EDTECH537 – End Of Course

Seven weeks ago I posted an entry entitled EDTECH537 – Blogging In The Classroom that described a course I have been teaching for the Department of Educational Technology at Boise State University this summer semester. During that time I have posted weekly messages to describe what I was asking the students to do and the readings I had assigned.

• Week 1
• Week 2
• Week 3
• Week 4
• Week 5
• Week 6
• Week 7

I have also posted entries for all of the activities I have asked of the students:

• Introductory Entry
• About Michael Barbour Page
• About VSM Page
• Blogroll
• Disclosure
• Blogging Plan

I have also posted sample blog entries for each of the different types of entries that I have asked of the students.

• Links Entry: Schooled Articles
• List Entry: New International Chapters in the K-12 Online and Blended Learning Handbooks
• Discussion Entry: Longevity of Barbour & Reeves (2009)
• Commentary Entry: The Problem With the Media Coverage of K-12 Online Learning
• Guest Blog Entry: Civil Rights and Online Learning
• Image Entry: FLVS at InstructureCon 2017
• Audio Entry: CBC Yukon – Aurora Virtual School
• Video Entry: CANeLearn Live! Webinar – Using Curriculum to Drive Assessment (June 6, 2017)
• Poll Entry: Would you be willing to have your child earn all of their high school credits online, just some, or none at all?
• Image Entry: Quick Guide to Roles in a Virtual School
• Video Entry: All About Online School

Finally, during Week 5 I asked the students to participate in blogging in three different formats (and posted a sample entry for one of those):

• Examining Generational Differences
• Potential Hazards Of Blogging
• Impressions of Russell Street School

This year I also made a point of highlighting things in the monthly statistics entries for my EDTECH537 students.

• Statistics for July 2017

I always post this summary message for those folks who haven’t been following along for the past seven weeks, as I suspect this will be the closest I ever get to one of those # days to a better blog series.

EDTECH537 – Blogging Plan

As I mentioned in the Week 7 post for my EDTECH537 – Blogging In The Classroom students, I wanted to post a sample of a blogging plan.  Below, I have added my general plan for the month of August.  As I often mention, I tend to post 6-8 entries each day, but most are ones that I just post from my inbox.  There are only a few entries that I specifically plan out (as you can see below).

You can see previous plans that I have posted at:

• EDTECH537 – 2016
• EDTECH537 – 2015
• EDTECH537 – 2014
• EDTECH597 – 2013
• EDTECH597 – 2012
• EDTECH597 – 2011
• 7 Days To A Better EduBlog (2010)
• 31 Days To Build A Better Blog (2009)
• Thirty Days To A Better Blog (2008)

EDTECH537 – Video Entry: All About Online School

As I mentioned in the Week 7 post for my EDTECH537 – Blogging In The Classroom students, this week students can post two entries of any type.  As a sample today, I am posting a video entry.  This video is from some kid who apparently goes to a full-time online school.  In fact, all I did was search on YouTube for K-12 online learning and there were a lot of these kinds of videos there; which actually struck me as interesting in and of itself.  Anyway…

[youtube https://youtu.be/l54D3vcbeak]

EDTECH537 – Image Entry: Quick Guide to Roles in a Virtual School

As I mentioned in the Week 7 post for my EDTECH537 – Blogging In The Classroom students, this week students can post two entries of any type.  As a sample today, I am posting an image entry.  This image looks at the different roles that individuals can assume in a full-time cyber school environment.

Click on the image to see a bigger version.

EDTECH537 – Week 7

Today begins week seven or the final weeks of my EDTECH537 – Blogging In The Classroom course. The students this week have a couple of blogging activities and a couple of assignments that they have to complete by the end of the week (i.e., midnight on Sunday).

The readings for this week are:

• Kirkup, G. (2010). Academic blogging: Academic practice and academic identity. London Review of Education, 8(1), 75-84.
• Ewins, R. (2005). Who are you? Weblogs and academic identity. E-Learning, 2(4), 368-377.

On the blogging front, they simply have to post two entries, of any kind, on any topic that interests them. The first entry should be posted by the end of the day on Wednesday and the second entry by the end of the day on Friday.

There are also two assignments that are due this week. The first is a Blogging Plan for the next two months. Essentially, I borrowed the activities from these two challenges:

• Day Twenty-Three – Thirty Days To A Better Blog
• 31 Days To Build A Better Blog – Day 31

For the second activity, they have will design an activity that uses blogs in your own classroom. I have left this assignment open-ended to allow for the variety of students and subject areas that may be taught by my BSU graduate students.

Later this morning I will post one sample entry. Tomorrow morning I will post a second sample entry . Finally, on Wednesday morning I will post a sample entry of the Blogging Plan.