Open source tool: Blogr

It is interesting to see one good quote like this in a blog:

"learning with the read/write web"

I used to think that blogging is simply a fun site. People blog just for sharing personal activities or experiences --> just like a diary. However, it turns out that blogging is also a tool for learning. Will Richardson in his blog: http://weblogg-ed.com/ stated:

"Learning in the 21st Century is all about networks and the connections we can make to other learners and teachers both in our communities and around the globe. But being literate in this new learning environment requires more than knowing how to read and write. It requires us to edit, publish, collaborate, create and connect in the process of building our own personal learning spaces."

I do agree with him. I believe that students in this millenium generation need to know more than the previous ancestors. They cannot just sit in the classroom chair, listen to the teacher, do the homework, and complete the assignment. They should become better, and doing so doesn't mean that students need to learn harder. They just have to learn smarter.
Learning can happen anywhere, anytime and using any tools. With blogging, students not only get the reading and writing process, but also constructivism process. They will learn to think, analyze, create, design, and manage. Moreover, there are many free blog sites in the internet. One of the sites I found quite interesting is the Blogr.

Blogr provides a free spot for us to create our own blog site. It's free, and they will also help you to design, manage, and publish your blog


How to implement it in the classroom??
There are many ways doing it. Teachers can use it as a PBL lesson. Students can be assigned to create the blog, explore its features & use them, and collaborate with other web 2.0 tools.

As Mr. Richardson believed that "the almost limitless potential of Weblogs as a teaching tool is fostering an explosion of innovative projects, partnerships and techniques at every level of education from elementary school to graduate programs," blogging can become the powerful tool to create a meaningful learning.

Question 3 for activity

"Teachers often ask the question "How can I make more use of PBL at a time when my school administrators are demanding that I spend more time teaching to the tests that our students have to take?"

I would first say: "Yes, you can!"

Of course, this will bring challenge and time consuming for the teacher because he/she has to study, understand, analyze, adopt, craft, and design the PBL based on the subject matter will be tested. On details, the teacher has to study and understand the content subjects, then start analyzing it with question "what and how should I teach to the students in order to answer this test without focusing on memorization?" Once the teacher has figured out the material, he/she has to adopt the material into PBL concepts, then design it into the shape of PBL lesson.

This looks difficult; however, the main point is simple. It is basically: "how to change the teaching method to learner-centered." The curriculum would be the same, but the instruction and the delivery should be "authentic and challenging," and the focus should be "having students pose challenging problems and tasks, and then working to solve problems or accomplish tasks." In this way, students will understand the content more than traditional delivery method, and remember longer than memorization (Moursund, 2003, p. 21).

Inquiry: ask to know about how

What is Inquiry Based Learning (IBL)?
I've heard and read many thoughts about the definition of IBL, but when I analyzed more and simplified it, it came to the conclusion that IBL = ask to know about how.

I gained lots of information about IBL from videos about IBL and the seven inquiry-based questions in http://www.thirteen.org/edonline/concept2class/inquiry/index.html. Well, honestly, I didn't read all of it.. =) Mostly I just skimmed the readings, but...... wait the minute! I found one interesting question and the answer contains all principles of IBL. It's the 2nd question, and here is what I got from that page:


One more thing that I found interesting from my reading is the word "think." Somehow, I believe this word becomes the main goal, guidance, and process of IBL. Teachers will want their students to think than to memorize; they will focus on how to make students think when they create IBL; they will also expect the students to do the thinking during the lesson.

When I read Mr. Moursund (2003) book, he also mentioned about IBL has the same foundation as Project Based Learning (p. 37). And then I thought: "of course!" That's why IBL has almost the same principles as PBL. However, it is true that if we wanted to study more about IBL, we would find that IBL focuses on getting the students to get involved in, to have interest in the lesson more, to ask more questions in order to gain more information and knowledge. I think that is why many teachers uses IBL in their science and technology area.