1. Expected hours required: 2 ½ – 3 hrs
2. An explanation of the learning benefits for participants.
Proposed activity is about educational blogging.
Blogging reflects a personal style so it can be used as a tool for reflection and learning. This personal style may be reflected in either the writing or the selection of links passed along to readers.
Blogging also combines aspects of thinking writing which is the writing for ourselves and not for audience, with aspects of presentation writing which is the kind of writing we do in order to communicate a message and finally adds in conversation as well.
3. Any prior reading or resources that they need to engage with.
Reading 1: Educational blogging by Stephen Downes
http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0450.PDF
Reading 2: Blogging as a tool of reflection and learning, Rettberg, UiB
http://www.virclass.net/eped/ep_tmp/files/17842056574abc85cdf304e.pdf
4. What they are expected to do.
4.1 Participants are expected to:
(a) read the two readings
(b) keep notes of what is important and useful
(c) reflect their ideas/notes using forum discussion and
(d) provide constructive comments on others participants postings
4.2 Participants are expected to join a SAC main room and 4 sub-rooms to discuss in groups the following topics
4.2.1 Main SAC room– Rules of discussion using SAC, check of microphone set, Delegation of topic (Tutor present) and
4.2.2 Sub room A – Discuss how blogging helps learning (No tutor)
4.2.3 Sub room B – Discuss how you can help learners use blog so that they will learn gaining confidence, practicing, writing, participating in networks of other learners ( No tutor)
4.2.4 Sub room C – Discuss how you can use blogs in your teaching as tutors ( No tutor)
4.2.5 Sub room D- Propose any other software except WordPress.com (advantages/disadvantages) (No tutor)
Finally, use their personal blogs to reflect on the resume of each group discussion and inform others for their blog posting via twitter for any comments.
5. Your expectations of their participation.
I expect that they will all participate actively for activity 4.1 which is a straight forward activity that needs no group working effort. I do not expect that all participants will read each other’s postings and give comments but some or most of them will do so.
Also, I expect some kind of difficulties in agreeing on a suitable time for the main and sub room SACs but this is predictable. If such difficulties arise I will propose the use of doodle software as a time scheduler instead of forum area.
Another difficulty in participation is expected during SAC discussions due to the fact that some participants might be shy and not speak at all. I will try to create a friendly environment during main SAC so that to trigger more smoothly SAC sub room discussions.
Finally, I believe all participants are expected to reflect their ideas on SAC sub rooms discussions since is creative and useful for their learning.
6. What kind of support they can expect.
They can expect support from me as a tutor and from other co learners during forum discussions in order to clarify topics they read from proposed readings. They can also expect support from me (tutor) especially when using SAC (main and sub rooms) if technology problems appear. Finally, they can expect support again from me (tutor) and co learners to give constructive and encouraging comments on their reflection postings in their blogs.
7. How you would like them to feedback to you on their experience.
I would like every participant feel free to give me feedback whenever he/she feels that has to do. Feedback for me is more than welcome since it will improve my efforts to provide an authentic and collaborative activity. Learners are free to use different channels of communication: emails, tweets, forums, skype, viber. Having in mind that some learners might be shy to give feedback I will ask them to give me feedback with a small formal evaluation at the end of the SAC meetings and before the reflection. If they are not feeling happy with the result mostly due to unexpected technology problems I will suggest repeating the SAC meetings (in the meantime I will try to fix any technical problems) so that all be satisfied.
despablog 
by VASILIKI PAPAGEORGIOU – Friday, 3 April 2015, 11:47 AM
Despo mou,
these are my comments for your pilot activity.
First of all, I would like to tell you that even though my activity is not on blogging, I have started using blogging slowly with my students at College. Right now I am introducing them to ‘paragraph’ blogging which is writing one paragraph about a topic every week. So, I find yours extremely useful and interesting. I have also started blogging a little bit over a year ago and it has been a great experience so far. I am more than interested in what you are doing here.
Regarding the procedure you are describing, an idea is that perhaps you should consider leaving a comment or two (or a sentence/statement) for each group in the beginning to start up the discussion. There is always the chance one of the participants has not read the readings or is too shy to be involved in the discussion.
Also, the readings you posted could not be reached via the link you provided, yet it was easy to google them and find them in this way.
Finally, in case not everyone reflects on the resume of each group discussion, why not consider choosing one person each time who would do that? And then , this one could follow the procedure you are describing ( inform others for their blog posting via twitter for any comments) and ask for further comments? This is just an idea, of course, in case not everyone blogs about it.
I am going to be there tonight and will have done my homework!! Great job, Despo mou!!
Talk to you tonight. Good luck!!
