Blogging is not a new thing to me as an audience. Besides traditional newspapers, I usually read blogs to have different points of view. However, I have just started writing my blog last semester as a requirement of my class. Since our topic this week is “Networked Learning”, I will blog about the difference how I write my assignment using a blog.
In general, I think blogging has positive impacts on my writing. Traditionally, my work is only seen and evaluated by a single audience, my teacher. Meanwhile, by blogging, my audience changes significantly, they include my teacher, my classmates, and even people outside classroom scale. With broader audience with diverse opinions, I have spent more time and effort to think about what I should write, what other people want to read, and what they might think of the topic. Besides, before publishing my work online, I spend time to double check grammar, spelling, and word choices. A hard copy of a writing paper is easy to be lost. Even a paper submitted online by mail or Canvas can be hard to find. Writing a blog makes it very easy to go back anytime to read, to revise, and even to continue the content. Another thing I like about blogging is it is convenient to cite or link online related information as many as I want, which makes information is clearer and more connected to each other. The crucial benefit is that blogging is purposefully designed to promote communications between the author and audience as well as among audiences with different features such as providing feedback and sharing the content easily. Therefore, when I write I can leave some open questions and ask for others’ opinions.
Saying that does not mean using a blog for writing assignment has no limitations. However, I think generally it has more positive points than negative ones.
I think you’ve made some great points about the benefits (and limitations) of blogging in your post. I’m glad you found it helpful for your writing experiences, too; I also feel like these blogs sort of require you to look back and reflect on what you’ve been thinking. (Were you also in PFP last semester? I was, and it was my first experience with required blogging. We won’t talk about my early blogging days, back in middle school. Thankfully some web pages were not meant to last forever!)
I liked this observation you made: “A hard copy of a writing paper is easy to be lost.” I teach writing to materials science engineers, and this is something they could stand to learn. You could print this on a billboard and they’d still miss it!
Yes, I was in PFP class last semester. Sometimes, it is fun to come back to read my blogs and see how much my thinking changes.
Since I am new at this new ‘blogging’ way of learning, it’s interesting to read positive experiences about it. I only wrote 1 blog post so far, and it did take a while to write. But I do not feel the second one will take as much time. Other that that, I agree with you about the fact that blogging will improve writing skills, and the benefits of taking the publics opinion rather than just one individual, the teacher. However do you think this method can be applied to any subject? I wish..
I think blogging works best for reflection and raising opinions. For original work such as scientific research, I prefer to publish on journals and disseminate the published work via blogs.
I agree with many issues that you’ve raised in your post. I sense that it fosters a sense of “community” between the students. I would add that this way of learning also depends on the nature of the class, the size and the audience. For example, I am not entirely sure if including blogging in a math class would be very practical or useful.
I agree, for a math class, I think it is better to have a discussion forum.
After watching the video “Seth Godin and Tom Peters on Blogging (2009)”, I tried to think about how blog change my life. I am glad to read your blog about how blogging changes the you write and learn your real life experience about blogging. I think you do a good summary on the advantages of blogging and I agree with most of your opinions since I have the similar experience about blogging. Among all your opinions about blogging, I think the one that blogging makes the information clearly connected to each other is outstanding. When we do the blogs, it is more convenient for us to link online related information, that makes information or knowledge become netted and organized. At the same time, netted information or knowledge can really inspire us to think more and connect more. That becomes the true meaning of networked learning.
I agreed. I think it is the reason to name “Networked” learning.
Great post! I especially like your statement that says “I have spent more time and effort to think about what I should write, what other people want to read, and what they might think of the topic.” This is certainly the way that blogging should be done, although admittedly, not everyone follows the same principles, to the detriment of some material that is out on the web. But what I focused on is your positive reflection, which I truly admire!
Great Post! Its great to read a reflection from someone who both enjoys blogging and has found value in it. Given that you use your real name, do you ever get concerned that a mis-step in a blog post could reflect poorly on your academic career? This is of course a question that is very subject to your field of study. Given that I am a sociologist, I think about this often. I am interested in your perspective.
I prefer to “Call everything by its real name” (It was from a movie but I could not remember the name). I know some bloggers do not use their real name because of political issues for example. Without special reasons, I prefer people using their real name because by using their real name, authors agree that credit of what they write goes together with their responsibility about what they write.
You’ve got great comments here so I’ll just say that I enjoyed reading this thread and I’m looking forward to your future posts!
Thank you for exposing your opinion on why do you enjoy blogging. Do you think there is a difference between willingly writing a blog and being required to do so for a class? Is the result different ?