Hello!
I once thought that I was an experienced blogger. I owe that thought to the creation of this blog – from a past course. However, that was determined to be false. I might have gone in thinking I knew what I was doing – but I had no clue. My old blog was personalized and fun to create, but somehow I lost all of the skills I had learnt a year ago. In creating this blog I learned a lot: how to delete a WordPress site, how to find pictures, I even CHANGED one of the pictures on my site (I’m still trying to attach a picture for this one). I can’t quite explain how I felt doing it, but I found a picture representation.
This picture makes it easier to describe: it felt hectic and harebrained. Chaotic and confusing. Scary and surprisingly rewarding. There was a lot of back and forth between the learners and the instructor while we were setting up. We (the learners) were all panicked, pressing all the buttons and getting none of the results. We were pressing the wrong buttons. Then it said my domain name had a “fatal error”. Oops I tried to create two blogs with the same domain, that obviously wont work. Then I changed the domain name, hit refresh, and it worked. Now I have this amazing tool that I can utilize for implementation into my future classroom. I have by no means mastered it. I likely never will. However, using a blog as pedagogy would be a fun approach. Blogs are innately informal and easily accessible for the average person. Wherein my teachable (biology) is inherently formal and inaccessible for the average person (myself included). Science always has big words, vocabulary that I pretend I understand until I got home to research it for myself. Please tell me I’m not alone here. *Ahem* What was I saying? Oh, yes, how useful blogs would be in the classroom.
Blogs would allow learners to feel more invited to study and explore (Shana & Abulibdehb, 2015; Yu-Chun et al., 2017). You could even have a “blog feed” of relevant blogs for the learners to take a peak at. For many classes implementing various blogs gives learners the chance to read, see, and hear many different points of view and opinions. As much as teachers try to interweave objective points of view it is difficult to see all of the sides of one argument. Using blogs will allow the learners to access varying views and opinions and allow the teacher to focus on relationship building and meaningful discussion with the learners.
The act of finding and following blogs will also allow the learners to have some autonomy in their learning; by doing so it will allow them to become more independent in their education (Shana & Abulibdehb, 2015; Yu-Chun et al., 2017). By allowing learners to become more independent in their learning they will gain self confidence which will aid in any life and/or higher education goals they may have (Crippen & Archambault, 2012; Manoque et al., 1999). I believe blogging is an excellent way to conflate teaching to the curriculum with teaching useful soft skills to learners; this will add up to create a flourishing classroom.
Works Cited:
(2012) Scaffolded Inquiry-Based Instruction with Technology: A Signature Pedagogy for STEM Education, Computers in the Schools, 29:1-2, 157-173, DOI: 10.1080/07380569.2012.658733
Manoque, M., Brown, G. A., Nattress, B. R. and Fox, K. 1999. Improving student learning in root canal treatment using self-assessment. International Endodontic Journal, 32: 397–405.
Shana, Z. A., & Abulibdehb, E. S. (2015). Engaging Students through Blogs: Using Blogs to Boost a Course Experience. International Journal of Emerging Technologies in Learning (IJET), 10(1), 30. https://doi.org/10.3991/ijet.v10i1.4240
Yu-Chun Kuo, Brian R. Belland, & Yu-Tung Kuo. (2017). Learning through Blogging: Students’ Perspectives in Collaborative Blog-Enhanced Learning Communities. Journal of Educational Technology & Society, 20(2), 37-50. Retrieved September 18, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/90002162