blogging
Instructional Blogging
Mon, 2009-07-20 13:04 — maritzaqA number of faculty and instructors at the UA have introduced instructional blogging into their courses. Blogs are simple educational technology tools that lend themselves to a wide range of pedagogical styles, disciplines and course levels. There are a number of free blogging resources available: Blogger, TypePad, Live Journal and Wordpress are four of the most popular. The Office of Instruction and Assessment has installed and maintained Movable Type on a server and maintains that for the campus.
Blogs are easy to use. Entries may be created in the display area much like composing in word processing sofware. Text is typed and words may be selected by highlighting to add hyperlinks and format with bold or italics. A powerful stylesheet controls the published entry's appearance.
In hybrid and fully online courses, blogs can promote community, provide a virtual space to discuss course readings, share ideas and further knowledge. Instructors may find having one place to address course activities is convenient.
A Journalism professor uses student-created blogs to augment the teaching of abstract skills and values (truth telling, ethics, and critical thinking) as well as practical skills (the integration of multimedia into news story telling) that are necessary for new professionals in journalism as well as many other fields.
An English 101/102 instructor has students submit their assignments via their blog. He teaches them ways to provide constructive feedback to each other's writing and make substantive comments using the entry's comments feature.
Blogging @ the OIA: Best Practices & Case Studies
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