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Blogging and Peer Interaction


We've been blogging for this class for a while and I've enjoyed the opportunity to learn from my peers and engage in interaction despite not being in the classroom together. This week I read the article Assessing the effects of interactive blogging on student attitudes toward peer interaction, learning motivation, and academic achievements. The article states that "blog platforms provide a personal writing space, which is easy to publish, sharable, and automatically archived, empowering users to form learning communities through inter-linkages" (Yang & Chang, 2012). 

In fact, I'd argue that I've learned more from my interactions with others in this class than I would from a traditional teacher and textbook style of presentation. In a classroom, when a teacher poses a question, "students express their opinions without solid support from content they are studying, perhaps because there is not enough time to prepare or reflect. Disengaged students frequently remain silent, and others who might have something truly relevant to contribute are too shy to do so" (Yang & Chang, 2012). On the other hand, "blogging gives students the time to think. This motivates us to investigate ways of using blogs to engage students in learning when they are not in class" (Yang & Chang, 2012). I think this class does a great job of encouraging us to use blogs to engage in learning. We reflect on prior readings before responding to a classmate's blog and the blog is a great way to ensure everyone has a voice and is a valued member of the learning community.

In the traditional classroom, the environment only includes the instructor and the students. The instructor delivers content and answers questions while the students play more of a passive role. Communication is mostly done one-way from the instructor to the student (Yang & Chang, 2012). Using blogs as a form of communication has created opportunities for learning to become a more interactive process between the instructor and students as well as among students. The main conclusion of the article is that "engaging in dialogues in the form of blog comments is associated with positive attitudes towards online peer interaction and academic achievements" (Yang & Chang, 2012). What do you think? Have you felt like learning via blogging has been effective for you?

Comments

  1. LeahJuly 14, 2020 at 7:52 AM

    That's a good point! Blogging can definitely be a great addition to classroom teaching and learning.

    ReplyDelete
  2. KendylJuly 14, 2020 at 9:12 AM

    I completely agree! I am not a student that likes to contribute to the conversation on the spot if I am not comfortable in the material. Being able to read the text, reflect on it and collect my thoughts in a more manageable way has allowed me to engage with others in a really beneficial way. While I have never experienced an in-class experience with any of our peers in the class, I feel the content shared by others is much more personal than what would be shared in an 90 minute class meeting.

    ReplyDelete

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