Using Blogging as a Learning Tool

With the increased interest in introducing digital literacy skills in the classroom as a means of preparing students for the 21st century marketplace, our teaching and learning center has had more questions from faculty about using blogs as a teaching tool. The Innovative Instructor doesn’t advocate using technology for technology’s sake, but student blogging can be a way to achieve several learning outcomes for your course.

Diagram of interactions: Student Blogs-Classroom-Comments

CC Jeff Utecht: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jutecht/

For example, blogs can be used to improve student writing, especially for developing skill in analysis and critique. The blog format is particularly useful for shorter, less formal, assignments. Blog platforms allow for inclusion and display of multimedia, which may offer an advantage over paper submissions. Blogs provide a means for student response to or discussion of outside-of-class readings that are not adequately covered during class. They can be useful as a forum for group projects, or act as a collaborative authoring tool for students to develop and present a group assignment or project.  Blogs can be a place where students reflect on readings, much as analog journaling was used as a pedagogical tool in the past.

In order to achieve your curricular goals you could use individual student blogs (each student has his or her own blog), group blogs for team projects, or a class blog to which everyone contributes.

The Innovative Instructor gathered some tips for ensuring that implementing blogs in your class will be a success.

The most comprehensive advice comes from the Chronicle of Higher Education’s Professor Hacker blog columnist Mark Sample (assistant professor of literature and new media at George Mason University) in a somewhat tongue in cheek commentary entitled A Better Blogging Assignment.  Sample claims to be sick of student blogging, but then goes on to provide very useful guidelines for different ways of using blogs as a pedagogical tool. In fact, Sample is looking “for ways to re-invigorate [his] blogging assignments.” He outlines methods for structuring blog assignments using all of the course blog types (individual, group, class), and recommends having a schedule or assignments for posting and commenting. He advises being detailed in your expectations and provides this example of student guidelines:

Each student will contribute to the weekly class blog, posting an approximately 200-300 word response to the week’s readings. There are a number of ways to approach these open-ended posts: consider the reading in relation to its historical or theoretical context; write about an aspect of the day’s reading that you don’t understand, or something that jars you; formulate an insightful question or two about the reading and then attempt to answer your own questions; or respond to another student’s post, building upon it, disagreeing with it, or re-thinking it.

Read the post and the comments and don’t be disheartened by Sample’s momentary discouragement with ways in which he is using blogging assignments.

From the Georgetown University blog Initiative on Technology-Enhanced Learning – Engaging Students through Blogs in Large Classes comes this idea.

For his introductory course on the U.S. political system, which enrolls nearly 150 students, Mark Rom turned to a course blog to help stimulate class discussion and personal interaction among students. Because class discussion can be intimidating in such a large course, Rom decided to integrate a course blog into his curriculum in order to ensure that all students had the opportunity to engage in meaningful discussion about American politics.

As a side note, instructors should consider making blog participation a percentage of the grade to encourage student use.

Course blogs are often thought of as a way to provide an authentic learning experience. And yet the product often falls short of the promise. Read Using Blogs in a College Classroom: What’s Authenticity Got To Do With It? by Sarah Lohnes,  a doctoral candidate at the Teachers College of Columbia University. She cites the following “necessary ingredients” for creating effective class blogs:

  1. Blog posts should be original, “well-crafted,” “well- informed”.
  2. [There should be] an authentic purpose for maintaining the blog.
  3. A blog should offer a window into the author’s identity and community affiliations.
  4. A blog should take advantage of the medium to offer a sense of immediacy and intimacy.

Faculty have shared some lessons learned from experience with course blogs. Hillary Miller, Baruch College of CUNY, in her post Lessons from a First-Time Course Blogger talks about the “out of sight, out of mind syndrome” noting that “the blog can feel like that side dish you ordered but weren’t quite hungry for. It’s easy to lose track of the blog, and its implementation should be planned with an eye towards avoiding this. “… I had good intentions – I wanted to comment on posts frequently, but commenting is time-consuming…. From the student side, they were assigned a date for one post; once students posted, they didn’t have a strong incentive to return, which would leave me begging them to “visit the blog!” when I myself was embarrassingly behind on reading their old posts.” In other words, set specific expectations for students’ blog assignments and for how often you will grade or comment on their posts.

Miller writes that students not always comfortable with new-to-them instructional technologies and methodologies. She suggests “[m]aking some class time available to teach students the rhyme and reason behind some aspects of the blog is arguably essential, and yet somehow easy to overlook.” Letting students know why you are having them blog is a key to successful implementation.

