Blogging can be very useful to politicians and people seeking information on issues of interest to the public. When public figures set up their own websites and request feedback from their constituents, it provides an instant resource to measure the feelings of society. Surveys and phone calls are costly and time consuming. The data collected via these sources are outdated before the information can be tabulated, whereas, electronic feedback elicits instantaneous responses. (The power of the internet was demonstrated when a simple posting saying to meet in the park for a snowball fight produced a 1000 participants.) When political figures stay connected with their voters through blog sites, voters have a better scene of being a part of the political process and being represented by a concerned administration.
When I was in school, my research consisted of reading a variety of articles and books in the library. Now, my daughter actually has an opportunity to ask questions online and receive professional responses from experts in the area she is exploring. Those opportunities are more meaningful to her than reading about it in a book. Also, blogging provides feedback on her thoughts on the subject, before she submits the report for grading. Her information is current and provides credible resources and data unavailable to her classmates. The electronic dialogue allows my daughter to clarify misconceptions and develop a better understanding of the technical aspects of issues.
Also, blogging allows an audience to share your thoughts and feelings with before making critical decisions, to sway public opinion, or elicit support. One must be careful not to fall prey to fishing or predators inundating your computer with spam. People who share the same interests or intellect can converse in minutes and not wait for snail mail to carry responses. You are free to converse with people in other countries and all across the United States. People you would never have an opportunity to meet and talk to face to face. Many educators are willing to share ideas and discuss ways to teach students of varying ages. These posters have already completed the projects and can provide helpful hints on how to modify instruction to meet the needs of at-risk learners. The comment section, allows other instructors to discuss how they used the activities, and the responses obtained from their students. These websites are safe means of reaching fellow teachers and sharing ideas. This is a constructive uses of blogging. Hopefully, our society will not completely retreat into the internet world and forget the beauty of discussing issues face to face with colleagues.
There’s a Dragon in my Art Room: http://plbrown.blogspot.com/p/about-my-classroom.html is for elementary art teachers to share ideas and make comments. Also, The Teaching Palette: http://theteachingpalette.com/category/blog/ provides a wide variety of art activities, interactive games, and videos posted by elementary art instructors.
After reading Jeremy Hand-Roe’s, Alicia Coakley’s, Nathan Davis’, Katrina Motter’s, and Michelle Parson’s blogs, I realized that we were all basically concerned about the same things when communicating over the internet. Two of us were novices at blogging, and the others were concerned with using proper etiquette while chatting. One even suggested having a special font for criticism, so you could push delete when it came on the screen. All of us wanted to communicate with our peers and fellow educators in a constructive manner, in an effort to share ideas.
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