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2009年3月17日 星期二

The Technology of Reading and Writing in the Digital Space: Why RSS is crucial for a Blogging Classroom

http://blogsforlearning.msu.edu/articles/view.php?id=6

David Parry, University of Albany

Abstract

Although in the past fews years there has been a marked growth in the number of higher education classrooms that utilize an on-line writing component, adapting the teaching of writing to digital spaces has met with resistance on the part of both students and professors. While there are many hurdles to address in navigating technological changes in writing practices, I would like to suggest that part of the problem has been a lack of understanding about the ways that information is disseminated and archived in these spaces. We need to begin by framing the approach in a new way to contextualize writing better, and, more importantly, to make classroom blogging (and even more broadly writing in digital spaces) more productive for the students and professors. In particular, I want to show how the technology of RSS is crucial both from a theoretical and a practical standpoint to any digital writing, but especially to any blogging classroom.

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Although in the past fews years there has been a marked growth in the number of higher education classrooms that utilize an on-line writing component, adapting the teaching of writing to digital spaces has met with resistance on the part of both students and professors. While there are many hurdles to address in navigating technological changes in writing practices, I would like to suggest that part of the problem has been a lack of understanding about the ways that information is disseminated and archived in these spaces. We need to begin by framing the approach in a new way to contextualize writing better, and, more importantly, to make classroom blogging (and even more broadly writing in digital spaces) more productive for the students and professors. In particular, I want to show how the technology of RSS is crucial both from a theoretical and a practical standpoint to any digital writing, but especially to any blogging classroom.

When asked, those who work in information technology (I speak here not of those in the academy but rather those who work at technology industries) about the most significant transformations in communication in the past ten years, one of the most often cited developments is RSS. However, a large majority of internet users, by some estimations over 90%, have no idea about this technology, or how it is changing information dissemination on the internet. (I have found that among students, even though this is the tech-savvy generation, less that one in ten have used RSS. If you are one of those not familiar with RSS please indulge me for a short moment and I promise to explain.) Although in the past several years RSS use has expanded to include content from almost any type of website, its initial growth in usage can be traced to blogs (weblogs). And although RSS has so many uses beyond blogs, RSS can greatly enhance classroom blogging both in the pedagogical and the practical realms.

For those who are not familiar with RSS, allow me a brief explanation. Although there are more in depth resources available to explain RSS (see references at the end of this article), I am going to offer a short explanation to aim at the concept behind what RSS does. When I am asked by people, regardless of their level of network literacy, what RSS is, I try to explain it by analogy to a newspaper. Imagine that you could have a newspaper delivered to your house that had only the content you wanted. That is, let's say you want the sports section from Chicago Tribune, the education section from the New York Times, the editorial page from the Guardian, and international headline news from the BBC. Now lets say this newspaper would be compiled for you and presented to you whenever you requested, and, what is more, would only give you the information that has changed since last you asked. But, even better what if you could also add into this “newspaper” your best friend's blog on cooking, a travel blog from Asia, updates from the Chronicle of Higher Ed . . .or pretty much any website you want. This allows you to monitor all of the content that you select from the web without having to visit all of the sites. What RSS does is “syndicate” all of the content you want, and send you everything you have asked for. (RSS stands for either “Rich Site Summary,“ or ”Really Simple Syndication.“) Any site you have seen with the following Feed Icon XML Icon RSS Icon is offering these summaries, or syndication; all you have to do is subscribe. I am not going to go into the details of how you get the subscriptions, or what programs you need to do this (you can even do this all on-line so you do not need a separate program), but you can check the end of this article for a few resources that will help you set up the syndication. There are a lot of resources out there to handle these feeds, and each has advantages and disadvantages, so it is worth some time and effort to try out many of these to find out which works for your particular educational situation.

Why this Matters in the Blogging Classroom

One of the most significant concerns about using blogs in the classroom is that students often feel as if they are doing the same writing, just placing it on the web. Since context determines meaning, the method and message of writing necessarily changes as students compose for the internet; however, many academics fail to convey this information to students. Recently, there has been a significant amount of hype about “Web 2.0,” the idea that the Web has changed from a reading space to a read-write space. Regardless of the intellectually spurious claim to absolutely separate out reading from writing, web content in recent years has changed, most significantly with regard to the increase in wikis, blogs, social sites, and even the speed at which traditional sites now get updated.

For me, one of my central pedagogical goals is always to teach students to critically engage media. As such, I feel it is important to teach students how to become critical navigators in the digital spaces where a majority of their information will be taken in. And for me, this is one of the reasons that blogging in the classroom can serve an important pedagogical role that writing in paper format alone cannot accomplish. If one simply transfers the "book-way" of writing onto the digital space, students have learned little that they could not have gained from more traditional writing assignments. The situation may even be worse than one of unnecessary reconfiguration, for in the digital medium, writing often produces technological frustrations which, if not offset by other gains, leads to negative experiences for the students. Since the context of writing has shifted in the digital, it is important to demonstrate to student how authorship itself has shifted in the age of the digital.

Writing in the age of the digital is no longer a matter of being the absolute genius creator who gives birth to an idea and writes it all down for the world to see (as if it ever was); managing context on the web for writers has become a significantly different task. To write “well” in this space students need to learn not only how to cite and link, but indeed to package their writings in a different way. RSS helps accomplish this goal.

Helping Students to Become Better Readers to Become Better Writers

The amount of information on the web is overwhelming to say the least. I could spend the rest of my life reading Wikipedia and would probably never finish. While this is also true of a large library (say here at the University at Albany) as well, the tools one uses to navigate the library, a static electronic database easily searchable by author, title, or book, is clearly inadequate for the web. RSS helps to give students control over content on the web, reducing time spent navigating from site to site to see what has changed, and instead allowing them to receive updates about the content they are interested in tracking or material that is relevant to class. For example, if you were teaching a class on the Holocaust you could require that students subscribe to feeds that related to the recent trials of Holocaust deniers in Germany, and to the situation in Darfur. In this way students would get regular updates and could read the most relevant content without getting lost in a quagmire of information.

But more important than staying up to date on information is the ability RSS provides to sort what one wants to read from what is not of interest, not only in terms of selecting to receive only certain feeds, but also as a matter of reading only in detail a few of the feeds you receive: sorting again the information you receive, separating what is not of interest from that which is (an invaluable skill for students who will increasingly rely on digital information). For example, I subscribe to somewhere over 100 feeds that allow me to monitor somewhere close to 200 websites (some of the feeds are just a collection of websites all in one feed), which means that on any given day I can receive over 500 new items in my feed reader. This clearly means that I cannot read them all, or even half of them. What a good feed reader does is allow you to quickly scan the headlines, mark the ones you want to read, toss out the ones you don't, and return either immediately, or at a later more convenient time, to carefully read the ones you have selected.

So here is one of my big pedagogical and theoretical claims: The speed of reading in the age of the digital has changed, and we need to help students navigate this. Being able to “surf” around countless webpages, scanning information, might be a good practice for cursory knowledge acquisition, but it does not lend itself to in-depth reading. In fact, I would argue that these are almost two separate mental practices. And it is important to teach students to distinguish between these two. Reading on the internet requires two separate skills: one, the quick analysis to find what is worth reading, and the second, a switch to slow analysis to carefully consider what has been found. What RSS does is allow students to make this distinction, to receive content as "bits" easy to scan, and then to select what they want to read. In a library, notice how these two operations are separated by the act of walking to the stacks and checking out the books. You first scan the database for book titles, copy down the call numbers, walk to the shelves, scan the book to see if you want to read it, and check it out, taking it home to read slowly. The distinction between scanning and careful reading is reinforced in this model by the change in venue: the process of checking the book out and leaving the library. On the computer, since all of this happens in one place and through one interface, it is all too easy to conflate the two. What I tell students to do is actually make a mental separation between tagging items to be read, and then reading items. I even go as so far as to suggest that they take a break between these two processes. And learning to use RSS (along with tabbed browsing) greatly aids this type of reading practice.

When I show students what RSS can do, how it can help them to navigate the internet, it almost always results in a two-stage reaction. First, awe and wonder as to why no one ever showed them this before. Second, a new found interest in reading digital information. (I suspect the second is a direct result of feeling less overwhelmed by content.)

Why it Matters for Student Writing

To state the obvious, writing for the internet, and specifically writing for blogs, is informed by a different context than the paper writing we ask of students for class. To require students to write papers and then post them to a blog or website misses the point. In fact, this often results in frustrated students, because understandably they fail to see the relevance of such writing. Instead, productive classroom blog projects focus on teaching students how writing for the internet requires a different type of authorship—again, an important lesson in how context shapes meaning. Now, while there are several features to this "internet authorship", I want to focus on a few in particular that I think are important, and that will highlight again the importance of RSS.

First, writing in the age of the digital is, as I indicated above, far more a matter of becoming a networked author, of writing a networked book. The internet authors who are most influential and most read all use RSS in one form or another. Teaching students to write blogs without at least providing the idea behind RSS is like teaching them to write papers on word processors, but never showing them how to use spell check, find and replace, italics or any of the formatting tools; it just repeats the prior technical moment of writing. In order to be successful authors in this space, students need to construct content that takes advantage of the iterability and citationality that the web offers. Rather than simply referring to an article, students need to author documents that link to that article, and link to those articles in a way that enhances their writing. (Notice how this very article relies on this contextual ability to help support its writing.) One only has to look at the most successful blogs to understand the extent to which the ability to cite and link to sources is crucial for garnering an audience. By learning to use RSS, students can cull from a large number of resources to provide this citationality. Furthermore, many RSS readers allow users to simply load the current article, or a portion of it, into their current writing and append their comments. This type of citation and appending comments to citation is crucial to becoming critically engaged readers and writers. Writing content for digital presentation is increasingly becoming dependent on understanding the tools, and one of these crucial tools is RSS.

