If I had a desert island EdTech, it would be blogging, and that is not just in a nostalgic sense. No other educational technology has continued to develop, as the proliferation of WordPress sites attests, and also remain so full of potential. I’ve waxed lyrical about academic blogging many times before, but for almost every ed tech that comes along, I find myself thinking that a blog version would be better: e-portfolios, VLEs, MOOCs, OERs, social networks. Sometimes it’s like Jim Groom and Alan Levine have taken over my brain, and I don’t even mind. I still harbour dreams of making students effective bloggers will be a prime aspect of graduateness. Nothing develops and anchors your online identity quite like a blog.
Tag: education
“It’s almost as if my teachers set me up to fail and take pleasure in that failure.” These quotes from first-semester college writers demonstrate how the “red pen of death” shapes the student experience of an academic culture of humiliation.
We noticed three dominant motifs emerge, in which mocking and shaming work together to undergird a capitalistic hierarchy that dehumanizes and commodifies students.
Source: Student Shaming and the Need for Academic Empathy – Hybrid Pedagogy
As the Boomers age, grandparents and grandchildren will vie for scarce funds.
If the underlying problem behind all these issues is competition for funding, couldn’t we also say that the underlying issue is the lack of funding?
Could we not say that the underlying problem is that too few people are collecting too much of the wealth generated by the economy and paying too little tax on it?
doesn’t the fact that some states have to choose between being sensible and being civilized– isn’t that a sign that we may have veered a bit too far in the direction of using government primarily to service the desires corporations and the rich folks who run them? Because I don’t think there’s anything sensible or civilized about a country that makes Grampaw and Junior fight over table scraps while the rich are grabbing more food than they know what to do with.
Source: CURMUDGUCATION: Fight for Scraps (The Real Causes of the Strikes)
“There is no way to cultivate equity through an ideological standpoint, like deficit or grit ideology, that is formulated to discourage direct responses to inequity.”
Source: Paul C. Gorski – On the need for Structural Ideology rather than Deficit or Grit Ideology
“It’s almost as though all that marketing helps the (ed-) tech industry resist investigative dismantling.”
Source: HEWN, No. 260
“Parents don’t like the idea of standardized testing, so finding out the PL means test after test, day after day, does not play well in the market.
So instead, what you actually get is a software, computers, algorithm-selected teaching, teachers who aren’t really teachers any more, and school leaders who think this is a way to put 100 students in a single classroom (which is what the oxymoronic “personalized learning at scale” means).
“As someone who accurately identitied that raging fever I’ll concede that “corporate” reformers may not be the best description. Rather it was the hedge fund plutocrats of the Financial Privatization Cabal who were most responsible for seeking the privatization of public education.”
Why deem the “corporate” reformers the Financial Privatization Cabal? Because most of the money came from hedge fund and other financial services titans. They ardently seek privatization. And as they knew transparency would be the death of their plot, their strategy depended on a secret cabal.
Source: MassPoliticsProfs| Mr. Lehigh Misdiagnoses a Fever, Ms. Rodrigues Recovers at DESE
It’s a tall order, I realize. But that’s why student blogs are awesome. It gives students a chance to practice writing in a virtually fail free zone, and they learn important lessons not just about reading and writing, but themselves as writers and what it takes to craft engaging, effective writing. But the freedom of blogging is what makes this type of self-evaluation and practice possible.
Think of blogging as the anti in-class essay.
Of course, you can focus student blogs on any topic, theme, or style to meet any academic purpose, but for me, blogging frees my students from the constraints of what they believe assigned essays should sound like.
For starters, there’s no official rubric or handbook, the style is incredibly familiar, and the pressure of page length is off. Because blogs offer students creative control of layout and themes, it’s this same ownership that encourages not just a unique layout but a considered style and voice in their writing.
My students are discovering over time that who you are on paper is who you are, so they strive to show how interesting and intelligent they are with the voice and style of their writing.
In our blogging project, students have taken cues from mentor texts we’ve studied in class, but just as importantly, they’ve paid attention to the writing of others, both professional and non. They’ve assessed what works, what doesn’t work, and what makes for an interesting and engaging post. And blogging provides them a safe space to play with different craft moves they might not try in class.
Source: 5 Things Your Students Can Learn From Blogging | Moving Writers
“This year, I introduced reflective blogging with my students to slowly release control. They write, everyone reads, and everyone comments. Here’s how it’s made them more independent:”
Instead of me answering questions, my students write through their confusion.
Instead of waiting for my judgement, they look to one another.
“Over the years, I’ve come to believe that the more the writing I ask students to do in the classroom can mirror the world outside our classroom walls, the better served my students will be.”
“Yet if I had to choose just one technology tool I could not live without, it would be blogging, hands-down. It’s not even close.”
Because blogging feels less formal than a traditional essay, students are more willing to experiment with and find their voices. Blogging feels personal, and thus, the person behind the writing shines through in ways that paper keeps hidden.
When students blog, they learn how to use hyperlinks and visual media to support their ideas. They learn how to use categories and tags to help their readers find their work more easily. And when students practice commenting on each other’s blog posts, they also learn how to engage in civil and thoughtful discourse in an online environment. Our students today could be engaged citizens or thoughtless trolls (and everything in between). I think we all know which would be better for the future of civic discourse.
rnbn 