How to Use Blogging
Impact on Learning
Assessment Strategies
Blogging in Canvas
Relevant Technologies
Things to Consider
Bibliography
Blogs originated as a tool used to log chronological postings of personal commentary on the web, or a web log, and were used almost like a journal or diary. In recent years, blogging has moved away from focusing on personal commentary to being focused on content-specific information postings or editorials that are widely accepted as mainstream publication for all types of information. At one time, some knowledge of HTML was necessary to be able to produce a quality blog. Now, through the use of newer publishing technology (many for free), blogging is as easy to use as email.
How to Use Blogging
Blogs typically take one of two overall approaches.
Class blog: One blog that collects and presents all students’ individual contributions. Students may contribute by authoring and/or editing individual posts. The blog may include work from students spanning multiple semesters of a course.
Student personal blogs: Student personal blogs, which are largely created by individual students, but may also include comment sections where other students or even members of the wider community can respond to or ask questions of the original author.
The following are some of the ways a blog teaching approach is used to engage students:
- reflecting about class content, discussions, current events, or assigned reading (e.g., case studies)
- exploring potential career choices through interacting with career-focused blogs or through reflecting on their own career experiences in volunteer, work-study, and internship experiences
- widely disseminating information by using RSS feeds which make blogs available through newsreaders
- sharing private journal entries viewable only by login access for writing assignments to be graded by an instructor or for closed discussion only open to other participants in a course
- creating opportunity for discussion that goes beyond course work to include experiences, culture, politics, etc.
- creating and sharing personal expression through dialogue, used to meet course requirements, sometimes in the place of a discussion board
- starting conversations and discussions in the traditional classroom (e.g., instructors can post a course content blog entry before class and then ask if anyone saw an interesting or insightful comment, or discuss any questions that were asked repeatedly)
- providing an online forum for informal study groups where students can discuss ideas from class, share resources, and ask questions
- requiring students to set up and regularly post entries to their own blog, focusing on content recently covered in the course
- scaffolding for other course projects, allowing students to post draft segments that will eventually be turned in as a cohesive product or project
- collaborating as a class to develop a collection or library of research work
In her blog post, “A Few Creative Ways to Use Student Blogs,” Gonzalez (2020) identifies six general categories of blogs that might be useful in a course:
- the single project blog
- the special interest blog
- the portfolio blog
- the journalistic blog
- the review blog
- the advice or how-to blog
Impact on Learning
Using blogging in instruction can impact learning through:
- providing a high level of autonomy
- creating a sense of community through interaction with peers and the broader community outside the classroom
- encouraging students to learn from each other as well as the instructor
- fostering quick, open discussion because blogs can be easy to create and maintain
- creating a person-centered discussion, as opposed to the topic-centered discussion of the learning management system
- improving student scores when used in combination with labs to post results from experiments
- motivating students to invest more effort and care in their work
- encouraging higher levels of reasoning including analyzing, evaluating, and creating
- practicing good digital citizenship and the ethical use of images and other media in their work
- experimenting with different types of media to communicate ideas, arguments, and stories to an authentic audience
Assessment Strategies
Best practice for assessing student blogs would be to provide students with a rubric that clearly states the criteria used to evaluate their work. In her blog post, “A Few Creative Ways to Use Student Blogs,” Gonzalez (2020) shares the following recommended criteria to consider when assessing blog assignments:
- purpose and audience
- development
- organization
- style and tone
- effective use of multimedia
- ethical and appropriate use of multimedia
- writing mechanics
- technical functionality
In “Using Blogs for Online, Hybrid or HyFlex Teaching,” Annette Vee (2020) recommends that you “establish your expectations, but avoid writing detailed prompts.” Blogs work best when they are left more open-ended and flexible than more focused class discussions tend to be. Blogs are closer in nature to essays but not quite as formal. In fact, Vee (2020) recommends that blog posts be treated as low-stakes “one-and-done” assignments. Rather than asking students to revise blog entries, provide feedback for them to improve with the next entry they do. The student’s complete blog should ideally then be planned as a long-term assignment comprising many smaller pieces (blog posts) that students publish throughout a semester. When assessing the complete work, Vee (2020) suggests asking students to evaluate themselves by selecting what they feel are their best posts and peer comments and explaining why in a short reflection. This approach to assessment can help to improve students’ metacognitive ability to gauge the success of their own work and reduce some of the grading time needed.
