Tool #2: Building Community & Comments

• What are your thoughts about building an online education community and participating in a PLN?

Personal learning networks seem like the next logical extension of the classroom. I have used online communities in the past, such as Ning, and students have enjoyed and grown from the opportunity. Our classroom Ning allowed students to share ideas, respond to questions, post video, post pictures, and post final products of our learning experiences. While using a Ning I also realized the need to learn not only about what a new technology means for a learning experience, but also what it means to have good digital citizenship.

As we have more access to technology we should be teaching our students to be good digital citizens; they will be expected to have a wide range of skills we can hardly imagine in jobs once they leave our classrooms. In order to become a good digital citizen, students must have an area in which to practice. In addition to being a good training ground for the real world, PLNs allow students go beyond the four walls of their teachers' classrooms. Whether they are reading blogs from around the world or Skyping with students in classrooms outside of their school they will be learning from a variety of sources they didn't have access to only a few years ago.

• What point stood out to you from the commenting advice?

Engaging students on a blog is much like engaging students in the traditional classroom. Bloggers, as do students, like to be rewarded for their thoughts and know they are recognized for their contributions. It can be very intimidating to share one's ideas on a topic or issue and I think an online community can make that process easier; however, positive feedback will encourage more thoughts and ideas from all involved. Once a student or blogger has shared her ideas, she also likes to see that the blogger/teacher she is responding to doesn't already know everything about a topic and is genuinely interested in their ideas. One final point that stood out to me is that it needs to be somewhat easy to share ones ideas. Whether a blogger is a student or a teacher these tips for commenting make sense for all contributing to a collection of thoughts; we want our ideas to be heard, yet we also want to feel good about our contributions.

I'm guessing the question my students will ask is "Is this for a grade?" So my question to you is, should it be for a grade? If so, how should I grade it? (Sigh, I do hope I am wrong and they all want to blog for the sake of learning!)

• What five blogs did you select for your comments?

I commented on Onward and Upward Learning and The 11 Tools of Arbuckle thus far. I will follow up with an updated list soon!

Update 7/18/2010: Commented on Beth Bray's Blog, Frogs, Chihuahuas, & Good Times, and being patty joyce.