Let's blog

Blogs can be used for a lot of interesting pedagogical techniques, particularly when you want students to engage in conversation with ideas and each other and when you want to easily include web links and media in assignments. An article on Inside Higher Ed discusses some of the benefits of using blogs in the higher ed classroom. Educause also released a document, "Blogs in Higher Education: Pedagogy, Practice, and Really Simple Syndicaton" with some good introductory information. For more on this topic, check out Jeremy Friedberg's video about wikis and blogs in higher education below.




You want to make sure that what you are trying to accomplish is best done by using a blog before putting in the effort and expecting your students to do so. But if the project or learning outcomes lends itself to web exploration, incorporating media, a linear archive of information, and conversation between users, then blogs might be the right choice. Just make sure you don't get too caught up in the fun of it...

One month finished

I've been working at the Somerset Children's Center for a month now and it's amazing how much I've learned it such a short amount of time. I've been helping Miss Jill work on motor and cognitive development with the kids. In class, we learned about the development of children's understanding of cause and effect. To reinforce this skill, we play with jack in the boxes and watch the children start to realize that at a certain point when they are winding the toy, the clown will pop out. It's fun to see them get excited or startled the first time and then start to understand that this is an effect that will happen every time they turn the crank...