What is a Blog?

Wikipedia defines a blog as: "a web-based publication consisting primarily of periodic articles, most often in reverse chronological order." Blogging is the posting of journal-like pages to a website. While these pages can contain photos or media, they are primarily focused on the easy ability to post written thoughts to a website. The postings are organized chronologically. Typically, a blog post can be commented on by others, allowing for a dialogue on a the topic of the post. Teachers and educators have used blogs to allow for what is commonly called "peer review," meaning that students can post writings or assignments to the web, and other students can respond or encourage through the comment feature.In a broader and more educational system, blogs are about communicating. You observe your experience, reflect on it, and then write about it. Other people read your reflections, respond from their perspectives by commenting or writing their own blog article. You read their perspectives, often learn something through their eyes, and write some more.

- Blogging is about reading and writing.
- Literacy is about reading and writing.
- Blogging is about literacy.

ASSIGNMENT
You will create a blog on some aspect of the media. For the duration of the unit (until October 23) your blog will replace your media log entries. You will be asked to contribute three or four entries centred around a theme of your choice (i.e. evaluating your favourite television show, band or website; writing reviews of video games; or exploring how social networking sites such as Facebook or MySpace operate). Your blog can also be a commentary on anything we’ve discussed in class. If you’re having trouble, each week I’ll provide some topics or websites you can visit to get the ball rolling, which you'll be able to find here.

Homework: For Monday, October 1, please prepare a informal paragraph describing a possible theme or topic for your blog. I will return these with feedback and suggestions the following day.

Today's Assignment

Hi everyone! Nice to see you here. Today we'll be continuing work on evaluating websites, and I thought it would be easier to provide the instructions and information on this page. The assignment is just like the one you began completing yesterday, except this time all you'll need to do is click on the following links to open the windows you need.

• The on-line evaluation sheet can be found here (just click on the hightlighted word). This is called a hypertext link.


• The website you will be evaluating is here (clicking this will open it in yet another window).

Take your time viewing the site. Keep the points discussed in class yesterday in mind. (these are the ones that are on the "Criteria for Evaluating Websites" handout).

Do not forget to put your name at the top of the NetCheck form. When you are finished completing all the questions, click the "Show Me My NetCheck Page" button at the bottom. Review your answers before printing the page out.

Two days in.

The first day was the hottest September 25th on record here in Stratford, and if it wasn't it should have been. Closing the blinds to watch the movie meant that the air in the room was stifling, but despite this, the movie was worth watching if only for the historical perspective. It was called "The Roots of the Revolution: Understanding the Internet", and would have been completely mind-blowing in 1994, when it was produced. Viewing it from a distance of 12 years shows just how much things have changed. Those huge hard drives! Text-only newsgroups! Young women with no makeup and frumpy dresses being described as young and hip! And everyone so idealistic, full of awe and wonder at what this new "internet" might achieve. World peace, one even went so far as to say. Yeah, we're definitely at the interweb teen stage by now.

A little history is always useful. I'm reminded of all those past-and-future quotes, like George Orwell's "He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future." We watched the Web 2.0 clip I posted down there at the end of the last entry. Then (since it was on and it was hot and it was close to the end of the last class of the day), I showed a couple of my favourite YouTube clips as well ... David Elsewhere, who landed a job as one of those ipod commercial dancers because this video of him got noticed on YouTube; and Lisa Nova doing Lindsay Lohan. Now she's on MAD TV and gets paid per click for her YouTube sketches. Who exactly is the mass media again?

Today my lesson was 'don't try to accomplish anything in the computer lab for the first time when there are only 30 minutes left in class'. We'll try the evaluating websites activity again tomorrow, when I'll post the excellent site we'll be examining. It's a goodie.

I also got a couple of great emails from students. A large thanks to Hayley for her YouTube suggestions. I've got Lucy's very cool map of the internet on an overhead too, I keep neglecting to put it up. Saving it for a good time, maybe. If by any strange chance you're a student reading this, click "comment" down there and leave a note!

Getting started.

Next week I begin a unit on the internet with the Grade 11 English Media Studies class at Stratford Central Secondary School (taught by the talented Mrs. McConkey). This is my first student teaching placement, and I'm looking forward to the opportunity to teach, work with and learn from these students. But where to start? Many of the ideas buzzing around in my head are eluding capture just yet. I want students to be able to understand the web's history, its impact in the present and where it might be taking us. I want them to be able to analyse many different websites and understand the ways in which different websites construct meaning. In particular, I want to take a good critical look at Facebook, MySpace, YouTube and other on-line communities that have a large teen audience.

As a class, I think that beyond analysing and discussing the internet, we should make a mark on it ourselves. A good place to start is this blog. Every day, a different student will be asked to contribute, writing a summary of what we've been up to in class that includes their own reaction to and opinions about what we've discussed. Every now and then, I'll publish links to what we've been viewing or other sites I think are worth seeing. Hopefully the students will contribute their favourites as well.

To begin, here's this gem:





And another one wondering about what media may be like in the not-too-distant future. Can you tell where the science fiction begins?: