Message: 10 From: dca4@georgetown.edu I'm having two of my classes use weblogs this semester. Students in one class are keeping journals, writing about anything they desire, http://cct723.blogspot.com. Another class is using them in a more structured manner to answer weekly questions, http://cct717.blogspot.com, then read each others answers. Please browse, if you have a chance.
Are others using blogs as an educational information sharing or creativity device? Would love to discuss what you are finding. I'm getting very mixed reactions from students, especially those asked to journal. Dorine
Students always hate to write. It seems. Blogger also seems to be the hardest for some students due to the design. Not that any of them are good.
If you want to talk off list email me, or iChat (aka AIM): complicitytheory, or if there's interest from others, a group chat on my CVE.
Jason
Hi Dorine, I've used blogs in the highschool English classroom, where we ask students to journal all the time, and have increasingly felt the need to re-evaluate and re-situate the idea of the "journal assignment." as i mentioned in a recent meta-blog post on my own blog (http://www.meadow4.com/squish/archives_02/001023.html), it's a fairly co-ercive, invasive gesture. i usually encourage my students to lie. one thing that i always hope is stressed in the use of blogs in the writing classroom is the performative nature of the public writing act. I notice that Gary Thmospon just delivered a paper on this topic, (http://www.svsu.edu/%7Eglt/Louisville/Louisville_title.htm) and i haven't had time to give it more than a glance, but i do think this is a crucial starting point, and part of what can get people out of the trap they feel when they start to contemplate that fact that you've just asked them to expose themselves for a mark. as for creative uses of weblogs, my favourite so far is lying motherfucker: http://lyingmofo.ohskylab.com/ although it's been aiming a bit low of recent. the neil gaiman entries are very, very funny. anyhow, i'd also be interested in talking more about this- and so backchannel or synchronous meet-up with jason or something would be fab. katherine parrish http://www.meadow4.com/