Finally, what platform should you use? Here at Johns Hopkins, we have Blackboard, which has a built in blogging tool that can be customized for individual or group work and can be made private (between instructor and individual or group) or public – in the sense of being available for the entire class – not to the outside world. Course blogs, where all students contribute to a shared blog, are also an option. Other Learning Management Systems (LMS) offer similar tools. If you are looking for a more “authentic” experience or don’t have an LMS or blogging application at your institution, there are free, public options available. WordPress and Google’s Blogger are two popular ones. WordPress, in particular, offers the ability to easily create a full-fledged website. For facilitating multimedia assignments, tumblr might be a good choice. If you want more options, Six Revisions ( a website with useful information for web developers and designers) offers a list and descriptions of the Top Ten Free Online Blogging Platforms.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources


Image Source: CC Jeff Utecht,  http://www.flickr.com/photos/jutecht/

2013 GSI Symposium Breakout Session 4: Student Engagement in Curriculum Development

A Report from the Trenches

We’re continuing with our reports from the JHU Gateway Sciences Initiative (GSI) 2nd Annual Symposium on Excellence in Teaching and Learning in the Sciences.  Next up is “Student Engagement in Curriculum Development: School of Medicine Medical Education Concentration” presented by Sarah Clever, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Assistant Dean for Student Affairs, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and her students Mark Fisher JHSoM ’14, Sara Fuhrhop, JHSoM ’14, Nikhil Jiwrajka, JHSoM ’15, and Eric Sankey, JHSoM ’15.

Please note that links to examples and explanations in the text below were added by CER staff and were not included in the breakout session presentation.

Dr. Clever identified physicians as having distinct roles as teachers as they interact with their peers, trainees, and patients. As well, graduates from the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine (JHSoM) often pursue careers in academic medicine. Specific training in medical education significantly enhances physicians’ skills as educators.

Based on an online needs assessment survey she conducted of 306 JHSoM students in June 2011 (86 responded), Dr. Clever felt that there was substantial student interest in the implementation of a medical education track including didactic teaching in medical education, hands-on curriculum design with a faculty mentor and evaluation of that curriculum, as well as presentation at a national meeting and or scholarly publication.

Nationally, clinician-educator tracks for residents and faculty are growing in popularity, but Student-as-Teacher programs for medical students are less common. The schools that have such programs include the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (Distinction in Medical Education), University of Rochester (Medical Education Pathway), University of Chicago (Medical Education Track), University of Texas at San Antonio (MD with Distinction in Medical Education Program), and Stanford (Foundation in Medical Education). These institutions provided inspiration in developing the JHSoM program, and the discussions with medical students from these institutions about the strengths and weaknesses of their programs were particularly helpful.

The JHSoM Medical Education Concentration (MEC) started with a pilot in the fall of 2011 (for JHSoM Class of 2014 students) and opened formally for application to JHSoM class of 2015 students in May (at JHU, student self- select into this option). There are 20 participants in the first year. The Medical Education Concentration students apply in the 2nd half of the first year.  The second year is spent in a fall seminar series and on developing a curriculum module.  This is done individually in conjunction with a faculty member. Year three, they implement and obtain feedback. In year four the module is implemented a second time.  By the end of the program, students will create an original teaching module in the clinical or preclinical curriculum; collaborate with a faculty mentor using evidence-supported curriculum development methods; and implement and evaluate their module and teaching performance. The overarching goal of the JHSoM program is to teach students critical curriculum design and teaching skills.

The fall seminar series is taught by JHU faculty and includes topics such as: adult learning theory, conducting a needs assessment, writing quality goals and objectives, choosing educational methods, technology in education, constructing an effective PowerPoint presentation, small group facilitation, eliciting, giving, and receiving feedback, and learner and curriculum evaluation methods.

Some of the pilot cohort teaching modules were:

  • Conducting a follow up visit with chronic disease patients in the Longitudinal Clerkship
  • Conducting a well-child visit with pediatric patients in the Longitudinal Clerkship
  • Developing oral presentation skills in the Longitudinal Clerkship
  • Incorporating inter-professional education modules into the Pediatrics Clerkship
  • Surgical skills education for first year medical students.

Refinements to the Medical Education Concentration in the second year have included some changes to the seminar series, integration with other SoM education initiatives, and improving MEC infrastructure (i.e., Blackboard components used for the MEC).

In the future, Dr. Clever hopes to develop a system to track students’ project progress, create a handbook for MEC leadership, work on pre-assessment for prospective participants, and to collaborate with similar programs at other institutions.

Dr. Clever’s presentation ended with these questions for discussion among the breakout session participants:

  1. How can student involvement in curriculum development benefit the Gateway Sciences?
  2. What are the implications of undergraduate student involvement in teaching and/or curriculum development for courses that are already well established?
  3. How can we better involve students in the learning process?

