Educational Blogging: Do we really do that?

Reflective Blog #1

I just read an article by Stephen Downes’ on Educational Blogging. I was shocked to find the article was written back in 2004. I was shocked because it appears that educational technology, or I guess I should more properly say, the use of technology in education does not keep up with the rapid pace of the use of technology in the real world.  Being a mathematics teacher, I'm going to have to really get out of my comfort zone to see and develop ideas of how blogging can impact my students learning in mathematics class.  However, as I look around at other subjects within my school and others I've taught at, I can see that educational blogging is not being used as it was intended, that is as true blogging. Just because a teacher may use blog software to post class syllabi, rules and announcements, does not mean she is blogging.  Also, if a teacher posts a writing prompt on a blog site or an IWA (independent writing assignment as our teachers call it) on a blog site for students to respond to, does not mean the students are blogging either.  True blogging is a result of a legitimate intent to read, learn and respond to information.  “It starts with listening” as stated in Mr. Downes’ article.  For instance, most adults, including myself, and kids “google” when they have a question about something.  Many times I’ve read articles that included information  I did not completely understand or wanted to know more about.  As a result I began to look for more information on the internet…which may have led me somewhere else and so on and so forth.  Imagine if that were happening in context of the classroom and that one article may lead to another, and that along the way students could ask questions and make statements to others that had done the same thing along the way.  That would be true blogging.  Blogging, in its purest form, leads to research based learning.  I do not see this occurring in the educational environment.  I believe this is happening for several reasons, but I’d like to mention just a couple. The first is I do not believe teachers truly understand the concept of blogging. I know I did not until I started reading these and other articles.  As a result, I do not believe they know how to incorporate this into their curriculum.  Furthermore, the school environment and the policing of web content by administrators on teachers and students could have a negative impact as well.   

With this being said, educational blogging in some places is obviously working well.  I believe as time goes by and more teachers become educated on the proper use of technology in their curriculum, that blogging will definitely become a viable tool in learning.