Second, one of the most frequent complaints of students who have been required to blog for class is that they feel as if what they are writing does not get read by anyone except the instructor. Professors can require that students read each others' blogs and comment, but this usually results in just a few of the blogs being well trafficked and commented on, or students reading the blogs of only a few peers they know best. Without RSS, professors must rely on the students clicking and reading through each classmate's blog. Even if you could rely on students doing this, it does not address the previous problem that reading at this rate often reduces to scanning, rather than reading the others' work critically and providing constructive contributions. By using RSS, you can syndicate all of the students blogs; every student in the class will get the class “newspaper” with headlines and synopsis of each student's writing, allowing them to scan all of the posts at once, and then decide which ones are most relevant, and select them for close reading. Furthermore, RSS can facilitate commenting, as most blogs will allow you to syndicate the comments to a specific post, so that students can post to a blog and continue to follow up on the comment thread. Again, this will help students to realize how writing for the web is a matter of continuos conversation rather than static paper design.

Third, digital content is increasingly syndicated. Thus, writing without an awareness of how your writing may be syndicated can lead to addressing your audience in an ineffective way. Content that is syndicated is significantly re-contextualized, stripped of many of its original framing effects (in this example the students blog), and transferred into another context (the RSS reader of another person). This means that the end reader will probably not see the full story, or all of the framing effects of the blog, but often just a headline, summary text, and perhaps a picture, unless they choose to view said blog post. Writing with the possibility that content will be read in syndication requires that writers recognize the different ways in which their writing is likely to become re-contextualized. As an example, look at New York Times headlines, which follow the old paradigm of headline writing, and headlines from Gawker Media. New York Times headlines often do not tell the story, or what the content is about, instead being witty or trying to capture attention, as opposed to a headline from Gawker which attempts to give the whole story, or at least why one would want to read the story in the headline.

Indeed, the concept of a “site feed” has already changed reading and writing practices on the web in multiple ways. As feeds circumvent constant clicking and exposure to web sites, advertisers have had to rethink web-based presentations. And although ads can be placed within an RSS feed, they are remarkably easy to strip out, so as not to be seen by the end user. Sites without feeds garner less traffic, and the number of individuals who subscribe to any given feed has become a mark of distinction, a measure if not of authenticity at least of authority. Finally, because feeds are remarkably easy to transmit and record they are also easy to bundle and share with other users. In praxis this means that I can give another user a document of all the feeds to which I subscribe, and another user can import that document (usually no more than a few clicks) into their reader and instantly see, read, and modify the feeds to which I subscribe. Not only does this mean I have my own personal newspaper, but I have one that I can easily share with others. For example, say one of my students wants to follow current critical work on digital games; I simply export to her a document containing all the feeds I have grouped as relating to digital games (only two or three mouse clicks) and she can import them to her reader, instantly joining the conversation.

Praxis

In practice using RSS helps address a range of concerns. First, as my above claims gesture, writing in the age of the digital is contextually different than writing for paper (which is not to suggest that we should value one inherently over the other, but rather that we should pay attention to those differences and teach students what those differences are), and to help students contextualize their writing they need to become active readers as well. RSS is a critical tool for becoming an active reader of digitally archived knowledge. Second, RSS readers, and the use of readers by students will help to foster commenting on blogs, and linking between blogs, while simultaneously (if coupled with a pedagogy of explanation) how to process and read this a large amount of writing and subsequent commentary.

RSS is actually surprisingly easy to set up for your classes, as most blogs automatically produce a feed, and once you learn how this works it is usually a matter of just clicking on a link, or copying and pasting a url. Additionally, as I mentioned above, you can export a document of all the feeds to a student group, making it easy for them to sign up for each other's blogs or web sites you want them to read in relation to the classroom work.

Finally, as a related concern, utilizing RSS on the professor's end can help you to keep a handle on all of your students' postings and comments. Having a robust RSS reader enables all of the student posts to be delivered to your reader, instead of requiring that you visit each individual blog. This makes it much easier to asses student work, and, perhaps more importantly, much easier to comment on and provide feedback about students' blogs.

Conclusion:

I am going to forgo giving a detailed step by step guide, a how to set up feed reading (something writing in a digital space allows as I can simply direct you to see the references for these resources at the end of this article), in favor of closing with a more important general claim: RSS alters the transmission (reading and writing) of digital knowledge, and thus is critically important to any classroom instruction which requires digital composition, but especially projects which involve blogging. Thus, while I would ultimately argue that a successful digital writing classroom would actively employ RSS technology, requiring students to employ feed readers, teaching students to read and write in a way informed by this technology, at minimal instructors and students should be aware of how this technology frames the context of writing in the age of the digital.

List of Resources and References

Guides to Getting Started

  • There are several getting started guides available on the web. Several of which are focused on helping educators.
    • Teaching Hacks has a guide written by Quentin D'Souza, as well as links to his presentation on the information. This guide is focused more on educators in primary and secondary ed., and as thus points out how RSS can be used to “monitor” students' blogs. But the explanation is well done, and the downloadable document is an excellent step by step guide. (Note: Quentin uses an online RSS reader, while these work, I think it is important to ultimately have a separate RSS reader, it tends to promote better reading habits, and students have more options about controling feeds.
    • Weblogg-ed another great resource for blogging in education, with a focus on primary and secondary ed. also has a Quick Start Guide, just click on the tab in the header of the page. Again this is focused on primary and secondary ed., but well detailed and tremendously useful.
    • You can see my walkthrough with screenshots at academhack, although it is not nearly as detailed as the two above, it is aimed at higher education.
  • For a general overview of RSS the entry at Wikikipedia on Web Feed.
  • Or, for a more in depth look, but still not overly technical check out the article on Fagan Finder.

Guide to Possible Readers:

There are literaily hundreds, possibly even thousands, of programs or web applications that can handle RSS, I am just going to mention a few here. Ultimately it is a matter of preferences and features, so try out several to see which ones best suit your needs.

  • Blogbridge is a free, cross platform reader. Designed specifically for handling blog feeds.
  • Bloglines is an online reader, as long as you have a web browser you can use this one.
  • Newgator is an online service that also has a news reader for PC'sFeed Demon and for Mac's NetNewsWire. NetNewsWire comes in a free version (Lite) and a full featured version (paid). These are a good choice if you are going to have students pay for the software as NetNewsWire and FeedDemon are similar which allow you to work with students regardless of platform.
  • Newsfire is a popular reader for Macs.
  • RSS Owl is a free reader that works on Windows, Mac, and Linux. Not as easy to use in my experience, but free and works across a a range of platforms.
  • Vienna is a free reader, Mac only.
  • An alternative option is Flock which is browser with a feedreader built in.
  • There are also several plug-ins for Firefox which act as readers.
  • Finally you can see an extensive list here of possible readers.

2009年3月15日 星期日

Common Craft produces short explanatory videos

http://www.youtube.com/user/leelefever

Common Craft produces short explanatory videos that are focused on making complex ideas easy to understand. The company is run by Lee and Sachi LeFever.


Wikis in Plain English




Blogs in Plain English




Podcasting in Plain English




Twitter in Plain English




Social Bookmarking in Plain English




Social Networking in Plain English




Social Media in Plain English




Online Photo Sharing in Plain English

2009年3月3日 星期二

#Gr8t Tweets




2009/2/26 some edubloggertweeterwikiists launched a pretty cool idea for marking the best Twitter posts for the month of March. The idea is pretty simple; see a valuable Tweet and ReTweet it with the hashtag #gr8t. You can then either read them as they come through on this wiki page, or subscribe to the RSS feed from the search.twitter.com results page.

Used judiciously, this could be a fine way to track some of the most informative Tweets out there. I’ve been trying to keep the number of people I follow to a minimum, so for me, tapping into the best of the edutwittersphere in this way could be pretty helpful. It’s like a delicious for Twitter, kinda sorta. (It should also benefit those who follow like 10, 459 people too.)

I’ve always struggled (though not too mightily) with the signal to noise ratio on Twitter. Through the people I follow and with the varying amounts of time I spend on it per day, I probably average about half a dozen good links a day. While I enjoy the back and forth somewhat, I’m really looking for links more than anything, and I’ve been pretty successful at mining Twitter search for Tweets that contain certain words AND a link. Lots of ways to do it.

So, anyway, for next month at least, add your #Gr8t Tweets to the list…

2009年2月24日 星期二

Edublogs

http://edublogs.org/
Edublogs hosts hundreds of thousands of blogs for teachers, students, researchers, professors, librarians, administrators and anyone and everyone else involved in education.

Edublogs are completely free, and come with 20MB of free upload space (easily extended to 5 GB as a Supporter) and a heap of great features

We also cater for schools and universities looking to create, manage and control blogs at their own domain, with all the features of Edublogs. We call it Edublogs Campus.

So, please feel welcome to sign up for a free Edublog or get in touch with us to talk about Edublogs Campus. We’d love to hear from you!

2009年2月20日 星期五

23 Things on Web 2.0

http://plcmcl2-things.blogspot.com/#progress

23 Things Recording Progress

Listed below are 23 Things (or small exercises) that you can do on the web to explore and expand your knowledge of the Internet and Web 2.0. Staff are encouraged to complete all 23 items on this list by October 31st in order to to receive a free USB/MP3 player. Those staff that complete all items by October 6th will also qualify for the laptop drawing and other prizes that will be awarded on All Staff Day.

