May
6
Overwhelmed and Encouraged
May 6, 2007 | | Leave a Comment
I am flat-out overwhelmed. A few months ago, I introduced my students to blogging by showing them a blog I had created for our class. Students could use this blog to post responses to assigned journal entries instead of writing them by hand in a notebook.
After a few of these assignments, I lost interest in having my students use the blog.
- I was not sure how to assess these entries in comparison to the handwritten entries.
- Several students did not have access to the Internet from home.
- I lacked confidence in my ability to plan meaningful lessons involving blogging that aligned with our district’s curriculum.
Then I read Jeff Utecht’s article, “Blogs Are Not the Enemy” in Technology and Learning magazine.
Utech uncanningly described my earlier attempts at blogging:
Blogs are not about writing, they are about a conversation. I have seen teachers give students a class assignment on their blog to write answers to questions or their thoughts on an issue, yet those thoughts, those conversations, are not brought back into the classroom to enhance the exchange of information and debate within. Sure, it is great to read how students respond to a question, but if you do not bring the conversation back into the classroom, they are no different from assignments written on paper and handed in to the teacher for a grade.
His ideas resonated with me because I had been guilty of limiting the conversation I tried to create with our class blog. I have read others who had published blog posts, articles and books about blogging. With Utecht’s comments, however, I was in a place, mentally, where I was open to understand this information. Like many, I am one of those people who need to be exposed to a concept several times before the information sticks.
As a result of reading this article, I designed a lesson to engage my students in conversations with others on the Web. I cannot wait to share these responses with them on Monday…and to extend our conversations.
I am excited, again.
