An Idea to Elevate Student Blog-Writers: Giving them space on Support Blogging.com
Real quick, an itch to scratch:
While I laud the impulse behind the “Support Blogging” “links to school bloggers” wiki [update: link repaired], I think it might improve by being a bit less egalitarian and a bit more meritocratic–or, more accurately, a bit more student-centered. As Scott Schwister points out on a recent post, we’re no longer in 2004. Surely a few student bloggers have emerged over the past 3 years that deserve to join our ranks. Surely there are pioneers among them too.
What I mean is this: Every teacher knows that all students are not created equallydo not have equal writing skills and/or motivations. It follows that all student web-logs writers are likewise not equal.
So rather than (or maybe “in addition to”) promoting connections between classrooms that write on blogs, I think we should identify our exemplary student writers for individual attention. If the top student web-log writers world-wide had a resource–a wiki, for example–that alerted them to the existence of others like them, then a more authentic “learnerblogosphere” could come into being. Students could subscribe to their worldwide peers’ blogs on their feed readers and put them on their blogrolls. And they could begin enjoying the kind of community-of-interest connectivity that we adults do.
I almost started a new wiki to do that, but instead, just edited the Classroom Blogging wiki. I changed the heading “Student Blogs” to the more accurate “Classroom Blogs,” and I added an “Individual Student Blogs” section. I hope other teachers out there will add their deserving individual student blog-writers to this list. Not only would it separate the wheat from the chaff, it would also provide teachers a quick reference of ready exemplars to show what good student blog-writing looks like.
Right now on Support Blogging, there are a gazillion links to adult edublogs, and a gazillion more of whole class blogs. It’s time, I vote, to let the student writers have some of this space, and make it “student-centered.” Maybe we should even put their blogs on the top of the list.
If any of you out there have the power to add to this list, please do so. Let’s connect the real student bloggers out there. They might develop into a learning community that can teach us adults, since they’re experiencing all of this from the front lines.
[Post-script: What would happen if we educators encouraged volunteer students to create a niche of learner edubloggers? That could be enlightening indeed. I know a few students who would probably be interested. Anybody else? Chris? Jeff? Jeff? Bruce?]
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Clay: What a great idea, and I applaud you for taking the initiative. It is this very nature of the web 2.0 that makes it such a powerful and rewarding learning tool. In an earlier post, you had talked about getting ready for next year. Me too. I’d like my students to establish blogs, but the only way it’s going to truly stick for the students is if they experience the same power and possibility we all have through our own web 2.0 tools. The linking and the commenting to one another has been one of the most powerful experiences for me. This would encourage just such activity and promote the use of blogging as a valuable learning tool.
And on a related note, I will be teaching a non-fiction writing class next year and I hope we can collaborate at some point. Thanks again.
Bing Miller
6 May 07 at 6:28 am
Great, Bing–do you have any student bloggers you can add to the list?
And I’d love to collaborate next year. My problem is I’m only teaching AP Lit next year.
What are the solutions?
If you want to work together b/w now and next autumn to develop a student blogging training sequence–you know, all the processes they need to know, understand, do, plus widgets they should have and so forth–let me know. We can Skype or Yackpack and start a wiki.
Clay Burell
6 May 07 at 6:39 am
BUT…as K12 teachers, we can only do this (which is an excellent suggestion) once students become adults. Because of privacy concerns, implementation is problematic. My star bloggers are only in 8th grade. Above that age at my school are, well, just not getting it.
Durff
6 Jul 07 at 8:35 pm
Hi durff,
I love turning assertions into questions: Can we “only do this once students become adults”?
Why can’t we find creative ways to protect privacy? Anagrams or other privacy-protecting codes, for example? Parent permission to let star writers blog (they let them act on stage in school dramas, after all, with their full names and pictures on the programs)?
I really think we can
That being said, I tend to forget that not all teachers are high school teachers. I can see your point about K-8, though again, I’m not sure it’s impossible. Moderation, for example, might be a factor that makes things okay.
And your reply is making the word “adult” ring in my ears: there’s the legal definition, which in litigious America has to be factored in; but there’s also the maturation definition, which qualifies a few ninth graders (age 15) I know as adults. They’re far more capable and prudent already than many a “legally adult” frat boy I witnessed in college.
Thanks for your input. You’re helping me get ideas about this
Clay Burell
7 Jul 07 at 12:15 am
In the USA, privacy concerns are taking center stage with parents right now. I think this needs to die done before we forge ahead. Maybe just audio podcasts, which can be edited, would be possible.
In the USA, 18 years is the ‘adult’ designation. Litigation is rampant. I probably will have next year middle schoolers who can not take part in anything, thanks to the state laws. In other countries, student participation in the edublogosphere will be easier to facilitate. I don’t yet have any high schoolers that fit your description…though I know of a few in other schools.
Durff
7 Jul 07 at 10:33 am
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