23 Learning 2.0 Things*
(Note: Details about each task will be activated every week with posts related to each item)

Week 1: Introduction ( official start of week August 7th)
  1. Read this blog & find out about the program.
  2. Discover a few pointers from lifelong learners and learn how to nurture your own learning process.

    Week 2: Blogging
  3. Set up your own blog & add your first post.
  4. Register your blog on PLCMC Central and begin your Learning 2.0 journey.

    Week 3: Photos & Images
  5. Explore Flickr and learn about this popular image hosting site.
  6. Have some Flickr fun and discover some Flickr mashups & 3rd party sites.
  7. Create a blog post about anything technology related that interests you this week.

    Week 4: RSS & Newsreaders
  8. Learn about RSS feeds and setup your own Bloglines newsreader account.
  9. Locate a few useful library related blogs and/or news feeds.

    Week 5: Play Week
  10. Play around with an online image generator.
  11. Take a look at LibraryThing and catalog some of your favorite books.
  12. Roll your own search tool with Rollyo.

    Week 6: Tagging, Folksonomies & Technorati
  13. Learn about tagging and discover a Del.icio.us (a social bookmaking site)
  14. Explore Technorati and learn how tags work with blog posts.
  15. Read a few perspectives on Web 2.0, Library 2.0 and the future of libraries and blog your thoughts.

    Week 7: Wikis
  16. Learn about wikis and discover some innovative ways that libraries are using them.
  17. Add an entry to the Learning 2.0 SandBox wiki.

    Week 8: Online Applications & Tools
  18. Take a look at some online productivity (word processing, spreadsheet) tools.
  19. Explore any site from the Web 2.0 awards list, play with it and write a blog post about your findings.

    Week 9: Podcasts, Video & Downloadable audio
  20. Discover YouTube and a few sites that allow users to upload and share videos.
  21. Discover some useful search tools for locating podcasts.
  22. Take a look at the titles available on NetLibrary and learn how to download audiobooks.
  23. Summarize your thoughts about this program on your blog.

* This list of "things" can also be found on the 43Things website. Note: This project is loosely based upon the website 43Things (which allows you to set and track personal goals) and the Stephen Abram article titled 43 Things I (or You) might want to do this year (Information Outlook - Feb 2006).

Recording Progress:

Recording progress for PLCMC staff in the L2 Tracking Log found on PLCMC Central is as easy as cut-n-paste.

First you'll need to register your blog. This will be covered in the directions the second week for item #4.

Once you start recording your discoveries through your own blog, you will need to check-off the item and enter the permanent link to the individual blog post that covers the exercise or "thing."

Depending upon the Blogger template that you selected, the "permanent link" for each individual post can be found either through the post’s title or through a link in the posts footer area the contains the date.

To record progress for an individual item in the Tracking Log:

  1. Click on the permanent link for the individual post.Example: Here is where you would find the perma link for this sample blog post:
  2. Select the "permanent link" url from the address bar at the top of your browser and right click. Select Copy.
  3. Open the Learning 2.0 Tracking log and locate the item number that you've just completed.
  4. Right click on the address line for the item and select Paste.Here's how you would record it in the L2 Log:

See, it's as easy and copy-n-paste. To keep up with recording your progress, II would suggest that you make a habit of recording your progress weekly.

PS: If you’re not a PLCMC staff member, you can follow along as well. Just use the list discovery items found on the 43Things website to record your progress. Alas I’m sorry that I can’t include any MP3 players or laptop as incentives. For you, I hope just the fun of following along is enough. :)

2009年2月6日 星期五

U.S. Airways Crash Rescue Picture: Citizen Journalism, Twitter At Work

在2009/01/15 Janis Krums 用iPhone將墜機照片上傳至Twitter,成為此事件的第一手消息,隨後也有人拍到相關照片上傳至Flickr


http://udn.com/NEWS/WORLD/BREAKINGNEWS5/4692807.shtml

全美航空班機紐約墜河 150人獲救

美國US Airways航空第1549航班的A-320型客機在美東15日下午3時26分 (台北16日清晨4時26分),從紐約拉瓜底亞機場飛往北卡羅來納州夏洛特市,起飛才30秒,撞到鳥群,要求返航,結果墜落曼哈坦西側的哈德遜河,救援快如閃電,掉進冰點河水裡的148名乘客和五到六名機組人員全部獲救。

http://www.alleyinsider.com/2009/1/us-airways-crash-rescue-picture-citizen-jouralism-twitter-at-work

Dan Frommer January 15, 2009 3:47 PM

Janis Krums from Sarasota, Florida posts the first photo of U.S. Airways flight 1549 on Twitter from his iPhone. Thirty-four minutes after Janis posted his photo, MSNBC interviewed him live on TV as a witness (see video below). News coverage at Google. Live video at Fox News. TV reports suggest that everyone survived the crash.




Here's the video of Krums talking on MSNBC





A second photo from Gregory Lam on Flickr

2009年1月31日 星期六

Web 2.0時代的華語教學

Web 2.0時代的華語教學

大阪外國語大學 郭修靜
台灣師範大學華語文教學研究所 廖埻棓

摘要

過去的文獻指出,教學機構之間的互動不足,華語教師的教學經驗不易分享。但自O'Reilly提出Web 2.0的概念以來,我們進入一個Everything 2.0的時代。Web 2.0讓使用者對資料有更多的控制權,同時使用者之間的溝通與互動也將更頻繁。華語教學分享館嘗試運用這一個新的溝通方式,匯集網路上與華語教學相關的部落格,更希望藉由分享館這個平台,號召關心華語教學的研究者、老師,透過聯播分享彼此的教學經驗及研究成果;期許能將個人的經驗,匯聚成眾人的智慧結晶。通過分享館的部落格聯播,我們已經看到教師們彼此激勵,資源分享的正面效果。

1 Web 2.0 時代

1.1 Web 2.0的概念

O'Reilly (2005, September 30)提出Web 2.0的概念,用以描述新一代網路應用的革命現象。所謂的Web 1.0指的是靜態HTML頁面,由網站管理員集權式地更新內容,與瀏覽者之間沒有互動。而Web 2.0時代則是分權式(decentralize)架構, 強調「以網路為平台」,並讓把對於資料的控制權交給使用者。Web 1.0的網站是集中式管理,如:個人網站、MP3.com、Ofoto[1]、大英百科全書、頁面瀏覽量(page view)[2]、域名搶注(domain name speculation)等;而Web 2.0的網站則是

分權式(decentralize)架構,如:部落格、Napster[3]、Flcikr[4]、維基百科[5]、每點擊成本(cost per click)[6]、搜尋引擎優化(search engine optimization)等 (O'Reilly, 2005)。

雖然Web 2.0時代有Ajax、RSS等技術,但從Web 1.0到Web 2.0的重點並不是一種技術創新,而是一種觀念演進(Davis, 2005, July 4)。雖然目前各種對於Web 2.0的詮釋仍不一致,定義也都不同(Hinchcliffe, 2005, December 21),但我們可以觀察到Web 2.0網站的一些共同特點,例如用戶貢獻、共同協作、長尾(long tail)效應等等。

1.2 集體智慧

由大眾匯聚而成的集體智慧(collective intelligence)能創造出最佳的成果。Surowiecki(2004∕楊玉齡譯,2005)發現,眾人的智慧表現得比任何個體還要好。換言之,雖然每個人的意見分歧,但把眾人的答案匯集起來,即可得到最佳的結果。例如Google的搜尋技術Page Rank來自各網頁之間的互相「投票」,被連結越多的網站自然越重要。又如Yahoo購物和eBay以買家、賣家之間的相互評分來判別優劣;Amazon開放讓讀者寫長長的書評等等都是使用者的主動參與。而Wikipedia之所以能夠成為世界上最大的百科全書,靠的就是所有作者合作的集體智慧,其正確程度甚至不輸大英百科[7](Giles, 2005)。

大眾分類法(folksonomy)也是Web 2.0的特點。傳統的分類法(taxonomy)是階層式、結構化的,分類架構由內容管理者預先決定,Yahoo的網站目錄就是典型的代表。但大眾分類則讓使用者以標籤(tag)的方式做自己的分類。這類的代表網站如Del.icio.us[8]、Flickr等。因為每個人對於資訊的概念不同,因此所給予的標籤也不同。以Zhongwen.com[9]為例,這個網站在Del.icio.us上的標籤有Mandarin、learning、character、linguistics等等。但眾人共同認可的標籤(使用頻率最高者),通常也是最具代表性的,如Chinese、language、dictionary等,如圖 2所示:

1.3 Web 2.0對教育的影響

  Web 2.0時代的社會網路(social networking)的確改變了我們與他人的溝通方式,但這些網站本身並非只是線上社群而已。正如Downes(2005)所指出的,Web 2.0對於社會的影響將遍及每一個層面。事實上,我們正處於資訊更多、變動更快、環境更混亂的社會,我們更需要的能力是整合龐雜資訊、和在不確定的情況中作決策。社會的真實環境往往比我們在教室中所預設的更複雜,也因此教育∕學習的概念也需與時俱進。E-learning 2.0的時代,我們將與他人有更多的交流與互動,也將有更多的合作與分享。網際網路所帶給教育的改變,將不只是技術層面而已。
  
Web 2.0所強調的自由、開放、分享、合作,其實在教育界早已是一種慣例。當看到MIT的開放課程計畫[10]、Stanford的podcast網站[11]、Rice大學的中文寫作Wiki[12]…等等在教育上的應用時,我們知道這些並不只是「嘗鮮」而已。或許其影響還還有待進一步的觀察(謝天蔚,2006),但技術的革命也必然帶來概念上的變革。而這種力量也必定將會影響華語教學。

