Blogs for Learning: A case study
Ethan Watrall
Telecommunications, Information Studies, & Media, Michigan State University
http://www.captainprimate.com
Nicole Ellison
Telecommunications, Information Studies, & Media, Michigan State University
Blogging in an academic setting is starting to receive significant attention as a tool for increasing student engagement, active learning, and peer-to-peer learning. However, significant barriers exist, primarily technical. The goal of Blogs for Learning is to support instructors and students who wish to engage in academic blogging. Blogs for Learning will be a comprehensive online resources providing information about the technical, pedagogical, and policy aspects of educational blogging.
View the screencast (40:47); will load directly in a Flash-enabled browser.
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Tags: Blogging, Teaching, higheredblogcon
April 5th, 2006 at 10:45 am
Slides 8 and 9 are not working.
April 5th, 2006 at 11:54 am
Should work now.
April 5th, 2006 at 11:56 am
Also, the “Coming Soon” page for your website has coming spelled with two ms…comming… Looking forward to seeing it nonetheless.
April 5th, 2006 at 12:28 pm
doh
April 5th, 2006 at 12:49 pm
I really appreciated this presentation and I’m excited about the launching of blogsforlearning. I’m presenting a paper on the availability and uses of blogs for community college instuctors at the Illinois Community College Conference this fall and I’ll definitely be highlighting this site. Keep me in mind also as a possible beta tester. Thanks!
April 5th, 2006 at 1:01 pm
Polly - I’m glad that you appreciated the presentation. If you are interested in being a beta tester, send us an email and we’ll add you to the list. As stated in the presentation, we are also looking for external content contributors (primarily for the articles section). So, if you have an article (or an idea for an article) that might work for the site, we’d love to hear about it.
April 5th, 2006 at 1:23 pm
Ethan, I’ll send an email and I’m also interested in contributing an article. Let me think about the content of the article.
April 5th, 2006 at 1:25 pm
Wonderful!
April 5th, 2006 at 5:26 pm
Thanks for a great presentation! The work you are doing is very exciting and lends credibility to blogging as a teaching tool. Many of my colleagues are skeptical of blogging, so I will be thrilled to see what you put together!
April 5th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
Beth - thanks for your kind words. I’m glad that you enjoyed the presentation. I think one of the most important things that I’ve learned from using blogs in the class (and I’ve been using them for a relatively long time) is that they work best in a “diverse portfolio” of teaching techniques and technologies.
April 5th, 2006 at 8:01 pm
We are currently seeking case studies and other short (less than 1000 words) for the site, so if you have an idea, please send myself or Ethan an email to discuss. Thanks!
Nicole
April 11th, 2006 at 6:54 pm
I enjoyed the presentation - thank you for helping to take the next step forward in getting blogs in the classroom. I was a student with a professor who used blogs as our main communication tool in class; where an in-person weekly meeting was ment to supplement that online discussion.
I’d be more than interested to help contribute to the development in any way I can. My next professional step it to develop an online leadership development site for students and staff to utitilize some community development tools (e.g. blogs).
Please keep me posted with your developments - I look forward to hearing about the development and results.