Archive for the 'Blogs' Category

There’s a lot of good arguments about having an acceptable use policy (AUPs) for the use of blogs in the classroom. While not a big fan of a list of do’s and don’ts, I like the idea of a document outlining rights and responsibilities. For every right there might be a commensurate responsibility. I also see value in creating such a document with the students who will be working with it. You’d be surprised about how astute kids can be around developing this type of stuff. You might also be surprised about how draconian kids can be in deciding upon sanctions for breeching such guidelines.

While on the subject I’ve read a lot of policy documents and often the most common response to breeches of guidelines particularly with computers and the Internet is removal of user privileges. The question is if computer based resources are really so essential to each child’s learning should using them be considered a privilege? I’m not saying whether or not this is right or wrong; in some cases I imagine it can be quite effective for a quick consequence for a wrong action, but might we be sending mixed messages here?

Anyway, in regards to AUPs in my experience it’s good to be proactive in these areas. In one school I worked at I had developed and implemented an Internet AUP that I felt was fair, balanced and was working well. When the controlling authority of the school produced a ’suggested’ Internet AUP which I thought it was heavy handed and unwieldy, I was able to go to my boss and say, “Look we’ve already got a policy that’s been in place and has been working well so we really don’t really need to run with this other one”. My boss was cool with that and so we kept the policy we already had in place.

If you want to explore the issues of polices for blogs in particular or other issues on blogs in general sus out Bud the Teacher’s wiki at http://budtheteacher.com/wiki/

The picture? Pearl Tower in Shanghai

Sometimes technology has been called a solution in search of a problem. So I’ve been trying to nut out some uses for blogs in the classrooms. Especially for face to face classrooms. A lot of the blogs I’ve seen have their authors engaging in a great deal of reflection. This wouldn’t be a bad thing for classrooms I think. All too often we’re so focused on getting the work done we often forget to sit back, relax and reflect on what’s been done, what worked, what didn’t and generally how we feel about it. Getting kids to be reflective is also about helping them become metacognitive.

I suppose the trick is trying to convince kids of the value of being reflective. Perhaps this is the medium to do it. A blog is a bit like computing in casual clothes. I’m here at my office, in bare feet, listening to The Who and typing out what’s running through my head. I mean, it doesn’t feel like work! I’m not too fussed that the stuff I’m typing doesn’t sound that “academic”. This doesn’t mean I don’t care what I’m typing, quite the contrary, I’m probably closer to this stuff than anything I’ve probably written in unit notes or journal articles. So maybe that’s what kids need; a place to be real. I dunno (see that, I typed dunno).

Anyway back to the classroom. The RSS feeds from blogs offer a great opportunity for teachers who can subscribe to their students blogs so when anything is posted they get an update. This is called “push technology” as the information is being pushed out to us subscribers. The old fashion “pull technology” meant we would have to go looking for this stuff. So imagine you’ve got a classroom of 25 kids all blogging. If you’ve subscribed to each of their blogs you can check out what each kid’s up to in one fell swoop through an aggregator or live bookmarks. I reckon I’d rather do that than lug home 25 exercise books for marking.

Another opportunity would have the students commenting on each other’s blogs. When I thought about this my first reaction was what if kids posted comments that were hurtful and offensive? I suppose the first defence is that all comments can be moderated so anything that got sent would only go public with the permission of the author. This doesn’t stop the stuff being sent in the first place but it can limit any potential damage. Besides you wouldn’t let kids on this technology without clear guidelines about what is and what isn’t appropriate.

Anyway a little food for thought. The picture? If you haven’t guessed it’s The Great Wall of China. UNE does a trip for a TESOL Practicum every year. I hope to be going back again to China this year for a wedding.

Zaijian!