I found the blog to be a great tool to express my opinion and thoughts. When looking back on class I think the things I'll take with me will be the blogs and class activity. It is true that we have to know the definitions but I find the blog and the group activities to be much more practical in the day after. First the blog will be up and I will always be able to look back and read what I wrote or what score I got on the DISC test.
I definitly think this tool should stay the upcoming classes.
The blog also gave me a chance to know people outside of class. Since I come to class directly from work and right after I have another class I don't really have an oppurtunity to speak with other class mates. Through the responses I gave and that people left on my blog I got to know a few people and started to say them at least "hello" when I get to class.
After responding to some students and read their replies I could guess there score at the DISC even without looking at the score. After a few blog assignments I picked five blogs that I constantly replied to because I really liked the style.
I truely think the blog accomplished the goals the Proffessor tried to achieve.
It was engaging,challanging at times and fun at the same time
The only annoying part is to keep track of all the responses but given the fact it is 20% of the grade it is not too much to ask :)
I completely agree with you. Blogging was a great tool to communicate with fellow students and to learn a lot more about them. It was also a better way to learn and retain the information we learned in class. As someone who really doesn't raise my hand in class, it gave me the opportunity to speak out and give my opinions. I think that other classes should begin to use blogging rather then papers because in the end I believe blogging is a more efficient and engaging tool.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that it was a great way to keep the class in our minds. We can always look back a few months from now or even years and see who we have communicated with in this class and about what we have done. You are right about increasing the interaction between the students, although not all of us have become the best of friends we at least say hello to each other, which I can not say for a lot of my other classes.
ReplyDeleteYou right. I think that the things I'll remember from this class will be the blogs and class activities too. For example, building an egg protector devise in a class activity and then writing about it were the best way to learn the concept of planning and organizing. That exercise really gave us an idea about how to organize our recourses and plan critically in order to achieve our goals.
ReplyDeleteI think that the fact that it was 20% of our grade definitely made it easier to motivate yourself to put comments, but I also felt that keeping track was kind of a pain in the #@$. However, that being said, this was an effective tool and it was an overall good experience.
ReplyDeleteFor me the most important aspect is the sense of teamwork and community. The Community helps me get motivate to work harder, and by connecting with the other students makes the learning environment more conducive. Inherently these are extremely important and positive. This kind of homework assignment is a thousand times more valuable than anything Whily plus could ever provide. Yet, I feel that as writing assignments go I got very little out of it when it came to the academic points of the class. I get more value out of more academic papers like the one I will write for the Essay on the Final. I relise I get more out of it perhaps becaues it is graded and I put forth much greater effort. Which leads me open to the argument that I could put forth greater effort in the blogs, and find more value in them, but there will be nine in total and there blogs not research papers.
ReplyDeleteYou are right that I have gotten more academic value out of it than I let on. Plus all the other aspects of the class blogging together that gives it value. Value that its hard to argue with. I am just mentioning that in someway I found it to be frustrating that I was doing homework that did not prepare me for the test.
If not for learning, at the very least blogging allowed for communication among the students. I found it to be more effective than standing before class and introducing yourself. Besides you can always think over the topic we studied and then post a response that perhaps you couldn't think of in class.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with you. The blog is something that is going to stay with us for a while. Not because of the fact that the blog will still be up and we can see it years later, which is true. But because these blogs helped reitterate the lessons to us and thus we relearned what already learned that day.
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