Gadgets - I'm not so sure

We've been asked to look into adding gadgets to our blogs. I've spent a few hours poking around what is available and I've added a few to my very simple blog. You'll find a calendar and a list of my favorite websites (or at least the favorites I'll share in this arena). I opted not to add the seemingly very useful gadget that emails followers blog updates. Many gadgets I looked at seem like a poor use of programming time. The gadget that shows images of swimming fish on the page was the one that made me ask myself, "You're a programmer, you have the knowledge and the ability to do cool stuff like this, and you opt to write code to have fish swim across my blog?"
I'll continue to investigate other blogs to see what else is out there and if there are uses I'd not considered.

Using Blogs to Encourage Collaboration

The article titled Using web logs as a tool to encourage pre-class reading, post-class reflections and collaboration in higher education reviewed how students used blogs to help them complete pre-class reading assignments and post-class discussions.

Several benefits of blogs were discussed. This included the ability for students to see each other's work, the ability of students who don't have personal websites to share with others in cyberspace and the ability for students to learn to be analytical (Al-Fadda & Al-Yahya, 2010). When used for students whose English is a second language, using blogs helps students learn English more thoroughly (Al-Fadda & Al-Yahya, 2010). Forcing students to blog can encourage students to learn new vocabulary and work with other students to determine the best use for English. Lastly, English is the international language of websites so using blogs to help students learn English better will help the students over the long term (Al-Fadda & Al-Yahya, 2010).

Issues faced by students used in the study included a lack of instructor presence on the blogs and difficulty of the level of readings discussed on the blogs (Al-Fadda & Al-Yahya, 2010.

Reading this study allowed me to look at blogs in a different view, as a tool for students to teach them a language. Having the information public can add additional pressure to ensure the information posted and the language used is accurate. I'm not surprised that the study found blogs can come across with low professor involvement and found that it is difficult for students to collaborate and have a vibrant discourse when classes use blogs.


References:
Al-Fadda, H. & Al-Yahya, M. (2010). Using web blogs as a tool to encourage pre-class reading, post-class reflections and collaboration in higher education. US-China Education Review, 7 (7), 100-106.

An article summary - Blogs in Higher Education: Implementation and Issues

In selecting an article to read about blogging in education, I wanted to start with one that discussed the idea of blogging in general, one that discussed some of the overall benefits or challenges posed by blogging. I selected Blogs in Higher Education: Implementation and Issues, published in TechTrends, June 2009 (Deng and Yuen, 2009). The article had just what I was looking for.

One of the topics covered was the fact that blogs, unlike personal journals that are kept secret and private, "can be a social medium that allows for dialogue among bloggers and their peers, outside experts, or even a global audiences" (Deng and Yuen, 2009).  This social aspect with the additional ability for blogs to incorporate hyperlinks and user comments and contribute to collaborative and cooperative learning.

That being said, the article also discussed the differences between blogs and forums when it comes to cooperative back and forth learning. The article describes how "unlike a discussion forum with a shared community space, conversations via blogs are distributed and fragmented in individual blog spaces, and there is no effective facility to track the flow of dialogue" (Deng and Yuen, 2009).

The article also addressed how some learners, those who are more task focused and outcome-oriented might find the rationale for blogging difficult to understand (Deng and Yuen, 2009). To help with this, the authors suggested it is important for the teacher or facilitator to set expectations for how blogs will be used in the class, what is expected to be gained or learned from blogging, as well as what is appropriate for blogging, since this can be a very formal or informal medium.

I agreed with many points in the article. I find blogs to be scattered and unconnected, so it makes sense to me that using blogs in an educational setting would be difficult for students to follow their classmates and for the teacher to follow student progress. I am extremely task driven, so setting out expectations for the use of blogs in class would help me very much understand where the blog might fit in for the class. Overall I found this article interesting and helped me, as a new blog user, articulate some of the issues I have with blogs.References:
Deng, L and Yuen, A. (2009). Blogs in Higher Education: Implementation and Issues. TechTrends, 53(3).

Introduction

I have worked in higher education since 1999. I'm not a teacher, but what some would call an administrator or a student services support staff member. I graduated with degrees in Botany and Horticulture and promptly moved to a state with very little plant life. I got a job doing menial data entry work in the local Admissions office and, little did I know, it was then that my higher education career began. I focused for several years on consulting, helping four year institutions implement computer software systems, working with office staff to determine new business processes and reporting. I have left consulting to work at a local institution in the Admissions office, focusing on data processing and operations. I've enjoyed the transition to a single home campus and am enjoying my staff benefits by going back to school to work on my Master's degree.

In this class I hope to further understand the practical uses of blogs and how to manage a blog of my own.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog for course CSE 694, Winter 2012 at Western Oregon University! I have experience reading blogs, but mostly on a casual level reading blogs about cooking or gardening. Most blogs I've read of a professional nature I've found to be ostentatious and annoying to read. I'm looking forward to gaining more blogging experience and the ability to build and maintain a blog of my own.