With the advent of the internet and its use in almost every household across the globe, learning has become interesting and fun. You can now get anything you want with just a few clicks, unlike the previous years when you had to search for books relating to the information that you are looking for and it could take ages to get that.
The internet has given education a new and interesting dimension altogether. Just like wiki, podcast and other sites, the different blogs can also be used in the classroom environment by children as a useful tool for communication and to keep a link between the study groups of different classes or even schools, and even maintain a diary entry.
If the blogs are effectively used, they can very well create a wonderful learning environment which could possibly extend to a level that is beyond the traditional school.
How Blogs are Useful in the Classrooms
The blogs provide the school children with various educational benefits. Students find the blogs to be highly motivating. This is the reason why all students enjoy working on the blogs and participating in them. A blog also provides the students with excellent opportunities for writing and reading.
Furthermore, the blogs have proved to be an effective forum for discussion and collaboration. Finally, they are regarded as a powerful tool for enabling mentoring or scaffolding learning.
How Blogs are Effective in Education
Blogs tend to provide the students with 4 basic functions:
They provide the students and teachers with a space for developing their writing and other skills and provide an advantage with an immediate audience. The teachers have the facility of providing the students with instructional tips that can be benefitted by the students who can practice and take full advantage. Online mentoring also becomes quite easy through blogs. The students also have the privilege of participating in the different learning activities which can enhance their skills effectively and in an interesting way.
The classroom blogs tend to serve as portals and foster the learner community. They are quite easy to develop and also can be updated efficiently. They could also be used as a tool to inform the students about the requirements of the class, post handouts, homework assignments, notices and also an answer board.
The class blog opens up plenty of opportunity for the students to discuss the various topics outside the classroom. With the help of such blogs, every student has the opportunity to share his/her views and opinions. The students also have excellent opportunities to reflect and react to each other’s blog posts. The teachers could also form a group of intellectuals for guiding the students and discussing different blog posts.
The blogs tend to present, protect and organize the student’s work as a digital portfolio. The older entries can be archived too, making it easier to develop the skills and analyze the progress of the individual. The students also tend to produce better skills in writing as they realize that their efforts will be published.
Thus, education through blogs imparts much more motivation to the students and they find the digital way of learning quite intriguing compared to the boredom of classroom lectures.
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