Author: Adjunct Associate Professor
Maryann DiEdwardo
Title: Blog and Wiki Journaling
Engage Student Voices for Practical Solutions in the 21st Century
Classroom
Thesis: Writing, an art, is a necessary endeavor, natural for the growth of human
intelligence. Use travel journals in blogs and wikis to enhance curriculum for
K-graduate students.
Author:
Maryann DiEdwardo Ed.D.
Published
in Kappa Delta Pi, The Record for Pairing Music and Linguistic Intelligences
Affilation:
Adjunct Associate Professor University of Maryland University College
Theme:
My
wiki generates free marketing and free research to my students and colleagues.
Visit http://maryannpasdadiedwardo.wikispaces.com
Excerpt
from thesis:
Based
upon the research of Lev Vygotsky in the field of Activity Theory ( Vygotsky
1978), the sociocultural phenomenon of wiki explodes the development of the
classroom in models that serve the students of the 21st century. Applicable to our varied student bodies
both tradition and distance populations, activity theory works to ensure that
students receive instructions that they can apply beyond writing in the
classroom. Wiki serves educators as an integrating technology compatible with
electronic portfolio, team newsletters, team papers, and frameworks that depend
upon technology to enhance cognitive functions of students. Thesis: Based upon the research of Lev Vygotsky in
the field of Activity Theory
( Vygotsky 1978), the sociocultural phenomenon of blogs and wikis
expand the development of the classroom in models that serve the students of
the 21st century.
Applicable to our varied student bodies both tradition and distance
populations, activity theory works to ensure that students receive instructions
that they can apply beyond writing in the classroom. In addition, blogs and
wikis serve educators as an integrating technology compatible with electronic
portfolio, team newsletters, team papers, and frameworks that depend upon
technology to enhance cognitive functions of students. Enhance
your teaching with designing your own blog or wiki journal or other writing
project to inspire and encourage students to see writing as a daily and
enjoyable task
Writing
based on keen observation and self discovery as a part of learning to write.
Applications of structured platforms create blog and wiki assignments that
benefit students. The blogs and wikis are embedded with techniques that have
detailed and required pedagogical focus such as the writing process, critical
reading, essay skills, grammar, mechanics, sentence structure, film theory,
literary terms, and journaling,
Students of the 21st century
benefit from educational models that mimic the design of Twitter and Facebook. Blogs that can be programmed to be
private or public within digital open access classrooms such as Moodle are
similar to the twitter or facebook interface with quick posting. Wiki or web
page can be edited in digital classroom platform to act as a model to motivate.
Create assignments that use life story journaling about immediate or recent
experiences to help students learn to create their own voices with immediate
and lively feedback from peers.
Blog and wiki assignments in English I and
II computer enhanced literature based composition classes in the University
setting in traditional or distance classes to create and implement assignments.
The blogs and wikis are embedded with techniques that have detailed and
required pedagogical focus such as the writing process, critical reading, essay
skills, grammar, mechanics, sentence structure, film theory, literary terms,
and journaling, I require my English 1 and 2 students to compose drafts of
essays in public blogs and private wikis to echo current trends in technology.
Furthermore, in class blog journaling in computer enhanced traditional
classrooms motivates students to write and to stay on task to achieve and to
develop style.
Applications of structured platforms create blog and wiki assignments
that benefit students. Incorporate the blog daily journal as a way to stimulate
students to write. Blogs seem friendly and offer peer feedback as a way to
encourage writers to learn from cooperative efforts as well. As a edited web
page with a place to save writing and notes, the wiki acts as a personal
private record of drafts of essays with the possibility of presentation of wiki
as a portfolio for final assessments. One of my students created a private wiki
of 10,000 words in the digital classroom Moodle. I encourage my student who
created the comprehensive portfolio to write daily even out of class and to
edit with me via email, text and conferences. She attended private and group
conferences out of class to hone her writing skills. Her favorite paper was
based on the television show Glee.
Through a blog journal that was public she created planning, thesis, first
second and final draft. She writes the following introduction to her paper: “From the
first episode to the season finale, Journey’s song “Don’t Stop Believing”
portrays themes in the popular television series, Glee. In the final episode of the first season, the Glee club sings
a mash-up of songs in the Regional competition which includes select verses of
Journey’s hit “Don’t Stop Believing.” Glee
focuses on evolving characters who are “outsiders” in their high school. Themes
of outsiders combine the show’s incorporation of music with characters who
embody inner life which represents the human condition. The lyrics of the
fourth verse in Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing” emulate the developments of
both characters and relationships in the final episode of season one of Glee. “
In January of 2007, I initiated my
practice of creating public blog journals for a public peer review practice and
private wikis to save and develop drafts of essays. I recall that I entered the
classroom on the first day and immediately set up a blog on the internet for my
students to finish the first day of class assignment. I used a site called Blog
Spot, since our digital classroom (Blackboard at the time) was not yet ready.
