Fresh prespective brought by student teachers

With the recent debate on social networking producing numerous threads of discussions throughout the blogosphere, I have decided to create a thread of my own. I believe social networking has a place in the future of education, and I think teachers as well as students can mutually share in positive growth fostered by social networking sites and tools. Where years ago each individual scattered around the world had difficulty sharing messages with broader audiences, technology has now created seemingly limitless pathways to connect these nodes and persons from every country in the world. Finally, the pathways are easily accessible and anyone can provide commentary and original thoughts on virtually any topic of discussion.

Although I do not consider myself to be in the same edublogger social circles as Ewan McIntosh, Danah Boyd, Will Richardson, David Warlick, etc., I believe I do bring an important perspective to the blogosphere as a young student teacher who realizes the title of "student teacher" will most likely remain an integral part of my identity as an educator. Many edubloggers recognize their roles of "learner" will never disappear, but I think actual student teachers who are at the early stages of their careers have a fresh, unique perspective on education, that is, its state, direction, reform, practice, etc. Student teachers should begin to enter the conversations about educational technology and Web 2.0 now while their practice is undergoing, perhaps, some of its greatest maturation processes. I challenge student teachers across the country to weigh-in on issues discussed in the most popular and visited edublogger blogs in the blogosphere. I challenge my peers and colleagues, local and international alike, to share their questions, thoughts, fears, and advice with each other in hopes of creating a network created and sustained by student teachers.

The venue for these discussions and collaborations is underway, and I hope to begin to contact student teachers across the States and abroad shortly. Until then, increase the number of subscriptions in your aggregators to the point where you have enough resources to read daily about the conversations and debates taking place in the world of education.

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Image citations:

Lakerae. (2005 August 6). Earth n America plus. Lakerae's Photostream. Retrieved on January 20, 2007, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/lakerae/31756773/

Christos_m2001. (2007 July 18). Earth - globe. Christos_m2001's Photostream. Retrieved on January 20, 2007, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/christos_m/846651493/

Who needs journal articles?

Scott McLeod presented some interesting analysis today in his blog. He points out that blogs have the potential to reach much larger audiences than academic journals. For example, his blog could potentially attract 4,200,000 people per decade; whereas, articles written by the same author in academic journals may only draw 166,667 people per decade. By the end of his post, McLeod poses the following question:

Why would anyone who wishes to actually reach educators and hopefully influence change in schools not be blogging?

Well, I simply agree. Blogs have the potential to reach wider audiences, but only if their authors take them seriously. According to StatCounter, I only attract about 15 unique users a week, but if I advertised my blog in local education newsletters or encouraged my colleagues to provide material for the blog, then maybe I could create a larger readership. Blogs serve as a medium of communication that links many people, and if we could create a virtual arena for discussions to take place, perhaps more educational endeavors could be begun. Perhaps, more ideas of reform could be discussed. The possibilities are endless.

I will end with McLeod's final question:

Why haven't more faculty caught on to this?

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Image Citation:

Automania. (2006 February 10). Spider web gravity well. Automania's photostream. Retrieved January 16, 2007, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/automania/97936640/

Classroom Blogging Resources

Today, I want to provide an array of excellent sources for blogging in the classroom. As teachers continue to think about integrating blogs into the classroom, I believe it to be essential for teachers to remain up-to-date on what types of research and studies are being completed on blogging.

Eide, F., & Eide, B. (2005, March 2). Brain of the blogger. Eide Neurolearning Blog. Retrieved January 4, 2008, from http://eideneurolearningblog.blogspot.com/2005/03/brain-of-blogger.html

Ellison, N., & Wu, Y. (2008). Blogging in the classroom: A preliminary exploration of student attitudes and impact on comprehension. Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 17(1), 99-122.

Kahn, E. (2007). Building fires: Raising achievement through class discussion. English Journal, 96(4), 16-18.

Lee, S., & Berry, M. (2004) Effective e-learning through collaboration. In T. Freedman (Ed.), Coming of age: An introduction to the World Wide Web (pp. 19-24). Ilford, England: Terry Freedman Ltd.

Lenhart, A., Madden, M., Macgill, A., & Smith, A. (2007, December 19). Teens and social media: The use of social media gains a greater foothold in teen life as they embrace the conversational nature of interactive online media. Washington, D.C.: Pew Internet & American Life Project.

Penrod, D. (2007). Using blogs to enhance literacy: The next powerful step in 21st-century learning. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Education.

Richardson, W. (2006). Blogs, wikis, podcasts, and other powerful web tools for classrooms. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press.

Sifry, D. (2007, April 5). The state of the live web, April 2007. Sifry’s Alerts: David Sifry’s musings. Retrieved January 4, 2008, from http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000493.html

Warlick, D. (2005). Classroom blogging: A teacher’s guide to the blogosphere. Raleigh, NC: The Landmark Project.

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Image Citation:

Krisde. (2006 May 18). Before high piled books, in charactry, hold like rich garners the full-ripen'd grain. Krisde's Photostream. Retrieved on Janurary 15, 2007, from http://www.flickr.com/photos/kristimeador/148787241/