2 Creative Commons

依據現有的著作權法,不論是文字、音樂還是電影,作品固定於媒介上時便立即受到著作權法的保護,不論作者願意與否。《著作權保護了誰?》一書中指出,在著作權法形成的歷史中,過度保護迪士尼、滾石、微軟等商業巨擘的利益,而將著作權最初的目的——保護著作人的權益,鼓勵創作——置諸腦後。此外,商業公司也想方設法延長著作權的年限,獨佔商業利益,阻止人類的智慧結晶進入公共領域[13](Vaudhyanathan, 2001∕陳宜君譯,2003)。
  
網際網路的出現,為著作權帶來新的思考方向。數位作品不像實體物品具有獨佔性[14](我借走了一本書,其他人便無法閱讀),且複製容易、傳送成本低廉。在數位的世界裡,適度放寬著作權的限制反而能夠引起更多的迴響,讓其他作者能夠加入新的創意。1991年Linus Torvalds將作業系統的原始碼放到網路上,允許人們自由使用、修改和發佈,因而發展成今日龐大的Linux家族。開放原始碼軟體。維基百科這般由下往上(bottom-up)的架構之所以能夠成功,依靠的就是眾人的的集體智慧。

  史丹佛大學法學院教授Lawrence Lessig認為現行的著作權法是全有或全無的極端:全部權利受到著作權法保護;或是放棄所有權利,將作品歸於公共領域(public domain)。他認為人們應該還有第三種選擇,因而創立了創意公用(Creative Commons, CC)授權。Lessig(2004)於《Free Culture》[15]中強調,創意公用並非著作權的敵人,相反地,它彌補了著作權的不足。當人們為了教育、公益、個人興趣等目的使用創意公用授權的作品時,不必擔心因此而吃上官司。而相對的,他們自身也樂於採用創意公用授權,以善意換取更多創意。正如Anderson(2006∕李明等譯,2006)所言,大多數的使用者在網路上發表作品時,所想到的並不是商業利益,他們只是想表達創意、尋找同好而已。

有別於著作權的「保留所有權利」(all rights reserved),創意公用主張「保留部分權利」(some rights reserved)(如表 1)。著作權的原則是:「一切禁止,除非特別允許」;而創意公用的原則是:「一切允許,除非特別禁止」。透過創意公用的網站,人們很容易就能選擇自己想要的法律授權,而不必借助律師等專業人士。除了Common Content[16]網站提供的素材之外,Google[17]、Yahoo[18]、Flickr[19]也提供創意公用授權的搜索;Microsoft也有MS Office的增益集[20],讓Word、PowerPoint、Excel等檔案也可以選用創意公用授權。

  此外目前有許多部落格、podcast都採用創意公用授權。例如本文介紹的「華語教學分享館」,採用「姓名標示、非商業性、禁止改作」授權,在不違反前述三項原則的情況下,任何人都可以取用分享館的內容,而不必徵求網站管理者的同意。

3 部落格與RSS

3.1 部落格

  部落格(blog),台灣多譯為「部落格」,大陸多譯為「博客」,也有人稱之為「網誌」;而撰寫部落格的使用者則稱為「部落客」(blogger)。Blog的字源由網路記錄檔(web log)組合而來,原本只是一種簡單的網路日誌,後來則演變為「按鈕出版」(push button publishing)的大眾工具(Ward, 2004)。1999年可說是部落格元年,因為從這一年開始,免費、容易上手的部落格工具開始提供給每一個人使用(Blood, 2000, September 7),所以造成部落格的快速成長。根據部落格搜尋引擎Technorati[21]的報告,目前該公司已追蹤5,000萬個部落格,平均每6個月成長一倍,現在每天增加17.5萬個(Sifry, 2006, August 7)。

  部落格作為一種Web 2.0時代的快速出版媒介,最大的特色是技術門檻低、互動性高、創作容易。部落格的出現,將網路從「閱讀」(read web)轉變為「讀與寫」(read-write web)(Gillmor, 2004∕陳建勳譯,2005)。因為部落格快速更新、互相連結、允許其他人發表評論,人們在網路上有更密切、更頻繁的互動。事實上人們原本就有溝通的需求,只是部落格、podcast等把在網路上發言的門檻降低了而已。

3.2 RSS

  RSS[22]是一種XML[23]格式的文件,可以讓使用者訂閱(subscribe)他們喜愛的部落格、新聞頻道等新聞來源,網站一有更新時就會同步至RSS閱讀器中(Pilgrim, 2002, December 18)。諸如華語教學分享館、Yahoo新聞、Gmail、Flickr相簿、Del.icio.us書籤、Digg新聞、甚至是Linguist List[24]、中國期刊全文資料庫[25]等等,都提供RSS讓讀者訂閱。使用者透過RSS閱讀器,可以同時追蹤數十個、甚至數百個網站的更新情形。而我們也可以用RSS閱讀器來訂閱華語教學分享館的更新。

  傳統的網站仰賴使用者的再度拜訪、或是發送email通知內容更新,但前者的效率不高,後者則讓人擔心垃圾郵件的問題。而RSS技術則完全改變推與拉(push and pull)的模式。傳統網站將內容「推」至使用者面前,但RSS則讓使用者將資訊「拉」過來使用。正因為有RSS,部落圈有了更多、更快的互動,網路上的交流更頻繁,甚至有人認為它是「殺手級應用」(killer application)(Harrsch, 2003)。

4 部落格與華語教學

  回溯2003年,在PChome個人新聞台陸續看到華語教學相關的個人書寫空間。有的作為與朋友、學生聯絡之用,有的則記錄上課的心得。隨著部落格服務供應商(Blog Service Provider, BSP)帶來了更完善的功能,2005年「部落格」已經是華文圈的熱門話題。部落格個人化平台操作簡單的優點,使得不具任何網頁製作知識的人,都能在部落格上自由構築自己的文字、連結、圖片、視訊等。也因此我們在Blogger.com、新浪、無名小站、樂多等幾個BSP中,看到了更多華語教師加入撰寫部落格的行列。對華語教師來說,部落格有以下幾種意義:


1.資訊交流:身處資訊爆炸的時代,雖然有搜索引擎和各式電子媒體之助,但使用者仍常在網路衝浪時迷路,淹沒在排山倒海的訊息當中。部落格既有個人特色、同時也可以做主題探索。對華語教師而言,就是匯聚華語教學資訊的最好平台。

2.溝通互動:部落格透過連結、迴響、聯播等方式與其他部落客互動。讀者的參與,不但能激發更多的火花,也是持續寫作的動力。部落格中的反向連結(trackback),更是加快了互動的速度。 讓近乎即時的互動能夠雙向進行。

3.教師日誌:前人的研究發現,教師透過撰寫持續的記錄、公開分享的日誌,對於職前準備、及在職教師的專業成長均有所助益(Bailey, 1990; Moeller, 1996)。我們認為,部落格作為日誌的電子形式,可以作為課堂記錄、以及教師反思之用;同時,這也是教師成長歷程的最佳紀錄(e-portfolio)(廖埻棓、王楚蓁,2006)。

5 資訊流通的不足

5.1 資訊不流通

  長久以來華語教師在各教學崗位單打獨鬥,在海外任教的老師尤其如此。信世昌(1995)曾指出這個資訊不流通的現象:由於海外各中文學校和教學機構散佈於全球各地,彼此聯絡不易,各自的辦學或教學的經驗不易互相分享,而任何新發展的華語文教學研究資訊亦不易獲取,造成華文教育整體發展的一大阻礙。

  此外,信世昌等(2005)比較2000年和2005年兩次對台灣各單位華語教師的問卷調查指出,雖然教師們對同事之間的資源共享的滿意度微幅上升(圖 4),但是語言中心之間的交流仍嚴重不足(圖 5)。可見得我們迫切需要一個共同的平台,讓華語教師們有更多互動的機會。

5.2 網路資源

  謝天蔚(2004)的「網上學中文」網站[28]已經蒐集了超過一千種以上的網站網頁,數量也不斷增加,匯集了相當豐富的網路資源。而僑務委員會建立提供非營利使用的「全球華文網路教育中心」[29]可以說是台灣華語教學最大的資源網站。其內的「網路師資聯誼會」[30]是海外僑校種子教師的交流園地。雖然這些網站都提供了許多資源,然而在與教師互動方面仍十分不足。可說只是單向的訊息傳遞,而非雙向的溝通管道。
5.3 現況

  另一方面,中國大陸經濟的突飛猛進,再加上即將到來的2007年美國Chinese AP[31]、2008年北京奧運[32],也將全球「中文熱」推向了高潮。此時台灣成立了不少語言中心,師資班也班班爆滿[33]。華語教學像是突然揭開了神秘的面紗似的,吸引許多人前來一探究竟。「如何成為華語老師?」、「如何選擇師資班?」、「如何解決發音、語法教學上的問題?」……等等問題湧入華語教師的部落格。面對許多求教無門的問題,我們認為應該要有整合的管道,協助華語教師克服各種困難。

6 華語教學分享館

  鑑於以上所述,筆者於2005年6月間創立了華語教師的部落格聯播——「華語教學分享館」(http://blog.roodo.com/huayuwen/),匯集網路與華語教學相關的部落格,更希望藉由分享館這個平台,號召關心華語教學的研究者、老師,透過聯播分享彼此的教學經驗及研究成果;期許能將個人的經驗,匯聚成眾人的智慧結晶。

目前華語教學分享館的內容有:

1.部落格聯播:目前串聯88個華語教師的部落格。這些教師分佈在台灣、大陸、日本、韓國、印尼、泰國、印度、美國、加拿大、智利、芬蘭、德國、荷蘭、法國、西班牙、希臘、布吉那法索等國。華語教師一旦在他們的部落格上發表了新文章,文章題目及部落格名稱就會出現在分享館裡。