Their task was to write a short paragraph about a personal immigration
experience. The outcome demonstrated how students are engaged by blogging and
by sharing their thoughts with the class community. I have consistently used
blogging as a daily task to complete portions of writing that lead to essays in
Lehigh University English 1 and 2 traditional computer enhanced classes. Blog
and wiki in learning communities engages student voices. Create a classroom
community where students participate as active learners by technological
friendly models.
Blog and wiki journaling act as
primary sources for essays. Writing based on keen observation and self
discovery as a part of learning to write.
Information processing generates active students. I have been able to create a blog in the newest open access
software called Moodle. I list homework in the following method
by mentioning the daily in class blog that will help the students form their
essays through the writing process
and group activities that take place in class or during
activities outside of class.
I mention that
students will write daily in the blog that is public or the wiki that is
private.
I program these myself and select to use the blog or wiki function to form my
own
paradigm. For part of every class, the students will meet with their selected
group to
plan
a presentation that uses technology like youtube and blog plans in course site,
blog
after and during class. I promote finishing project in our
digital
classroom in the blog and the wiki. The essay assignment is based in critical
reading
and prose writing techniques.
To ensure that there
is a methodology to the assignment I mention that the student will
read
Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek to
prepare for research class for week 4 on
2-9
in Linderman Library that I set up with a Guest Speaker. In private or group
conferences,
I work with the blogs and wikis to see how the writing process is going. I
ask
the student to present the MLA style essay. for every assignment I Include a
film and
literary
work in the paper for allusions and references. The most important combination
of book to film in 2011 was Annie
Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek compared
to the
film
Avatar.
My student writes the
following introduction to a paper: “Encyclopedia
Britannica explains Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim
at Tinker Creek as a work that was “distilled from keen observations of her own habitat
[conveying] the essential enigmas of religious mysticism” (Annie Dillard). To
compare a Pulitzer
Prize-winning collection to any film superficially seems unfair. James Cameron
delivers Avatar through complex
computer design and animation using appeals to sound and sight to his
advantage. Annie Dillard is able to just the same by vividly describing scenes
on a mere piece of paper. The readers must assume then that Dillard’s main
objective is to leave her words up for interpretation. It is with this liberty
that we can draw connections between these two original masterpieces of their
own form. Thus, through key passages in Annie Dillard’s work, we can discuss Avatar and Jake’s character
development.”
In my directions, I
also always provide a link to the public blog and to the private
wiki.
The wiki link will be placed in the announcement. An example of
the
directive to the blog or wiki may explain the way to find the place to save
writing to
retain
thoughts and ideas that are recorded by students during conferences, classes
and
group
activities. “Simply scroll down, click edit, add your name to a time, and click
save.
Students
present a youtube video, a short music video, a film trailer, show a web site,
or
select
a sound bite or technology to enhance our study of film ad literature with a
vision
of
the theme of the essay assignment (DiEdwardo, Moodle, 2011).”
Blogs promote student-directed learning. Students who write blog and wiki discussions
succeed in college writing classes as these activities are themed on their own
lives. Educational research is favorable for the private journal as a way for
literature students to progress.
Develop independent writers in technology based classes by blog and wiki
discussions to reach the students via conversations that lead to writing process
abilities. Design the blog and wiki framework as a planning tool based upon
curriculum goals. For instance, in
my English I classes at Lehigh University fall 2007, I used a wiki to generate
quizzes that are the basis of a final group essay project. Based upon the
research of Lev Vygotsky in the field of Activity Theory ( Vygotsky 1978), the
sociocultural phenomenon of wiki explodes the development of the classroom in
models that serve the students of the 21st century. Applicable to our varied student bodies
both tradition and distance populations, activity theory works to ensure that
students receive instructions that they can apply beyond writing in the
classroom. Wiki serves educators as an integrating technology compatible with
electronic portfolio, team newsletters, team papers, and frameworks that depend
upon technology to enhance cognitive functions of students. A public journal
blog or wiki can be a part of any writing class and can be any type of writing
that helps the student move forward with literary language skills.
Collaborative discussion wikis create online journals as participation to earn
grade points as well as paper points.
The writing process is the focus; we use the blog or wiki to stimulate
the transition from the thought or brainstorm to the page through wiki. In
addition, we cohesively work during our blog or wiki
experiences on a newsletter composed of all blog or wiki entries. Students thoughtfully write, then
publish online as part of the class experience.
Other frameworks
include writing about blog or wiki lectures, web experiences like video
streaming searches and reviews linked to blog or wiki posts, group research
library searches through blog links and wiki, after all, blogs and wikis create
the new 21st century writer who is making history. Blogs and Wikis are
technology areas where students learn to share thoughts on life as writing
topics or to add to writing topics.
Save blog and wiki posts and refer to them daily; they are documents
educators can refer to as citations or use as preliminary parts of papers.
