Welcome!

If you are in my EDS 310 course welcome to my blog. For anyone else feel free to read and comment as well. EDS 310 students are creating blogs and using them to comment on other blogs issued by teachers, professors and policy wonks who write about education issues. The goal of this exercise is to introduce teacher candidates to a powerful form of digital communication and get them to start thinking about how blogging can help them develop as educators and give them ideas as to how they may use blogs in their own teaching or personal lives.

Some may say that blogs are full of partisan commentary and unreliable or irresponsible opinions. These critics would be correct. But my observation is that blogs also provide a useful tool for getting at perspectives that the mainstream media fail to embrace or refuse to embrace. They are also a useful way of communicating with other people who share the same interests but not necessarily the same opinions. Issuing a blog and receiving comments are a great way of getting feedback on your ideas (if you can get anyone to follow your blog).

This assignment is experimental. I am looking for an effective way of getting my students to analyze current events in education but also, I want them to learn to engage each other in a meaningful manner. It is important that we recognize that there is not a consensus on issues involving education and that these issues are complex and that it takes many years to develop a mature perspective on what is best in educational practices. My hope is that reading and possibly writing blogs can help facilitate that process.