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by DIMITRIS ELEFSINIOTIS – Sunday, 29 March 2015, 7:27 PM
Dear Des,
I have just fulfilled the reading of the two documents provided in your proposed pilot activity. I have kept my notes, made up my thinking and I’ll try to post my ideas with what seems important to me, along with an evaluation of the whole structured activity.
My notes and ideas will be posted accordingly. They correspond to the two readings about educational blogging and how it can be utilized to enforce knowledge, enhance participation and foster the emergence of a learning community that goes beyond the TEL program walls. smile
Notes & Ideas
Blogging combines aspects of thinking-writing (think about a concept, problem, and then write about it) with aspects of presentation writing (everything we write will be read by a greater audience than our tutor) – and it adds in the conversation as well. (Rettberg, 2009, p.1)
Both readings emphasize on the fact that blogging is about, first, reading. In order to effectively blog you have first to read and then think of what you ‘ve read and reflect accordingly via a blog post, or a comment as an immediate response to another blog post. This “Blogging is about, first, reading. But more important, it is about reading what is of interest to you: your culture, your community, your ideas. And it is about engaging with the content and with the authors of what you have read—reflecting, criticizing, questioning, reacting.” (Downes, 2004, p.24), and that “You blog your immediate impressions and your first responses to ideas you have read about, or you blog about your experiences or about discussions that are going on in other blogs. Blogging as an immediate response to another text or to an experience or an idea is close to Olga Dysthe’s idea of thinking-writing.” “Blogging isn’t about being read by as many people as possible: it’s about being part of a conversation. Writing a blog without reading other blogs is like clapping with one hand: it makes no sense.” “We read each other’s blogs, shared ideas and research findings and gave each other fast and frequent feedback simply by commenting on each other’s blog posts.” (Rettberg, 2009, p.1-2)
Both readings also mention that students may have the same perception about blogging within the boundaries of an educational system. This perception may drive to an overall failure of blogging.”By its very nature, assigned blogging in schools cannot be blogging. It’s contrived. No matter how much we want to spout off about the wonders of audience and readership, students who are asked to blog are blogging for an audience of one, the teacher.” (Rettberg, 2009, p.2) “Many students don’t really like writing. Many students are shy of putting their words onto the internet. Even when they do blog, many students don’t think to engage in the larger world of blogging. They don’t really read other blogs and they don’t really expect anyone other than the teacher to read their blog. Partly this is due to the way we’ve brought them up in our educational systems.” (Downes, 2004, p.24)
Finally both readings agree that in order for blogging to foster learning experience and manage to spread and get adopted by the learning community, this exact engagement in a larger community need to be stressed by the tutors and realized by the students.”1. For a conversation to be successful, it must be given a purpose and it must remain, for the most part, unconstrained. 2. The process of reading online, engaging a community, and reflecting it online is a process of bringing life into learning. This engagement in a learning community must be embraced and encouraged, in order for blogging in education to be a success.” (Downes, 2004, p.24-26). “1. I tried to model the kind of weblogging I wanted to encourage in the blog I wrote for the class. I drew connections between posts students had written, helping them to see how discussions were growing forth between them. 2. Sometimes, the realization that their writing matters outside of the classroom can be a strong learning experience for students. As my blogging students realised that their writing was actually being read by other students and even by people outside the university, their writing changed. I was most impressed by the way in which they began teaching each other. 3. With the teacher no longer the overly predominant active reader and responder of student texts, students, as a community, take more ownership of their writing.” (Rettberg, 2009, p.4-5)
Evaluation of the Designed Activity
Very well written and comprehensive design taking into account a mix of right and balanced interactions (student-teacher, student-student and student-content).
With the various types of interactions, such as synchronous e.g SAC, and asynchronous e.g forum discussion, blog postings and reflection with comments on others postings, help learners learn and effectively participate, keeping them on the trails of the learning process from the beginning until the end of it. The forms of interactive learning (Anderson, 2004, p.9) are:
Structured Learning Resources
Paced, Collaborative Learning
Community of Inquiry
The learning theories mapped to Conole’s et al (2004) Model of Learning (p.25-26), are mainly behaviourism, reflective learning, experiential learning and overall building of a community of practice.
Expectations from the students are clearly stated and the overall risks are analyzed in the section of tutor’s expectations about students’ overall participation. However in that latter 5th section there are a couple of written points that according to my opinion could be placed in 6th section related to the kind of support we as students expect from the tutor. “If such difficulties arise I will propose the use of doodle software as a time scheduler instead of forum area” and “I will try to create a friendly environment during main SAC so that to trigger more smoothly SAC sub room discussions.” What do you think about this observation? Shouldn’t they match better if they were placed in that specific section?
One final comment from my side are about the readings themselves. I found them interesting but a bit old. I would like to read about how educational blogging evolved in nowadays, and what the learning community believe about blogging today, not in 2009 and 2004.
Kind Regards
Dimitris
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