Blogs and Wikis can be poetry fiction drama presentations where students post a
short set of web sites or literary terms or parts of writing and gain
discussion journal points or use the experience actually to write a paper. Papers can be ABOUT blogs and wikis.
Live internet experiences are life and students write about life or about
others who understand aspects of the human condition. Blogs and Wikis are live
writing process events as well. Assertive blog and wiki activities include critiques of peer
writing, group writing, and references to other students’ blogs and wiki posts
and Professor conferences. The platform of blog and wiki can result in a series
of thoughts that may become finished research essays.
Encourage students to print the blog wiki
document or save as a file to show ability to write online in a cooperative
team. Students are asked to act as editors, cognitive mappers of ideas within
the design of the wiki discussion newsletter, interpreters of website links,
all to demonstrate adaptive strategies to address visual and special thinking
of all class members with different modes and talents. Wiki teaches planning
which is also journaling. Any time
students write ideas save them either in a wiki discussion forum with conversations
that are shared with other class or team members. Writing has a new meaning in the virtual
setting. Every action is recorded
for points. Topics can be one word
for a first draft. The next draft
may be a thesis. I suggest
students draft at least two days per week and keep a record of al activity to
show me on the electronic classrooms or in a private journal in wiki posts or
even in a collection of wiki styles (private or public) that can be a
journal. Journaling is a wonderful
tool and allows us to be active in small groups or alone.
In my experiences at
the Northampton Community College, in English 1 and 2 distance learning
classes, I encouraged students post 25 wiki discussions for the entire semester
which satisfy the journal aspect of the class by use of three separate but
equal types of discussions available in my class. I encouraged my students to
write cohesively work during our paper 3 project newsletter composed of all my
English students. Present wiki team newsletter via a final posting area upon
completion of all requirements to encourage skills in cooperative learning.
Even if students write alone, they
participated as a team for a class publication on wiki. Students act as
editors, cognitive mappers of ideas within the design of the wiki newsletter,
interpreters of website links, all to demonstrate how strategies to address
visual and special thinking of all class members with different modes and
talents. Students
will gain points for wiki adding editorial commentary on drafts, adding
technical communications with outside experts, forming text, hypertext, and
hypermedia to consider how we as readers act, interact, and think visually with
new and evolving forms and structures. Thank students for participating in online
internet experiences and applaud their efforts.
In
conclusion, I offer more ideas about the healing and rewarding aspects of
journaling in a blog or wiki. Enhance your teaching with designing your own
blog or wiki journal or other writing project to inspire and encourage students
to see writing as a daily and enjoyable task. During the early months of 2009, contemplation and prayer on
the land where I live promoted me to write a diary called Writing between
Rivers, Lehigh, Delaware and Susquehanna, a paradigm for a juvenile fiction
novel called The Passing Light. The
purpose of the journaling was to reveal the writing process and the use of
actual experience to enhance and encourage the literary mind.
I visited special places that inspired me to retain hope as I experienced life changes such as job shifts, illness, and the death of my parents. The land between rivers emerged as a template and voice to tell a story that carries hope. In “The Song of Faith”, Christopher Promuk April 8, 2002 writes: “As a prolific writer of journals, Merton believed in the religious transparency of his own experience. Of this, he writes rather matter-of-factly, “Journals take for granted that every day in our life there is something new and important… Journaling was for him a means of paying attention to the hand of grace in his life and a way of exorcising the ego-demons that kept him from greater love, surrender and prayer. It was a means of participating in his own salvation (Promuk).”
I visited special places that inspired me to retain hope as I experienced life changes such as job shifts, illness, and the death of my parents. The land between rivers emerged as a template and voice to tell a story that carries hope. In “The Song of Faith”, Christopher Promuk April 8, 2002 writes: “As a prolific writer of journals, Merton believed in the religious transparency of his own experience. Of this, he writes rather matter-of-factly, “Journals take for granted that every day in our life there is something new and important… Journaling was for him a means of paying attention to the hand of grace in his life and a way of exorcising the ego-demons that kept him from greater love, surrender and prayer. It was a means of participating in his own salvation (Promuk).”
“Merton’s
journals modeled for me the value of spiritual self-examination. As a teenager
I was wowed by the nakedness of his inner dialogue, watching him discern his
way through the relationships in his life. From the frustrations of living in
community to the solitude of the woods, Merton showed the latent sanctity
within ordinary human struggles. He illuminated nature as a place of revelation
“(Promuk).
References
Egan, K. (1992). Imagination in Teaching and Learning. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Promuk, Christopher. “The Song of Faith.” America, The National Catholic Weekly. http://www.americamagazine.org/content/article.cfm?article_id=1686
Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in Society: The development of higher psychological processes (M. Cole, V. John-Steiner, S. Scribner, & E. Souberman, Eds.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
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