Online version of the ICE (Illinois Computing Educators) Conference presentation given by Spiro Bolos on 2/26/09. Includes definitions, rationales, examples, tools, and strategies for success in both teacher- and student-authored blogs.
5. “If you are in the position where you need
to take a white person to lunch for
business or pleasure, saying “I know a
great sandwich shop,” will always bring
out a smile. The white person will then tell
you about the great sandwich shop in the
town where they went to college and how
they had a crush on a waiter, or that there
was some special sandwich that they
always ordered. This will put the person in
a good mood.”
26. “It's a teachable moment...an
opportunity to address the
differences between formal and
informal writing. They learn to
make the distinction...just as
they learn not to use slang
terms in formal writing.”
— Amanda Lenhart, senior research specialist at Pew
34. “[B]logs can teach students the
new literacies they will need to
function in an ever expanding
information society.”
35. “There are many skills and concepts that
need to be addressed...to foster these
new literacies. It is not just a matter of
transferring classroom writing into digital
spaces. Teachers need to address...how
to cite and link and why, how to use the
comment tool in pedagogical ways, how
to read web materials more efficiently...”
36. “Blogging requires us to teach students to
critically engage media....[h]ow to become
efficient navigators in these digital spaces
where they will be obtaining a majority of
their information.”
— Anne Davis, Georgia State University
62. [from the Pew Internet and American Life Project:
“Writing, Technology and Teens”]
“Forty-seven percent of teen
bloggers write outside of school
for personal reasons several
times a week or more,
compared with 33 percent of
teens without blogs....
63. Teens also report that writing for
an audience motivates them to
write well and more frequently
— and blogs are one way of
providing this type of audience.”
— “Blogging Helps Encourage Teen Writing”, eSchool News