Creating a Blog Reflection

A blog is an internet tool that is used by individuals or groups to post their own ideas, opinions, experience, observations, information and much more.  Although it has generally been used as a personal space, the use of blogs in educational situations is on the rise. This technological tool allows individuals to post content on a regular basis in an engaging and interesting way.  Before this class I had never used a blog before and initially found the task quite daunting but as I started posting reflections and using the space more I became more confident and actually enjoyed it. I think one of the things I like most about blogs is that everything posted on there is my opinion and my personal point of view on the topic – I guess, I essentially like that I can share my own ideas and thoughts in a non judgmental way.

BLOGS IN THE CLASSROOM– PMI CHART
POSITIVE	MINUS	INTERESTING
Supports collaborative learning	Students may not be away of safe, ethical and legal issues when dealing with the web	Students are able to work in groups or individually to showcase their own opinions and thoughts
It’s a learner-centred tool	May result in cyber bullying	There are millions and millions of blogs online being used
It’s engaging and interactive and allows creativity	Students may access or share inappropriate content	Increasingly popular as an education tool
Supports and facilitates; higher order thinking, exploration, contribution
Easy access
Easy to use
Allows students to embed videos, text, images, links etc

After exploring the positives and negatives of using blogs in the classroom, I believe that blogs would be an extremely effective teaching tool I could use in my own classroom. It allows students to show their creative side whilst promoting a collaborative and learner-centred activity. It is engaging and interactive and also facilitates higher order thinking of the learners. It also could be used in several ways; it could be used as an assessment tool, or a place to post a reflection every week as a study guide, or even as a class blog - if the class were studying a specific subject, they could create a blog to showclass their subject and what they're doing and learning etc.

Although I would use blogs in my classroom as a teaching tool, there are certain issues that must be attended to and monitored. Such as; students awareness of the ethical, legal issues and copyright issues when dealing with the internet and making sure students are cyber bullying one another or accessing and sharing inappropriate content online.

But as long as blogs are used in conjunction with the safe, legal and ethical policies they would be a useful technnological tool for learning managers.