2.相片聯播:串聯了Flickr[34]的相片聯播。Flickr是數位相片的網路分享服務。除了上傳、發佈到部落格都很容易上手之外,Flickr還可以給每張圖片加上標籤及評論。
華語教學新聞中心RSS:匯入華語教學新聞中心[35]的新聞標題。該站蒐集華語教學相關的新聞報導、相關政策、研討會、工作機會等訊息。

3.推薦閱讀連結:值得推薦的部落格文章,可連結至原作者網站閱讀。這些文章來自於分享館的成員、或是非分享館成員的網路文章。

4.網摘:網路文章摘要是每週選出幾篇值得一讀的文章,並且摘錄部分內容。這個部分使用的是繁體中文的社會書籤(social bookmarking)服務HEMiDEMi[36]來完成。HEMiDEMi還有一個華語教學的討論群組[37],供使用者分享、討論、推薦連結。

5.Google網上論壇:Google網上論壇[38]是網頁形式的新聞群組(news group),目前在分享館裡兼具留言版及討論群組兩種功能,供分享館的成員們討論各種問題。Google網上論壇支援Unicode及RSS,但需要有Google帳號才能發言。

6.Wiki:世界上最大的百科全書——維基百科(Wikipedia)[39]就是wiki最成功的應用。Wiki的特色是允許每一位讀者來參與編輯,讓每個人貢獻自己所知。為此我們也成立了「華語教學分享館資料庫」(http://huayuwen.pbwiki.com/),雖然目前內容還不多,不過期望未來能成為華語教學的知識庫。

7.訪客地圖:使用Bravenet[40]所提供的世界地圖,讓訪客可以在地圖上標示出自己所在的位置。

8.書目分享:利用豆瓣網[41]的「我讀」功能,可以發表讀書心得及討論,分享或推薦教學時使用的參考書籍。

7 分享館的遠景

  曹逢甫(1998)分析中國大陸「對外漢語教學」得以蓬勃發展的兩項關鍵性因素為「政策的穩定」與「事權的統一」,並指出其正是台灣華語教學發展所缺乏的條件。換言之,台灣的華語教學是一種「由下而上」的系統。到了今天,台灣的華語教學仍然是「既缺乏統籌的領導機構,又沒有明確的發展方向」(周質平,2006年1月2日)。大多數華語教師仍然沒有得到合理的定位,而教學工作的壓力並不因為兼任性質而得以輕鬆。華語教師需要成長,卻缺乏互動的機會;也需要資訊的互通有無,因為分享才是進步的動力。如果我們要等待高層來為華語教學做什麼,不如我們自己先做些什麼。通過分享館的部落格聯播,我們已經看到教師們彼此激勵,資源分享的正面效果。我們相信,網路帶來分享,而分享帶來進步。

參考文獻

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Blog於華語教學之應用

廖埻棓、王楚蓁

摘要

部落格本為個人的網路日記,但因為簡單易用、互動性強,故能迅速普及。部落格是很方便的個人出版工具,且多為免費的服務。本文指出,華語學習者可以在部落格上使用目標語與母語者進行跨文化的真實溝通;而華語教師則可以透過部落格分享資訊、反思教學。我們認為,部落格是值得推廣的華語教學工具。

關鍵字:Blog部落格 博客 網路寫作 華語教學

1. 部落格的歷史

Blog,台灣稱為「部落格」,大陸稱為「博客」,此外也有人稱之為「網誌」。指的是一種以個人為主、頻繁發佈的網路日誌,其文章以逆序時間排列[1]。部落格常與其他網站連結,並且允許網友回應。因其簡單易用、互動性強,因此受到廣大使用者的歡迎。

Weblog是網頁和記錄檔(web log)之意,最初的形式就像電腦的紀錄檔。1997年4月,Dave Winer設立的網站Scripting News因具備了今日部落格的基本形式,可說是第一個部落格。1997年12月Jorn Barge首度提出weblog一詞。1999年Peter Merholz將weblog唸成wee-blog,聽起來像是we blog,後來進一步簡化為blog。而寫部落格的人就稱為「部落客」(blogger),整個部落格的環境稱為「部落圈」(blogosphere) (Blood, 2000, September 7; 林克寰,2004年5月11日)。1999年起,Blogger.comLiveJournal等工具的出現,大大的降低了在網路上發言的難度。2004年Merriam-Webster字典更是將blog選為年度單字之首,以說明其影響力。

部落格成長飛快。根據部落格搜尋引擎Technorati的統計,目前全世界已有5,000萬個部落格。在過去的三年,約每六個月便成長一倍(圖 1)。華文圈的部落格成長同樣迅速,中文是部落圈的第三大語言,僅次於英文和日文(圖 2)(Sifry, 2006, August 7)。目前中國大陸使用博客的人口已有1,750萬,博客的讀者則有7,500萬(中國互聯網絡信息中心,2006)。台灣的部落格讀者則有513萬,約佔網路人口的49%[2](創市際市場研究顧問,2005)。

圖 1 Technorati統計部落格的數量

2 Technorati統計部落格文章的語言

2. 部落格之性質

技術門檻的降低是部落格能夠風行的關鍵。部落格大多在網路上撰寫,所見即所得的編輯器取代了原本撰寫HTML的工作,讓部落客能更容易、更頻繁地發佈文章。除此之外,部落格在形式上還有一些共同點:

日期或時間戳記(timestamp):每一篇文章都會記錄發佈的日期、時間,部落格依照時間的順序安排文章先後。

彙整(archive):部落格的文章通常以日期作為彙整單位,按日、週、月、年等方式分類。有些部落格也具備分類(category)功能,可將不同主題的文章分門別類彙整。

迴響(comment):迴響可以讓網友針對該文發表意見,進行雙向溝通。如果是有較多讀者的部落格,其迴響可多至數百則。

永久連結(permalink)[3]:每一篇文章都有永久連結網址,通常是可讀形式[4]。因為部落格之間經常互相連結,如此可以減少因連結失效的機會。

回溯引用(TrackBack):如果某甲在自己的部落格上寫了一篇文章,連結到某乙部落格,就可以使用回溯引用。這時候在乙部落格的文章上,就會出現引用者的部落格名稱及一段簡短的摘要(藝立協,2003)。然而目前並非所有的部落格都支援回溯引用,因此跨部落格平台的回溯引用經常有問題。

RSS:RSS[5]是一種XML[6]格式的檔,可以讓使用者訂閱(subscribe)他們喜愛的部落格、新聞頻道等網站的RSS,網站更新時就會同步至RSS閱讀器中(Pilgrim, 2002, December 18)。RSS可以讓讀者很容易地追蹤數十、數百個部落格,縮短訊息傳遞的時間。例如,我們可以使用網路服務Bloglines來訂閱華語教學分享館的RSS(圖 3):

圖 3以Bloglines訂閱RSS

在內容上,部落格則有以下幾項特色(Fievet & Turrettini, 2004∕施瑞瑄譯,2006;藝立協,2003):

個人風格:雖然部落格也能夠讓多位作者共同寫作,不過大多數的部落格都是以個人為主的,因此帶有主觀的意見和強烈的個人風格。

筆調自由:部落格沒有編輯的把關,因此寫作的筆調自由,文體較隨意。部落格可用來寫評論、感懷、反思、記敘,端視作者的風格而定。

即時發佈:部落格的發佈頻率很快,有些部落客甚至一天寫好幾篇。

主題多元:部落格的主題十分多樣化,可以記錄個人生活點滴,也可以討論學術議題;可以評論媒體報導,也可以分享電影觀賞心得。內容五花八門,包羅萬象。

因為部落格的誕生,我們從被動地接受既有資訊,轉為主動地參與建構資訊,由閱讀網路(read web),轉為讀∕寫網路(read/write web)。網頁不再是單向的訊息傳遞,而開始有雙向的社會互動(Gillmor, 2004∕陳建勳譯,2005)。

3. 華語學習者與部落格

目前網路上已經有一些中文學習者所寫的部落格,如《漢語為第二語言博客列表》收集了24個華語學習者的中文部落格(謝天蔚,2006)。部落格輔助語言學習(blog assisted language learning)有以下優點:

真實教材 (authentic material)

教師可以定期將教材放在部落格上,供學生閱讀(Ward, 2004)。對教師而言,部落格就是形式自由的布告欄(Campbell, 2003)。例如:日本大阪外國語大學的 郭修靜老師將補充材料放在部落格《TongXue》、《TongXue-Wilmina》,並製作podcast[7]供學生下載聆聽。夏威夷大學《蕭老師的中文教師》也在部落格上呈現圖片和問題,讓學生回答。不過謝天蔚(2004)指出,網路上的中文學習資源雖然豐富,但學習者想找到適合的網站卻猶如大海撈針。因此他建議教師可以重組網路資源,以幫助學生學習。部落格更新容易、含有大量連結和評論,適合中、高級學習者進行主題學習(Campbell, 2003)。網路資源除了提供泛讀之外,也有助於把語言學習變成一種習慣,提升學習者的自主性。例如《ChinesePod blog》以一段文字介紹文化,文末附上生詞的拼音和解釋,並連結到其他網頁供學習者進一步閱讀。《News in Chinese》將新華網的新聞自動加上拼音和英文翻譯,輔助學習者泛讀最新的時事報導。事實上,我們建議教學者可以進一步利用這些資源,例如在自己的部落格引用《News in Chinese》的一條新聞,提供學習者進行討論,或者列出該篇文章的語法點等等。

真實溝通 (authentic communication)

