From the “Throwing it Out There to See What Sticks Department” here are some very raw thoughts about the various types of Weblog posts for teachers and students and where they fit on our very indistinct blogging scale:

– Posting assignments. (Not blogging)
– Journaling, i.e. “This is what we did today.” (Not blogging)
– Posting links (Not blogging)
– Links with descriptive annotation, i.e. “This site is about…” (Not really blogging either, but getting close depending on the depth of the description.)
– Links with analysis that gets into the meaning of the content being linked. (A simple form of blogging.)
– Reflective, meta-cognitive writing on practice without links. (Complex writing, but simple blogging, we think. Commenting would probably fall in here somewhere.)
– Links with analysis and synthesis that articulates a deeper understanding or relationship to the content being linked and written with potential audience response in mind. (Real blogging)
– Extended analysis and synthesis over a longer period of time that builds on previous posts, links and comments. (Complex blogging)

We’re sure there’s more, and we’re sure others have been here already in some form. Peter’s post has really gotten us thinking about the two things that we think make Weblogs such an interesting teaching tool: an easy platform for constructivist learning and instruction, and the potential of a greatly expanded interested audience against which to test ideas and learning.

And that’s what our brain keeps coming back to over and over and over again, how much MORE blogging potentially offers our students over the traditional idea-draft-revise-done model that we give our kids. We’ve always hated that idea that writing ENDS. It doesn’t. This post, the last post, the first post are all done FOR NOW, and when you blog, the ideas and the feelings usually end up rearing their heads down the road in some new, hopefully more evolved form. They don’t get put into some dust-collecting folder (or should we say folder icon) never to be heard from again. They stay alive, Google-able, and out there for people to read and respond to a week, a month, or a year from now. (It always amazes us when we get a comment on something we wrote long ago. But it usually reminds us of something important, which then becomes a new post…)

But our kids need this, almost as much (if not more) than they need to write those phony essays about abortion, gun control and lowering the drinking age (which, by the way, we have read hundreds (if not thousands) of each.) They need to be analytical and engaged in topics that mean something to them. We’ve seen it happen. So has Peter, and Anne and many others. That’s what makes this all so cool.