Blogging as a Learning Tool
According to the assigned readings for the week, blogging is a useful tool to facilitate learning. Kuo, et al. (2017) cite 4 reasons for this:
1. Students are actively participating and collaborating
2. Students are interacting and supporting each other
3. Students' motivation to learn is increased
4. Students develop critical thinking and reflective skills.
MacPhail (2019) and Witte (2007) both described examples of blogs as effective learning based on student engagement levels. In MacPhail's (2019) article she described how her students engaged "more closely with class materials" and thought "more deeply" about the subject (p. 3).
Witte (2007) described how her students were more engaged when writing for a blog than paper writing assignments. Her study paired preservice college teachers with middle school students and found that collaboration, participation, and supportive feedback were common when the two groups communicated through a blog.
Garcia, et. al (2019) conducted a study aimed at determining whether students using blogs as an educational tool would report deeper learning. Her findings were that students did report deeper learning, but the level of learning depended on student attitude towards using technology for learning, "perceived usefulness of blogs, and the extent to which they have used blogs previously" (Garcia, et. al, 2019, p. 61). This rings true for me personally, as I am not that familiar with blogs, and I have certainly never created one myself prior to this assignment. I am also not convinced that blogs are more useful than research. Garcia, et. al (2019) concluded her article by recommending that educators use and promote blogs as a teaching and learning vehicle, however she seems to ignore that her findings excluded groups of people (including me) that may not find blogs useful as tools for teaching and learning.
I am not against blogs in general, and I'm not against blogs for students who want to use them to evoke discussions about certain topics. My concern is that blogs cannot replace research. In my opinion blogs are great forums for discussion, but they are largely based on opinions. The assigned readings for this week seemed to promote blogs as learning tools, which I can support if they are also used along with learning tools that are more robust, such as peer-reviewed research or evidence-based theories that provide more validity. Engagement with material is important to facilitate learning but the material itself has to be high quality.
This was my first blog ever (just in case you couldn't tell). I just came across this quote today and it made me feel SOOOOO much better about my blog! ;)
ReplyDelete"Your 1st blog post will be bad, but your 1000th will be great." - James Clear
I see your concern with blogs being used for replacement of research. “As a knowledge management tool, blogs provide the potential for relatively undifferentiated articles of information passing through an organization to be contextualized in a manner that adds, value thus generating ‘knowledge’ from mere ‘information’. (Williams & Jacobs, 2004, p. 234) Unlike a discussion board or posted classroom notes a blog will remain online for a longer extended time for retrieval.
ReplyDeleteEducational curriculum for classroom discussion blogs creates an opportunity for critical thinking and experimental learning a traditional classroom doesn’t provide. I agree that the material must be of high quality and that you must use judgement when choosing to use a blog for a source for reference. This assignment was also my first blogging experience.
References
Williams, J. B., & Jacobs, J. (2004). Exploring the use of blogs as learning spaces in the higher education sector. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 20(2), 232-247. Retrieved from https://eprints.qut.edu.au
I can sympathize with your skepticism towards blogging if the content involved is not high quality. The best way to use blogging for research purposes is not to use blogs as sole research source but as a place to publish your synthesis of research and get others' feedback, as a step along the research road rather than the final destination. Tekinarslan (2008) found blogging activities effective for helping students develop academic skills of research and writing, for example paraphrasing and citing. Chong (2010) studied a slightly different approach, with a traditional research paper assignment scaffolded by blogging as a research diary which the instructor gives feedback on. Both studies were done in a way that prioritized scholarly sources rather than opinion blogs as information sources. That is one possible pitfall a blogging assignment could run into, if it is not made clear that opinions expressed on blogs are not the same as peer-reviewed research. Nice first blog post, by the way!
ReplyDeleteReferences
Chong, E. K. M. (2010). Using blogging to enhance the initiation of students into
academic research. Computers & Education 55, 798-807.
Tekinarslan, E. (2008). Blogs: A qualitative investigation into an instructor and
undergraduate students’ experiences. Australasian Journal of Educational
Technology 24(4), 402-412.
I feel your pain; this was my first blog, as well. I struggled with the formatting and must have watched the u-tube video around 20 times.
ReplyDeleteI don't think blogs were ever intended to replace research. Blogs were just another way to discuss the research and "connect what is being learned in the classroom with what is being discussed in the blog" (Kresser, Wiggins & Jimenez, 2012, p. 328). Some students responded positively to the use of blogs and how it has helped them learn, while others did not react favorably to the use of blogs. I'm sure blogs develop better skills when it comes to "evaluat[ing] what they read and recognize[S] the ways in which they read information from the [i]nternet" (p. 328). I think it goes back to the students' and teachers perception of the use of blogs.
In the research conducted by Kresser et al. (2012) found that not one student thought, even those tech experts, that blogs [were] a smart use of their time. With some students calling it of no importance in helping them learn. Throughout two-years of research along with formative assessments, the students' requirements changed. All the changes may have just frustrated the students, which caused them to have a negative outlook on the use of blogs. To help the teachers understand their students feeling on the use of blogs "gathering input from the students themselves about the use of these tools...will yield information related to the expectations" (p. 328). One possible reason the students disliked using blogs is that the teachers violated Knowles rule by not fully explaining how blogs can help the students learn.
Reference
Hungerford-Kresser, H., Wiggins, J., & Amaro-Jimenez, C. (2012). Learning from our mistakes: What matters when incorporating blogging in the content area literacy classroom. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 55(4), 326-335. doi:http://dx.doi.org.er.lib.k-state.edu/10.1002/JAAL.00039
Alikat217, this is great work for your first blog. This was also my first experience with the idea of blogging in the academic environment. I really appreciate your up-front information and reference from Kuo, et al. (2017), which cites the four reasons that blogs benefit the educational environment. I also appreciate your theories and feelings about blogs. I echo your sentiment and concern about the idea of blogs replacing research. I don’t feel that they are meant to do that, I feel that they are meant to bolster learning and intra and inter classroom interaction. My concern is that blogs are open for the world to review, which may limit a students desire to communicate for fear that the world will see it.
ReplyDelete