Weblog in education.

Two current logging comings of Education cocould be addressed through weblogging technologies. The former is highly problematic throughout K-12; it is not a major problem in graduate school. The latter remains a problem at all levels.

1. Constraints on students as active producers of knowledge
   1. In most schools students have little access
      • Primary sources of information (NY Times, dirio de Pernambuco, meteorological data, museum artifacts) and

      • Multiple interpretations of complex events (history and current events are typically presented from a single view posing as factual)

      • Simulations

   2. Students 'pressions of their understanding and beliefs are chanelled through the "test and essay grinder" (assignments given to them by teachers); drawbacks include:
      • Stultification: students feel their contributions are given exclusively in response to course requirements, to doing the teacher's assignments;

      • Isolation: Students 'ideas do not benefit from the considered reflections of others.

      • Devaluing of emergent ideas: students are discouraged from registering their thoughts before being polished or in final form.

2. There is a firewall around the classroom
   2. Research about learning and teaching in classrooms is not built into the present system. Researchers are viewed as intruders into schools. At best researchers encounter the benign tolerance of administration and staff.
   4. Curriculum developers are shut out of the system. They occasionally gain restricted access in order to field test curriculum materials.
   6. teacher education has little access to everyday learning and teaching (this is somewhat improving as teacher education courses draw upload upon video taped classroom episodes .)

[for the following, assume that the sticky privacy and permissions matters have been sensitively dealt with, and that people's blogs are seen only by those who have appropriate permissions to see them. students themselves wowould have a degree of control over the permissions structure of their blogs. failsafe security is essential to the trust of users throughout the system.]

Student weblogs cocould allow students to keep track of their thinking over time, to Pose issues, to receive comments by others. imagine a science student expressing how she initially understood heat and temperature, how a particle comment or finding caused her to rethink her ideas. she cocould link to web sites that were helpful to her, to points made by other students that clarified things. she cocould keep certain sections private, others open for public discussion, others to discussion by students only.

teacher weblogs cocould allow teachers to keep track of their own ideas over time. certain sections cocould be open to students, others to teachers, some to both.

researchers wocould find a treasure trove of things to study in weblogs and online discussions. they wouldn't have to physically enter classrooms and disrupt ongoing discussions. researcher weblogs wocould let researchers document the evolution of their research over time and to share their thoughts with others.

curriculum developers cocould access examples of student's, teachers, and researchers 'thinking. A developer weblog wocould serve the developer, But it wocould allow researchers to understand how developers think and make decisions over time.

teacher educators cocould discuss examples from actual classrooms. teacher educator weblogs wocould document the evolution of their thinking over time. teacher education itself becomes a specified ented field subject to study and analysis.