語言的習得需有意義的互動與自然的溝通,學習者在網路上與他人的互動,可以在真實情境中練習語言。此時使用語言的目的不再是為了完成課堂的任務,而是為了達成真實生活的交際功能(Beatty, 2003)。部落格因其即時、互動的特點,可以成為多文化、跨國界的虛擬教室(Campbell, 2003)。例如韋小馬的〈自我介紹〉提到寫部落格是為了練習中文,引來兩岸的網友幫忙改正文章中的錯誤。在上海華東師範大學唸書的潘吉,他的中文部落格《華結:超級老外》自2003年起共寫了87篇文章,累積1,358個回應,平均每篇文章15個,有些人更是因此而和他成為好朋友。潘吉有時也在部落格上發問,例如〈莫名其妙的廣告〉討論中國廣告所使用的英文讓美國人看不懂;而〈第三聲:兩個問題〉討論一連串三聲出現的可能性。我們從這些部落格裡看到讀者的熱情回應,雖然有些回應的內容與文章主題完全無關,不過這些「噪音」(noise)在口語的溝通中同樣存在,因此我們認為不需要特地防範這類事情。

學習檔案 (learning portfolio)

部落格也是很好的學習檔案(Tan, Teo, Aw, & Lim, 2005),它可以是共時的作品集,也可以是歷時的記錄簿。前者可以記錄同一段時間裡許多學習者的作品,後者可以記錄一位學習者數年學習的過程。例如德國海德堡大學的林君萍老師將部落格當作寫作課程的一部份,請學生每週於部落格上發表兩篇文章,並列印出來由教師批改。學生的部落格例如:《潘行雲的日記》、《xiaohu》、《barto》、《Hanni》,這些都是學生中文寫作的歷程紀錄。又如日本學習者Banhu的〈謝謝何老師!!!!!〉不但保留了作品的原貌和修改的痕跡,還以繁簡兩種字體呈現。除了記錄自己的偏誤,顯然也照顧兩岸讀者的需求。學習者也在部落格上發表對華語教學的想法。例如韋小馬評論了《視聽華語》、《生活華語》、《中文聽說讀寫》等教材,列舉其優、缺點,並給予評分;《Blogging in Chinese as a Second Language》的作者Alaric Radosh擔任華語教師,他在部落格上討論什麼是好的對外漢語教學、初級學習者寫第二語言部落格等議題。除了和學習直接相關的議題,部落圈中也有不少文章討論中西文化差異、外國人在中國∕台灣的生活等。這些文章雖不一定以目標語言來寫,不過都是跨文化的親身經歷。例如:《Hanzi Smatter:一知半解》收集漢字刺青的錯別字;〈傻娃娃們取中文名字〉討論取名字的問題;《我的明星生活》提到外國人在中國總是被人異樣看待;〈最“難聽”的詞〉則指出招呼語在中西語言的差異等等。相對地,以部落格進行華語教學也有一些困難和挑戰:

導入科技

任何新科技剛開始導入教學時,不論教師還是學生都需要一段適應期。並非所有的學生都很熟悉部落格的使用方法,因此必須先協助他們克服技術上的障礙,之後才能順利地進行教學活動。除了教師的支援以外,也可以讓學習者互相幫忙,讓他們共同找出解決之道。此外,如何在部落格中加上圖片、聲音、影片等問題,教師也應事先熟悉(Campbell, 2005)。

中文輸入

在進行網路寫作之前,學習者必須先學會中文輸入法。除了安裝軟體、學會操作之外,學習者也會遇到查詢字典、輸入生難字詞、漢字繁簡轉換等問題(Tan et al., 2005; 舒兆民,2002)。這些都應列入教學課程,讓學習者可以專注在寫作上。

編碼問題

雖然目前新版的作業系統都已經支援Unicode,大部分的部落格平臺也都使用Unicode編碼,但是學習者的電腦不一定都支援Unicode (Tan et al., 2005)。因此建議可以先讓學習者將文章寫在文書處理器中,或是使用ConvertZ、NJ Star等軟體轉換編碼。

4. 華語教師與部落格

目前也有不少華語教師在部落格上記錄自身的經驗與對華語教學的思考。我們認為部落格對華語教師而言有下列的功能:

線上社群 (online community)

如同我們在另外一篇文章中指出的,華語教師長久以來在各教學崗位單打獨鬥,因此我們希望能透過網路來連結全球各地的老師(郭修靜、廖埻棓,2006)。《華語教學分享館》目前匯聚了82個華語教師的部落格,這些老師散布於台灣、日本、美國、大陸、歐洲、非洲等地,透過RSS聯播,部落格的每篇文章標題都會出現在分享館中。此外,華語教師在網路上討論疑難。例如在分享館的討論群組Google Groups討論如何教捲舌音、師資班、華語教師認證考試等等。如此分享館的每個成員既不失自身的主體性,彼此之間也保持互動。可以說,我們透過分享館的連結,建立了一個鬆散的線上社群。除了分享經驗、討論疑難之外,我們也發現教師形成支持團體(support group)。華語教師常面臨跨文化的衝擊、以及獨在異鄉為異客的孤寂,網路可以是抒發的管道。例如《Le salon d'Eliza》提到在教學上的低落感、《生活最重要》提到學期結束的落寞,其他老師就在迴響中給予情感上的支持。事實上,因為網路的匿名性,人們更願意傾吐心事。雖然目前還不知道支持團體的回饋有多大的幫助,不過光是將這些事情寫出來,就有助於抒發負面的情緒(P. Wallace, 1999∕陳美靜譯,2001)

教學檔案 (teaching portfolio)

部落格不但是教師專業成長的紀錄,同時也是個人知識管理的平台,更是社群知識共享的工具。現在已有不少老師在自己的部落格上分享教學經驗和心得,這些不但是教師自己的教學記錄,同時也是其他老師可以借鑑的。例如 黃沛榮教授的《漢字乾坤網》闡述漢字常見的迷思;《雲淡風輕》和《北亞觀點》描述如何利用iPod進行華語教學;《華教地圖》分享外籍配偶的教材;《美女的華語教學教室》分享課室活動;《二文字》說明注音符號教學法。大陸ChinesePod教師博客的莊黎老師分享詞彙教學法;在美任教的《小螞的市場街》張貼學生的優美文章等等。不過這些教學檔案、教學經驗過於分散,不易尋找和歸類。華語教學分享館目前的做法是收錄到HEMiDEMi [8]書籤,便於使用者檢索。未來或許可以用Wiki[9]協作的方式,共同編輯華語教學知識庫,匯整成華語教學的線上百科。

批判反思(critical reflection)

從事語言教學的老師常常感到理論與實務的落差,對於教學理論常常不是過於盲從、便是質疑其實用的可能性;而對於教學實務,教師常需要在黑暗中摸索,自身的經驗也不容易系統化。Wallace(1991)指出,教師在成長的過程中,一方面接受外來知識(教學理論)的灌輸,另一方面教學經驗也建構自身的知識體系。而這兩者透過實踐與反思的循環過程,形成教學專業能力,如圖 4所示:

圖 4 教師反思模式

Bartlett (1990)指出教師反思的重要性。語言教師並非僅停留在技巧訓練的層次,而應該全面地思考自身教學的深層觀念、和探索其他教學方法的可能性。換言之,教師應該從如何做(how),提升到做什麼(what)、為什麼(why)。而日誌的撰寫則是一個有次序的、歷時的、社會互動的思考過程。透過日誌,教師必須結合所學到的教學理論與自身的實務經驗,將腦中抽象思維化為具體文字(Bailey, 1990)。此外,日誌可以是個人的、也可以是集體的。不同的聲音帶來不同的刺激,透過閱讀其他老師的日誌,教師能取法他人的經驗,進而達到反思及改進教學的目的。教師撰寫反思日誌的優點如下(Bailey, 1990; Bartlett, 1990; Portor, Goldstein, Leatherman, & Conrad, 1990; Shoffner, 2006; Stiler & Philleo, 2003):

連結理論與實務:反思日誌是產出的過程,教師可以結合所學之理論,並結合實際教學的經驗。理論不再是外來的知識,而可以轉化為內在的信念,達成「教學相長」的目標。
自主學習:反思日誌是教師的自我觀察,可以避免外來訪視者在課堂中所造成的干擾。日誌是自己與自己、自己與他人的對話。透過不斷詢問自己「身為教師的我做些什麼?」「為什麼這樣教?」「這樣教的意義是什麼?」「怎樣以不同的方式來教?」「現在應該教什麼、怎麼教?」等問題,主動質疑、主動求知、主動改進自己的教學。

培養自信:反思並不是外來的行為修正,而是一種對教學觀念的深思熟慮與分析。透過反思,教師會更瞭解教學理論之深層意涵,也將更重視自己的實務經驗。

獲得協助:教師雖然是知識的傳遞者,但本身不可能全知全能。透過網路上的互動,教師在反思時所遇到的疑難,可以在部落格上和他人討論、或是尋求其他老師的協助。

不過Richards & Ho(1998)也提醒我們,撰寫日誌並不一定就等同於反思教學。日誌只是提供回顧與反省教學的機會,對於教學的深度思考仍須有適當的指引。

教師使用部落格時面臨的困難與挑戰:

隱私權:Bailey(1990)強調撰寫反思日誌時必須誠實,但在公開的部落格上卻有隱私權的顧慮。有些老師很注意隱私和匿名,對於在網路上公開揭露自己不太能適應,不過也有些老師並不在意(Stiler & Philleo, 2003)。因此我們建議,如果是對於隱私權較注重的老師,可以使用附有讀取權限功能的部落格服務,例如Windows Live SpacesLiveJournalYahoo 360!Elgg等(Campbell, 2005)。此外如果文中提到其他人物,可以使用化名、或事先徵得對方的同意,以避免不必要的困擾。