Blogging in Canvas
In Canvas, instructors can set up Canvas assignments to accept blog postings by the URL of the online assignment. Students can submit blog posts via URL and their work will essentially be captured in Canvas at the time they submitted it, allowing for easy enforcement of assignment deadlines. Instructors will see a preview of the student’s blog in the SpeedGrader view for that assignment and it can be graded without having to link out to the blog itself.
You can learn more about adding details to a Canvas assignment from the Canvas Community and about using SpeedGrader.
Relevant Technologies
Sites at Penn State provides free blogging services to all members of the University community.
Other popular free blogging services include:
- Blogger: Google’s free blog hosting site
- Edublogs: the largest education blogging platform on the web
- Tumblr: a microblogging platform and social networking website
Many types of media such as podcasts, videos, MP3 files, and other widgets can be embedded into blog posts.
Things to Consider
For successful implementation of blogging, you should consider the following strategies:
Explain the goals and benefits of the blogging assignment in terms of how it will benefit them in your course and more importantly in their future work. Some research suggests that students’ perceptions of the use of blogging in class are influenced by their preconceived perceptions on blogging and digital tools in general, as well as their comfort level with the technology being used. Similarly, students may not see much benefit in interacting with others through blog comments unless you can demonstrate those benefits for them (Garcia et al., 2019).
Display and refer to posts as you cover course content. If you are teaching an online course, include the snippets of posts in your lecture review or wrap-up, especially if you notice common themes in your students’ posts or comments.
Encourage students to be creative and include video or music or other media that relates to the topic in their blog posts. If you are teaching a traditional course, play select clips in class.
Highlight particularly good blogs in class and/or on the class blog, announcements, or discussions.
Bibliography
EDUCAUSE. (2005, August). 7 things you should know about blogs. EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative. https://library.educause.edu/-/media/files/library/2005/9/eli7006-pdf.pdf
Garcia, E., Moizer, J., Wilkins, S., & Haddoud, M. Y. (2019). Student learning in higher education through blogging in the classroom. Computers & Education, 136, 61–74. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2019.03.011
Gonzalez, J. (2020, July 19). A few creative ways to use student blogs. Cult of Pedagogy. https://www.cultofpedagogy.com/student-blogs/
Lo, C. (2018, September 1). Teach smart with technology: Blogging as a write-to-learn exercise. The University of Chicago Academic Technology Solutions. https://academictech.uchicago.edu/2018/09/01/teach-smart-with-technology-blogging-as-a-write-to-learn-exercise/
McClurken, J., & Meloni, J. (2010, June 21). ‘How are you going to grade this?’: Evaluating classroom blogs. ProfHacker, The Chronicle of Higher Education. https://www.chronicle.com/blogs/profhacker/how-are-you-going-to-grade-this-evaluating-classroom-blogs
McDaniel, R. (2010, June 10). Blogs and discussion boards. Vanderbilt University Center for Teaching. https://cft.vanderbilt.edu/guides-sub-pages/blogs/
Orlando, J. (2010, June 7). Blogging to improve student learning: Tips and tools for getting started. Faculty Focus, Higher Ed Teaching & Learning. https://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/effective-teaching-strategies/blogging-to-improve-student-learning-tips-and-tools-for-getting-started/
Vee, A. (2020, September 15). Using blogs for online, hybrid or hyflex teaching. Inside Higher Ed. https://www.insidehighered.com/advice/2020/09/16/advantages-blogs-and-how-effectively-incorporate-them-your-courses-opinion