The discussion centered on transferring this experience to the Gateway Sciences Initiative.  Although participants did not feel that freshman and sophomore students would be able to effectively have a role in curriculum design, peer-teaching or developing focused instructional modules could help an upperclassman to gain a greater understanding of a concept or to understand its application to higher level courses.

The consensus was that these SoM medical education concentration students could be role models for pre-med students.  They also could provide insight to faculty teaching undergraduates about the skills needed in medical school (at least the JHU model).  Everyone agreed this was a session that showed how cross- University collaboration could benefit all involved.

For more on the development and implementation of the MEC program see Dr. Sarah Clever’s presentation for the Johns Hopkins Medicine Institute for Excellence in Education Grand Rounds, March 14, 2012: Learners to Educators: Development  and Implementation of a Medical Education Curriculum [JHED ID required].

Many thanks to Melissa West for providing The Innovative Instructor with the notes she took during this session.

Macie Hall, Senior Instructional Designer
Center for Educational Resources


Image Source: Dr. Sarah Clever

 

2013 GSI Symposium Breakout Session 3: Flipping the Classroom

A Report from the Trenches

We’re continuing with our reports from the JHU Gateway Sciences Initiative (GSI) 2nd Annual Symposium on Excellence in Teaching and Learning in the Sciences. Next up is “Flipping the Classroom: How to Do It Conceptually and Technologically” presented by Michael Falk, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Material Sciences and Engineering  and Brian Cole, Senior Information Technology Specialist, Center for Educational Resources.

Please note that links to examples and explanations in the text below were added by CER staff and were not included in the breakout session presentation.

Instructor with students at computers

For the past several years Professor Michael Falk has “flipped” his course EN.510.202 –Computation and Programming for Materials Scientists and Engineers.  [See the recent Innovative Instructor post on Flipping Your Class.] The purpose of Falk’s class is to teach algorithm development and programming in the context of materials science and engineering.  The class size ranges between 20 and 30 students, and Professor Falk has one Teaching Assistant for the class.

Professor Falk outlined the logistics for the students taking the course. They are required to watch a video of a lecture-style presentation he has posted on his Blackboard course site, and then take a quiz on the content presented in the podcast, before coming to class. The quizzes ensure that the students will watch the lecture and are held accountable for the information presented. Once in class, Falk has the students engage in an interactive experience, such as writing a mini-program, based on the material from the presentation. He noted that he has not found making the podcasts difficult, but creating in-class active learning experiences for his students has been more challenging. He spends a great deal of time developing in-class exercises that will build cumulatively. He also wants students to be able to get enough from the classroom activity to continue work on their own.

For assessment purposes he has students take a survey at the beginning of the semester and at the end of the semester to determine learning gains. Preliminary data indicate that the class increases the ability of students to program, that students showed increased perception in their abilities, as well as an increased intention to use programming in the future.

Brian Cole discussed and demonstrated the technology behind the flipped classroom.  Falk uses the software application ClassSpot, which allows students to share their work on the classroom’s main projection screen, to edit common code during class.  Cole described using Audacity, Adobe Connect, Adobe Presenter, and QuickTime on Macs to create the video recordings.  He mentioned that a faculty member could also use an appropriate pre-recorded lecture from a trusted source. Falk uses ScreenFlow to make his presentations; however, Johns Hopkins does not have a license for this software. Adobe Captivate is another possibility. It is very powerful but has a steeper learning curve.

The follow questions were raised and answered during the session:

Q – Could this method be used to flip a few modules as opposed to the entire course?
A – Undergrads don’t like change, so it would probably be better to do the whole course.

Q – Can students watch the podcasts over and over?
A – Yes.

Q – Where is the textbook in all of this? Could you replace your podcasts with readings from a textbook?
A – There are reading assignments in addition to the videos. In my experience, students prefer a human face, a talking head, over reading a textbook.

Q – How do students reach you if class time is dedicated to working on problems?
A – I encourage students to use the class Blackboard discussion board. [Note: The flipped class structure  doesn’t prevent students from talking to the faculty member, and Falk also has office hours.]

Q – Did you scale back student work [outside of class] since more time spent watching podcasts?
A – Yes – most of the traditional homework is done in class.

Q – Are there tests?
A – Yes.

Q- How important are quizzes to making the flipped course work?
A – Very important. Students are very grade oriented so having quizzes, tests, and exams matters. Quizzes are great motivators for getting students to watch the videos.

Amy Brusini, Course Management Training Specialist
Center for Educational Resources


Image Source: Microsoft Clip Art