To Blog or Not to Blog...? THAT is the Question!

I am a repeat offender of starting blogs and then leaving them in cyberspace untouched for years.  Every time I started my blog, from LiveJournal, Xenga, Myspace Blogs, Facebook notes, to the most recent endeavor of Apple's iWeb (starting a written and/or video blog series to let my friends and family know what I was up to), I would write on it religiously - every day, if not more than once a day.  After about a week or two, it spanned between weeks, then once a month, then I all of a sudden a few months to a year would go by and I'd re-read my previous blogs posts thinking how silly and immature I was and how much I've grown since I wrote those posts.  So the question I ask myself - is it worth it? Or since I am a thespian, more appropriately, to blog or not to blog? <- That is the question!

However, this is not why I am writing my first post on the next chapter of my blogging ventures.  In studying at Pace University in the Educational Technology Specialist Grad Program, our online class was posed the question: "Why could blogging change, or not change, the traditional classroom?"

Initially I thought it would be revolutionary, classrooms of the past never had this capability because of the lack of technology.  After reading this article, I realized just how revolutionary it could be!  I had not thought about the students' writing - with the added element of their writing being seen by the world.  I believe some may have the fear that increased technology use strips students of interpersonal contact.  However, this article made me realize that we are possibly shifting to a different kind of interpersonal contact.  One of the students explains, "the blogs give us a chance to communicate between us and motivate us to write more."  The article also made me think about the dangers of a public forum for a private classroom.  We need to protect children from the dangers of cyberspace.  Monitoring posts and protecting students' identities are of utmost importance.  But I believe with resources such as Miss Brunes' 5th Grade Class' Rules and the extensive list found on Bud the Teacher's Wiki Page we can proactively handle any sticky situations.

This article also opened my eyes to why blogging in classrooms can be so beneficial.  We need to have the students practicing what we are eventually going to be testing.  As the article states, "Educators cannot teach one way, test another way, and expect positive outcomes."  If students are blogging, students will certainly be prepared to enter answers to tests online in an even simpler format than blogging!

I am so glad I came across one resource in my clicking around in research.  I got to hear it straight from the horse's mouth. These students give a very compelling argument in the video posted by the students of Miss Baker's Biology Class in Why Blog? Science Online Students Answer.

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So to answer my question - To blog or not to blog? - I lean very heavily towards blogging in the classroom.  I also lean more towards blogging in my life again...in case you were interested...