2006 from http://gsi.berkeley.edu/resources/learning/social.html