Twice the Fun Means Twice the Work: Learning To Blog in University Course Assignments

To respect students’ desire for privacy, I’ve allowed them to choose whether they want their blogs to be private or public. While I don’t entirely disagree with one blogger’s point that private blogs are not blogs at all (Arvan), my decision was based on my belief that students might feel uncomfortable, and take fewer risks, if they are forced to write in an online public space.  

However, has not knowing how to create private blogs, how to add each other as readers, and how to respond to blogs in fact added more strain? Students must not only understand and follow particular formatting guidelines, structural and stylistic rules of writing, and standards of critical engagement; they must also learn how to use blogging technology in order to complete blogging assignments on time. This may be a confusing and overwhelming assignment for those who know little about blogging, or who have little time to learn about it. Knowing nothing about how to work fountain ink pens, if I had to write an essay using one, I’d only have frustration and blue hands to show for it.

So far, some have picked up the blogging tech more easily than others, due to differences in the time they have allotted themselves and in their individual abilities with computer technology. I am decidedly un-tech savvy myself. When I first started using Dreamweaver and Adobe Photoshop, I constantly wished for some little magical helper on my shoulder to instantly answer all of my questions. I also wished for a full week just to “play around” with all the little buttons. Learning how to learn to use technology is itself a valuable skill; but, when you’re very late, you’re far less interested in how the car runs than in how fast it can get you where you need to be.

A “cost-benefit” approach suggests that our efforts are worthwhile when we get out more than we put in. Of course, in the middle of learning those “benefits” are not always apparent. As we discussed in class, blogging is a valuable tool for learning about gender in a global context, in part because this activity allows everyone to bring to class their own interests and experiences. So, although I cannot be a little shoulder helper this weekend, I ask for students’ patience as they continue to learn about this new writing medium. On Monday, I hope to spend time as a class in the computer lab so that we can all be on the same (virtual) page.

Works Cited

Arvan, Lanny. “Teaching With Blogs”. Inside Higher Ed. 27 July 2010. Web. 16 Oct. 2010.