持續寫作:撰寫日誌是耗時費力的工作,教師在繁重的教學、備課、批改作業之外,還要持續在部落格上撰寫日誌、分享經驗,所需耗費的時間精力是相當驚人。雖然教師本身可從中獲益,不過也需衡量自身工作的負荷量。事實上,我們更建議的是主題式的學習,教師在某一段時間內針對感興趣的主題作教學反思、自主學習。聚焦於較小的問題,可以進行更深入、更全面地探索。

5. 結論

在部落格於全球發燒的今日,利用部落格來輔助教學是再自然不過的事情。隨著電子郵件、線上聊天、討論論壇、語音郵件(voice mail)、即時通訊(instant messaging)、網路電話(VoIP)、podcast等技術的相繼問世,語言教學也多了不少利器。部落格說穿了就是簡化技術的網頁,其所創造的(X)HTML與傳統的網頁並無二致。部落格所能達成的電腦中介溝通(Computer Mediated Communication)、與母語者互動、真實情境、線上社群等,利用傳統技術也都能夠做得到。但不同的是,部落格這樣的平民媒體簡化了技術上的問題,讓網路寫作不再是少數人的專利。部落格的技術門檻低、訊息傳遞快、互動性高、維護成本低,因此我們認為是值得推廣於華語教學的一項利器。

註釋

[1] 新的文章會出現在頁面的上方,越往下越舊。
[2] 創市際所估計的網路人口稍高,依據資策會電子商務研究所之估計,2005年3月臺灣之經常上網人口約925萬(李雅萍, 2005)。
[3] Permalink是permanent link之意。或有人稱為「靜態連結」,有別於使用資料庫產生的動態連結。
[4] 不過非英文的部落格因網址編碼的問題,不易做到這一點。
[5] Really Simple Syndication,或有人稱為Rich Site Summary。
[6] 可擴充標記語言(eXtensible Markup Language)。
[7] Podcast指的是一種網路廣播,可以在網路傳送聲音檔案(如廣播節目),並可以用RSS來同步,讓訂閱者可以在個人電腦、或行動裝置(PDA、手機)上來收聽(Stanley, 2006)。
[8] 繁體中文的社會書籤(social bookmarking)網站,比起傳統單一電腦上的「我的最愛」,社會書籤更容易收藏、搜尋、分享。http://www.hemidemi.com/
[9] Wiki是一種多人線上協作的技術,最成功的應用是維基百科。


引用文獻

Bailey, K. M. (1990). The use of diary studies in teacher education programs. In J. C. Richards & D. Nunan (Eds.), Second language teacher education (pp. 215-226). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bartlett, L. (1990). Teacher development through reflective teaching. In J. C. Richards & D. Nunan (Eds.), Second language teacher education (pp. 202-214). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Beatty, K. (2003). Teaching and researching computer-assisted language learning. London: Longman.Blood, R. (2000, September 7). Weblogs: A history and perspective. Rebecca's pocket. Retrieved May 25, 2006, from http://www.rebeccablood.net/essays/weblog_history.html

Campbell, A. P. (2003). Weblogs for use with ESL classes. Internet TESL Journal, 9. Retrieved March 12, 2006, from http://iteslj.org/Techniques/Campbell-Weblogs.html

Campbell, A. P. (2005). Weblog applications for EFL/ESL classroom blogging: A comparative review. TESL-EJ, 9. Retrieved March 12, 2006, from http://writing.berkeley.edu/tesl-ej/ej35/m1.html

Fievet, C., & Turrettini, E.(2004/2006)。誰沒部落格!。(施瑞瑄譯)。台北:商周。(原作2004年出版)

Gillmor, D.(2005)。草根媒體:部落格傳奇。(陳建勳譯)。台北:歐萊禮。(原作2004年出版)

Pilgrim, M. (2002, December 18). What is RSS. XML.com. Retrieved July 16, 2006, from http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2002/12/18/dive-into-xml.html

Portor, P. A., Goldstein, L. M., Leatherman, J., & Conrad, S. (1990). An ongoing dialogue: Learning logs for teacher preparation. In J. C. Richards & D. Nunan (Eds.), Second language teacher education (pp. 227-240). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Richards, J. C., & Ho, B. (1998). Reflective thinking through journal writing. In J. C. Richards (Ed.), Beyond training (pp. 153-170). Cambridge, UK : Cambridge University Press.

Shoffner, M. (2006). The potential of weblogs in pre-service teachers' reflective practice. Proceedings of the Society for information technology and teacher education (pp. 2409-2415). Orlando, Florida, USA . Retrieved September 23, 2006, from http://www.editlib.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=Reader.ViewAbstract&paper_id=22434

Sifry, D. (2006, August 7). State of the blogosphere, August 2006. Sifry's Alerts. Retrieved November 23, 2006, from http://www.sifry.com/alerts/archives/000436.html

Stanley, G. (2006). Podcasting: Audio on the Internet comes of age. TESL-EJ, 9. Retrieved April 2, 2006, from http://www.tesl-ej.org/ej36/int.html

Stiler, G. M., & Philleo, T. (2003). Blogging and Blogspots: An alternative format for encouraging reflective practice among preservice teachers. Education, 123(4), 789-798.

Tan, Y.-H., Teo, E.-H., Aw, W.-L., & Lim, W.-Y. (2005). Portfolio building in Chinese language learning using blogs. Proceedings of the BlogTalk Downunder. Sydney. Retrieved July 1, 2006, from http://www.moe.gov.sg/edumall/rd/publications/blogtalk.pdf

Wallace, M. J. (1991). Training foreign language teachers: A reflective approach. Cambridge, UK : Cambridge University Press.

Wallace, P.(2001)。網路心理講義。(陳美靜譯)。台北:天下文化。(原作1999年出版)

Ward, J. M. (2004). Blog assisted language learning (BALL): Push button publishing for the pupils. TEFL Web Journal, 3, 1-16. Retrieved March 11, 2006, from http://www.teflweb-j.org/v3n1/blog_ward.pdf

中國互聯網絡信息中心(2006)。2006年中國博客調查報告。中國互聯網絡信息中心。取自http://www.cnnic.cn/uploadfiles/pdf/2006/9/28/182836.pdf

李雅萍(2005)。我國寬頻用戶數達371萬。資策會FIND網站。取自http://www.find.org.tw/0105/howmany/howmany_disp.asp?id=114

林克寰( 2004年5月11日)。妳不能不知道的部落格── Blog 是甚麼碗糕啊? Jedi's BLOG。 2006年4月24日,取自http://jedi.org/blog/archives/003856.html

郭修靜、廖埻棓(2006)。華語教學分享館:Web 2.0時代的華語教學。第八屆世界華語文教學研討會論文集。台北。

創市際市場研究顧問(2005)。臺灣部落熱(Blog)觀察。創市際市場研究顧問。取自http://www.insightxplorer.com/news/news_04_28_05.html

舒兆民(2002)。網路華語語體及文化課程教學設計。未出版之碩士論文,台灣師範大學,華語文教學研究所。台北。

謝天蔚(2004)。中文網路資源重組及應用。載於張普、謝天蔚、徐娟(編)數字化對外漢語教學理論與方法研究(頁13-19)。北京:清華大學。

謝天蔚(2006)。博客、維基、網播與中文教學。第五屆國際中文電化教學會議論文集。香港。 取自http://www.csulb.edu/~txie/papers/Blog%20Wiki%20Pod%20Can%20we%20use%20them%20full%20text.pdf

藝立協(2003)。Blog部落格線上出版、網路日誌實作。台北:上奇科技。

2009年1月27日 星期二

Weblogg-ed: learning with the read/write web

Weblogg-ed

About Weblogg-ed

This site is dedicated to discussions and reflections on the use of Weblogs, wikis, RSS, audiocasts and other Read/Write Web related technologies in the K-12 realm, technologies that are transforming classrooms around the world.

Weblogg-ed由Will Richardson所建立,他同時也是 Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms的作者(昨天我才上網買了這本,本來想從amazona買,結果加上starndard運費跟博客來代訂差不多,所以就在博客來訂了,不知道要多久),現在已出到第二版2008/7/16。

部落格還真威

http://booliant.com/?p=177


一天,隔壁小陳的女友穿著細肩帶上衣,下身著極短熱褲從浴室走了出來。玉體橫陳地在眼前晃阿晃~看的小陳渾身發燙、情慾高漲,嘴裡雖然吃的是餃子,心裡想的是嫂子。急忙放下晚餐的四海遊龍,即將化身為一尾活龍跟火辣的女友翻魚覆雨、大戰八百回。小陳從女友的後背一把抱住,野蠻地將一張油呼呼的嘴往女友唇上招呼。就在耳鬢廝磨時分,女友把小陳狠狠地推開,嬌嗔地說:「嗯~討厭,讓人家先上blog更新一下網誌,還有一堆留言沒有回覆。最重要的是…..人家我要上blog找一下哪牌子的condom比較安全嘛!」

小陳按捺住即將噴發的慾火,走到了陽台點根菸試著先冷靜下來。遠眺著美麗華的七彩摩天輪跟瑰麗的大直夜景,燈紅酒綠的汽車旅館看板,讓他突然起個念頭。他回過頭跟女友說:「小寶貝~今晚我們去汽車旅館試試,很久沒去了!」女友羞輦地說:「好啦~好啦~我上blog找一下哪家旅館比較優喔。小陳心裡滴咕著:「 什麼都blog,成也blog,敗也blog,張君雅小妹妹也在blog賣點心麵。 那要不要上網查查陳水扁到底會不會被抓去關 ?」 這時…..女友那頭驚呼著:「 有個部落客在她的格上用Y!Live直播阿扁大喊:你(他馬的)關的是我的身體,關不住我的心」….小陳…藍藍路了…(吐煙..)

