Blogs and Teaching Teaching and Blogs What Well

Blogs and Teaching, Teaching and Blogs

What We’ll Do �Welcome to the blogosphere. �How can blogs help teach? �How can we be creative? © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

WELCOME TO THE BLOGOSPHERE © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Origins �Web + Log = Weblog = Blog �Narcissism? © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Self-Publishing �Vanity �Subsidy �POD �“True” self-publishing ◦ Stephen Crane, E. E. Cummings, Deepak Chopra, Benjamin Franklin, Zane Grey, Rudyard Kipling, D. H. Lawrence, Thomas Paine, Edgar Allan Poe, Ezra Pound, Carl Sandburg, George Bernard Shaw, Upton Sinclair, Gertrude Stein, Henry David Thoreau, Walt © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009 Whitman and Mark Twain.

Working Definition �A blog is a mechanism that creates a multimedia website �Kinds of websites ◦ Billboards �information ◦ Interactive �Information and response ◦ Transactional �Information and commerce ◦ Portals �Gateways to other sites © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Sample Blogs �Aggregators ◦ Art Throb ◦ The Good Men Project ◦ The Huffington Post �Personal ◦ Plainmoneytalk ◦ Dooce �Portal ◦ Arts & Letters Daily © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Effective Blog Qualities �Polymodality ◦ Words ◦ Pictures ◦ Video ◦ Archive �Connectivity ◦ Other web sites ◦ Online sources © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Publishing Comparison Paper Blogs Cost ◦ high ◦ near zero Distribution ◦ expensive ◦ no cost Interactivity ◦ little or none Authorship? ◦ immediate Authorship? © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Authorship Propositions Proposition #1 Writing & publishing have always been collaborative. Proposition #2 We teach students to compose so they might be read. Proposition #3 Blogs enable public interactive processes that encourage better writing © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

TEACHING WITH BLOGS © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

You must remember this… �Different websites, different purposes ◦ Billboards ◦ Interactive ◦ Transactional ◦ Portals © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Billboards Showcase student Showcase work BLOG Student group Teacher Student BUT. . . Avoid the teacher as publisher! © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009 Student

Interactive & Process Group project Blog Graphic s Compose Rewrites Comments Blog Comments Final Blog © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

Portal Faculty Portal A student blog A student group blog Another class’s blogs © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009

WHAT ELSE CAN WE THINK OF? © Perry Glasser 8/29/2009