Module 2

Blogs are a whole new way of communicating with people.   People have the option whether they want to follow a particular blog.  The blogger has very little control over who reads what they write.  My brother was overseas last year and he used a blog to stay in touch.  He thought it was good because if people wanted to find out how he was going they could check out his blog, but he was not clogging up their inbox with large emails. 

The youtube clip about blogs in plain English was very interesting.  It made me think about the text type of blogs.  Blogs are very different to paper based communication in that the new post goes above the previous posts.  I wonder if in the not to distant future teachers will be teaching about this text type. 

Exploring different blogs from the other web2.0 participants was extremely interesting.  Even though we are all doing the same task the variety in the presentation and content of the blogs was amazing.  This highlights one of the benefits of blogs- people can express their own personality through their blog by adding images, audio, video, colour etc.

I really enjoyed activity 2!  I could have spent hours trying to find the prettiest template and design (which could be one of the disadvantages of using blogging in the classroom).  I have had exposure to wordpress blogs, but find blogger even easier to use. 

I think the possibilities for using blogs in the classroom is almost endless. Blogs can be used to keep people upto date with what is occurring.  In an upper primary classroom blogs could be used as a type of newsletter, keeping parents in touch with what occurred that week.  The students could take it in turns to write a new post.  At the high school where I currently work the ESL students use blog as a journal.  Instead of writing their journal entry into their exercise book they post it on their blog.  Students could also review books and blog their reviews.  Teachers could have a class blog which houses their links and instructions for lessons.  I think blogs can provide a way for teachers to connect with students though a platform that interests and engages them.



Blogging lets me... shows just a few benefits of blogs



Until next time happy blogging!

Cheers

Maria