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| Image Credit: High heeled Traveler.blogspot.com |
All courses are ecologies of learning. There is an
interrelationship between each activity in the course – each activity affects
the other. In order to get the most out of online learning I would suggest that
there are three main pillars that should be a part of most courses – especially
in social sciences and the humanities. These three pillars are: (1) Journaling,
(2) Blogging, and (3) Discussion Boards.
I see each of these online activities as being
interrelated and as contributing to different aspects of learning.
Journaling is an intimate activity between the teacher
and the student. When I use the journaling tool for an online learning
platform, such as Blackboard or Desire 2 Learn, I prefer to make those journals
private – just between the teacher and the student. I do not choose the option
where anyone in the class can see another student’s journal. The journal should
help the student to become more aware of his or her process of learning. The
journal should help the student track their own learning process and to take
control over it, rather than waiting for the teacher to orchestrate every
aspect of the student’s learning. Journals should encourage students to think
about themselves as being active learners.
Journal entries also help the teacher to understand how
different students learn. Students should describe the questions that arise as
they engage the content in the course and the steps they have taken to deepen
their understanding of that content. They should especially write about the
mistakes they have made or misimpressions they have had, and what they have
learned in the process of correcting these errors. Often they will conclude
that their assumptions were not entirely wrong, but that they were too limited.
Writing journal entries can help a student understand the limitations of ideas
that they might otherwise apply too broadly and uncritically.
When students have an opinion, or draw a conclusion, it
is useful for them to take the time to use their journals to write about how
they arrived at that opinion or conclusion. What did they base their conclusions
on? What led them to their conclusion? What evidence, examples, or experiences
played a role in their arriving at their conclusions? What doubts or caveats do
they have about the conclusions they have drawn? All of these questions will
lead to powerful material to explore in their journals.
Students will often find that ideas that bubble up in
their journal will lead to better blog posts. They will also find that
interaction on the discussion board will trigger thoughts that they want to
explore more deeply in their journal. The combination of journaling,
blogging, and participation on the discussion board is an interactive process
that allows ideas to feed off of one another.
One of the biggest criticisms of the use of online
learning platforms for instruction, even when they are coupled with instruction
in the classroom, is that they are impersonal and reduce the amount of human
interaction in education. I see writing journal entries as being a way to
counter this problem of impersonality. The communication between the teacher
and the student, in the student’s journal, can be a highly intimate
intellectual experience. The teacher can learn more about how much effort the
student is putting into the course, and how well they understand the key
concepts, than any activity in an actual classroom will reveal. Journaling can
help the teacher to know the student on a deeper level. The feedback that the
teacher provides to the student, through the student’s digital journal, can be
highly personalized and can provide a strong vehicle for individualized
instruction.
However, even though journaling should actually make it
easier for students to do well in a course, and the activity is a highly
effective method of studying, most students see journaling is simply being
additional work they are required to do in order to get through the course. Because
they may not, at first, be motivated to keep good online journals I typically
assign a grade value and a “rubric” for journaling. It usually looks like this:
Journals will be graded based on (1) how well you
identify what you didn't know; (2) the steps you have taken to learn more about
what you didn't know; and (3) further questions that came to you as a result of
the answers you have found. Basically, you should write about your learning
activities as you go through the course. You should have at least one journal
entry for each unit of instruction in this course -- each entry should address
at least one of the three questions listed above. By the end of the course
there should be at least one journal entry for each of those three questions.
I usually suggest that each journal entry should run
approximately 500 words, but because the nature of journaling is exploratory it
is not unusual for entries to be much longer – perhaps 1,000 words – as the
student writes in order to figure out what they want to know, what they want to
say, and how they want to say it.
Good journal entries will show that the student is
thinking and will make me more sympathetic toward the other digital work they
have done in the course.
Because journal entries are records of the internal
process of learning, and they give me insight into the depth of student
engagement, I generally assign 40% of the final grade to journal activity.
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