Domination WrapDog

As semester one draws to a close, here are some final thoughts on blogging. The whole blogging process has been fun and a great learning experience!

The main advantages of blogging include being able to embed different links to both the blog posts and down the sides of the blog; being able to write a draft blog and go back into it to edit and polish before posting and also following my classmates’ blogs to see what they have learnt as well as their progress and interaction with some of the new technologies we have seen in class (such as Voki and StoryBird). Using the blog as one point of reference to store, display and reflect on information has been really useful, too.

I found that regularly reflecting on the content of the course was really useful to reiterate and cement concepts that have been introduced. Further to that, it meant that some of the new types of technologies could be played with and used in the blogs as well.

I have learnt a lot through this blogging experience. The outline set by Mark required that we make a blog posting every week reflecting on what we have learnt as well as commenting on our peers’ blogs. The part of the experience that stands out to me the most is how different all our blogs are but still within the parameters that had been set up. Blogging allows for much more creativity and differentiation than simply writing an answer to a question that has been set. Also, scrolling through YouTube videos, making tag clouds and experimenting with StoryBird is really fun!! 

As I am generally a fairly opinionated chatterbox, I found it quite easy to establish my public voice. I think the most important thing for me to remember is that tone can be easily misunderstood when communicating via text. This is the case for any text and not just blogging.

Some of the key points that I will take with me to use as a teacher include:

• Structuring the task to ensure that the blogs are used effectively
• Setting up class rules around Netiquette
• Developing students’ understanding of cybersafety
• Improving students’ critical literacy and critical thinking
• Using the technology to support my pedagogy in the classroom

THANK YOU!!