While blogs are becoming more popular and resourceful as a classroom tool, Dr. Ruth Reynard states that there are 5 common mistakes that teachers make when using them. By knowing what these mistakes are and how to properly fix them, students will likely be more willing to include themselves in blogging activities.
1. Ineffective Contextualization:
This idea focuses on clarifying to students why and how the tool is creating an advantage to them and their education. It is the job of the instructor to decide what is an appropriate use of the tool within their classroom from how often to use it to which portion of the course it will aid in teaching. Because blogs are best used as self-reflection tools, teachers need to decide when self-reflection will most benefit the students within the course in order to not discourage the students.
2. Unclear Learning Outcomes
A teacher must have clear learning outcomes if they wish to use the blog for critical thinking and thought processing. One way to develop higher thinking skills using the blog is through analysis. Students can compare/contrast ideas and incorporate their answers for further learning through blogging. By doing so, they have it laid out for fellow students and themselves to reflect on. Another way is through synthesis. Synthesis can be used to take original ideas and incorporate them into what they are learning. Another way is through new ideas alone. By moving students toward new ideas through a blog, teachers can take their students to a higher level of learning. Lastly, a student’s application of all these newly developed ideas and thoughts shows that they truly have grasped a concept. It is great to see within one’s blog that these processes have been gone through step-by-step.
3. Misuse of the Environmen
It is of course important for a teacher to use a blog in the most appropriate way. For example, if a teacher is looking for a discussion, a blog is not the most appropriate tool. It is most important to use blogs for something that they can use to reflect as themselves on different ideas and also develop thought processes and “their own voice”.
4. Illusive Grading Practices
Grading of blogs should never be based on one’s specific answers because many students feel differently about different things. Instead, one should look at how well they reflect, use the course content in their ideas, move these ideas to a higher level, and apply these concepts to real life.
5. Inadequate Time Allocation
Because blogs are self-reflection tools, many students may need more time to learn more and expand their ideas within their blog. It is suggested that blog assignments stay open throughout a course so that students can often go back and add more to them.
If educators are able to follow these common mistakes and be sure not to fall into the traps of any of them, blogging should be an extremely effective tool within any classroom.
How could you use blogging within your content area of teaching?
As a future math teacher, I would use blogging for students to somewhat “workout” their problems with math. It is known that many students grunt and sigh at the idea of taking a math class. Instead of making it all numbers, I could have each student create a blog. The students would then be able to use these blogs to answer different questions I propose to them about real-world applications of math, their fears about math, and somewhat solve their own math issues by blogging about how I could make their math class better for them to understand.
Why do you think blogging/self-reflection are important tools to use within a classroom?
I think it is important for students to self-reflect because it makes them more aware of who they are and how they learn best. By thinking of what troubles they had with a certain concept, or what activity helped them learn best, students will understand better what they need in order to succeed. If students are aware of these ideas themselves, teachers are able to better adapt to their students’ diverse ways of learning.
Reynard, R. (2008, October, 15). Avoiding the 5 most common mistakes in using blogs with students.. T.H.E. Journal, Retrieved November 07, 2008, from http://www.thejournal.com/articles/23434_1
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