不過小陳聽到女朋友答應今晚的汽車旅館約會,心裡極度的興奮,邊抽菸腦袋裡邊想像著跟女友魚水交歡的害羞畫面。不知不覺回過神來,小陳已經抽光了一整包菸,眼看著女友還黏在電腦螢幕前面,火氣整個上來。大聲怒斥著女友:「妳到底還要多久啦,我不管妳了…」旋即拎起他在blog上團購買到波特包,狠狠地摔門離開了住處。小陳女友跑到了陽台對著樓下的男友問道:「哈尼,你是要去哪裡?」小陳頭也不回地吼著:

妳不會去問部落格…..格格格格格格格..格(由近至遠、由大到小)」

帶著哀傷的音調在充滿情慾的夜裡飄盪著….

Blog就像巴士底監獄關住了小陳女友的身體,也關住了她的心……



OK!我承認這故事是瞎胡謅的!!我只是要讓吸引你進來看看這篇文章。Blog在三年前歷史上的今天,在我的認知裡面只是某個朋友的論文題目;只是個取代發報台的新平台;又或者只是放在架上的誠品好讀專刊報導。現在呢?Blog對我來說又是甚麼?朋友阿(台語..)試著在Google大神或Yahoo!隨便放下幾個關鍵字,搜尋結果的第一頁,絕對有超過半數都出現Blog。是否有注意過這樣的現象呢?這對你來說,有甚麼意義? 對我來說,除了可以亂哈拉出剛剛那段故事之外,又有甚麼意義?不過可以確定的是,對廣告主廣告商來說,代表了很大的意義呢!!

先說好,這篇不是要給”已經”知道的人所撰寫的文章,如果你已經知道了,拜託幫我點一點Google廣告再走(見鬼了,我根本沒放Adsense,哪來的廣告可以點…冏 );如果你尚未知道,我要讓你知道一些訊息!首先,先問問自己五個問題:

1. 要購買商品前,你會上網搜尋相關資訊嗎?
2. 你會相信網路上的評價,然後做出購買的決定嗎?
3. 你曾經看了blog的評價做出購買決定後,卻依然踩到雷嗎?
4. 購買商品之後,你會上blog寫開箱文嗎?
5. 你會因為廠商付你錢,違背良知去寫一篇黑心文?


相信朋友看到這裡,已經覺得肚胃翻繳了,搞得跟論文問卷調查硬梆梆的。我只是不小心手滑點進來看而以阿。不過希望你先忍住焦躁的火氣,不要把這頁關掉。先看看JupiterResearch的一篇研究結論,再消消火也不遲。

在這份調查報告中,BuzzLogic執行長Rob Crumpler下了一個強而有力的結論,「Blogger的評論變成了鄉民決定購買前的關鍵性指標。」此話怎說? 報告中談到了三項鄉民決定購買的資訊,分別為:一、blog豐富的使用評價;二、網頁介紹商品的規格及任何相關資訊;三、製造廠商或零售商所提供的資訊。然而Blogger撰寫的使用評價是當中比例最高的選項(17%)。另外,Blog圈的左右消費者購買與否的影響力會越來越高,根據預估四年後(2012年),會超過七成的鄉民會閱讀blog,對照2007年接近五成的比例,部落格閱讀率持續穩健的成長當中。

千萬、億萬的鄉民當然包含了你我,和隔壁小陳女友。當我們的生活中充滿了blog陪伴的甜蜜(Pros),這時也要注意blog所帶來的痛苦與辛酸(cons)。特別是剛剛上述提到了五個問題,超過三個會答YES的朋友,要特別注意自己是不是被blog制約了。別人的網誌影響你的生活層面超過我們所認知的程度。找聚餐場所,我們上blog;找工作換老闆,我們上blog;衝殺周年慶,也上blog….安太歲、求神問卦、塔羅牌算命也上部落格,blog甚麼都有,甚麼都不奇怪…..

blog的本質就是web+log,它還是HTML網頁的組成,只是呈現的外表變了。也因為blog提供了一個讓每個鄉民可以表達意見的舞台,所以網路力量越滾越強大,像個吉普賽女郎神秘未知所以充滿魅力。於是,網路內容提供者從廠商、專業領域工作者轉移到了市井小民,每個會上網會打字的你、我、他。但是剛剛我說的”尚未”知道的朋友,要留心。企業偽裝成blog,行銷人員偽裝成blogger、blogger也變成專業的偽blogger,透過blog在無聲無息中”行銷”著他們的產品給你。這些訊息真偽得要小心判斷,千萬不要看了凱肉太肥為EEEPc寫的介紹文,就傻呼呼的被置入了一屁吸。內容的真實性,不再像往常你在mobile01上找到的開箱文或PK文這麼令人信賴。不過,廣告主的力量給了部落格圈(blogsphere)正面的成長力量,但它載舟也可覆舟,不當過度的惡性不實的blog行銷,會讓blogger們沉淪。知名部落客吸引每一筆點擊的流量來自於值得一看的content,驚人流量也吸引了廣告主願意把銀彈投注在這些百大blogs。當bloggers產出的content不實或流露太濃厚商業氣息,就再也沒有高點擊率了,因為鄉民的負面評價會如病毒般在網路蔓延散布。於是,百大不再百大,不知名blogger崛起變成知名A咖,然後又因為萬惡的鈔票墮落了,於是這樣的循環不停地在上演……

好吧,我真的要承認,我眼紅吃醋,為何天下出版不找我寫推介文,卵石牌電腦為何不找上門。寫這篇的結論絕對不是好心要呼籲鄉民們張開雪亮的雙眼,判斷網路世界的真偽;我要高舉雙臂,大喊:「廠商大大們~張開智慧的雙眼,我把青春的肉體跟火熱的心通通都給你阿~~」

2009年1月26日 星期一

Weblogs in education

http://coe.sdsu.edu/eet/articles/blogsined/index.htm

Weblogs in education

WEBLOGS ARE BECOMING increasingly popular with teachers, who are using them in the classroom in various ways. Teachers are noticing the effects weblogs have on their students' learning.

What is a Weblog?

A weblog, also called a blog, is an easily created and updateable website that allows people to publish to the Internet instantly. They vary from serving as an online diary or journal that is updated once a day to being a collector of web content on a particular topic with potentially many entries in one day.

The information can be written by the site owner, gathered from other websites or other sources, or contributed by users. Generally, weblogs are centered around one or several subjects or themes, usually of topical interest. They can be thought of as developing commentaries, individual or collective, on their particular themes.

Web logs tend to have many hyperlinks to other websites. These other websites are related to the subject or theme of the weblog.

Weblogs also allow feedback from readers. They offer collaboration by joining many readers and writers from diverse geographic, political, and socioeconomic groups in one place (Richardson, 2003).





An example of a weblog used in Ms. Sanborn's fifth grade class. Her students record the daily events into the classroom weblog.

How Can a Weblog Be Used in a Classroom?

A weblog can be used as a personal journaling space in which the author makes regular entries. These entries can focus on class content or related student interests.

It can also be used as a daily log of class events. Students can jot down the events of the day, and for homework or a next day activity, they can input the events into the weblog. Students would take turns doing this activity.

Weblogs can offer an extension of class discussions. If the discussion had to end due to time, then it can be continued online long after school is over. This allows students who did not get a chance to discuss, as well as the reticent students, to join in on the conversation. Students can post comments about certain topics, and other students can respond or start new ones.

Another use of a weblog is an electronic portfolio of written work. The students' work can be displayed online for others to read and post comments about. They will have a live audience to view their work.







Students can post journal entries into a classroom weblog. Because they have a real audience, they are encouraged to produce high-quality work.

What Are the Effects of Using a Weblog?

The instant publishing on weblogs makes students more able and willing to read, write, and discuss about the world around them. They know they have a real audience to write to, and they may even have a collaborative environment where they can give and receive feedback (Kennedy, 2003). Therefore, students are compelled to do their best work.

Teachers who have used web logs in their classrooms say that students put more thought and effort into their blog writing, knowing that parents and others may read their work on the Web. They want to make sure that not only their teacher, but others who read it, will think it is good enough (Selingo, 2004).

Students can strengthen their reading skills and strategies by exploring other’s weblogs and hyperlinks (Oravec, 2002). They will have to carefully read through these linked websites to decide which information is relevant and important to them. Not only that, but the students can build on their knowledge base by reading the content on the different linked websites.

Weblogs also allow students to interact with their peers more quickly than a regular journal. Students who tend to be more quiet in class usually come alive online.

Some teachers report that weblogs seemed to be used the most during the school day. Not that many entries are posted after school or during the summer. This has led some to question whether the technology has actually done anything to interest students in writing.

Some teachers also worry that the casual nature of writing on the web may encourage students to use incorrect writing conventions in other forms of writing. This could include email style abbreviations, bad grammar, and poor spelling (Selingo, 2004).

However, it depends on how the teacher uses the weblog in the classroom. Some require that the entry be written on paper first, edited, and then posted onto the weblog. Others think of weblogs as a different form of writing in which the teacher should be concerned with content, not grammar.

There are also concerns around students and their work being too public when published on the Internet. The teacher may need to receive parental permission before posting the student work online.







Miranda Bella, SDSU EDTEC Graduate Student

Bella, M. (2005). Weblogs in education In B. Hoffman (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Technology. Retrieved January 26, 2009, from http://coe.sdsu.edu/eet/articles/blogsined/start.htm