Engaging students in the curriculum through the use of blogs; how and why?

This paper presents an academic case for the use of blogs in higher education, and some key considerations for those planning and designing blogging activities in an HE setting. Focusing on the roles of action/activity and experience, reflection and community in learning, this paper suggests how the blogging process can engage students and enhance learning, and how specific features of blogs might be used to bring maximum benefit to the learner

Weblog For Teachers And Students

Educators are always looking for interesting and innovative ways in which to improve the communications skills of their students and in communicating with their students. This is even more important when the students are studying online. Weblogs, originally a simple web browser based system for updating websites, have developed into powerful web based content management systems, capable of acting as a platform for learning that can accelerate the development of expertise learner behaviour. There is a trend to utilize the benefits of the e-learning as a mechanism to improve learning performance of campus-based students. Whilst traditional methods, such as face-to-face lectures, tutorials, and mentoring, remain dominant in the educational sector, universities are investing heavily in learning technologies, to facilitate improvements with respect to the quality of learning. This study explores into the role of weblogs in supporting teachers during their teaching practice and the key factors determining their engagement with weblogs. Underlying our study is an integrative approach that puts weblogs alongside with other popular media in use. An online community was intentionally built with weblogs to facilitate reflection and social interaction among dispersed teachers. In parallel, multiple channels of communication were employed for peer interaction of students. Weblogs were perceived as valuable in relieving isolation, documenting their experience, and expressing their personal feelings. This study sustains our conviction that the integrative approach is vital to have a comprehensive picture of interaction among a community. Our study deepens the insights into the distinct benefit of weblogs as educational media and informs the future development of an online community with weblogs. Weblogs provide a chance for students to experience writing in a public space where their work can have real value both for their classmates and for a wider community. This prepares students for a networked world where communication is essential and often social and where writing can have consequences

WEBLOG FOR TEACHERS AND STUDENTS

Educators are always looking for interesting and innovative ways in which to improve the communications skills of their students and in communicating with their students. This is even more important when the students are studying online. Weblogs, originally a simple web browser based system for updating websites, have developed into powerful web based content management systems, capable of acting as a platform for learning that can accelerate the development of expertise learner behaviour. There is a trend to utilize the benefits of the e-learning as a mechanism to improve learning performance of campus-based students. Whilst traditional methods, such as face-to-face lectures, tutorials, and mentoring, remain dominant in the educational sector, universities are investing heavily in learning technologies, to facilitate improvements with respect to the quality of learning. This study explores into the role of weblogs in supporting teachers during their teaching practice and the key factors determining their engagement with weblogs. Underlying our study is an integrative approach that puts weblogs alongside with other popular media in use. An online community was intentionally built with weblogs to facilitate reflection and social interaction among dispersed teachers. In parallel, multiple channels of communication were employed for peer interaction of students. Weblogs were perceived as valuable in relieving isolation, documenting their experience, and expressing their personal feelings. This study sustains our conviction that the integrative approach is vital to have a comprehensive picture of interaction among a community. Our study deepens the insights into the distinct benefit of weblogs as educational media and informs the future development of an online community with weblogs. Weblogs provide a chance for students to experience writing in a public space where their work can have real value both for their classmates and for a wider community. This prepares students for a networked world where communication is essential and often social and where writing can have consequences

Weblog Impact on Organizational Intellectual Capital and Innovative Capabilities

Weblogs have been proposed as a highly effective means for organizations to communicate with customers, suppliers, andemployees. This paper provides a conceptual model of the relationships among weblog use, intellectual capital--thecumulative knowledge resources possessed by organizations-- and both radical and incremental innovative capabilities. Weargue that in enabling the transfer of knowledge, the creation of connections among individuals, and the storage ofrepositories of knowledge, weblogs have become tools that positively impact the three dimensions of intellectual capital--human, social and organizational capital. We also explain how intellectual capital facets are able to differentially affect twotypes of innovative capability

The Interconnected Object: Are You at Home in a Network?

Interconnected devices and objects pervade our everyday lives with an increasing trend. These digital objects, connected through wireless and cable networks, exchange information in various levels, producing diverse types of interactions between them and their users. The paper explores the aspect of interconnectivity as a key-attribute of the contemporary digital artefacts that populate our everyday environments. It explores the notion of home, place and network by focusing on the effects of digital interconnectivity in the way we perceive private and public space. In this context, “HOME network”, a collaborative project, is presented. The project is a portable, netless (without an Internet connection) Wi-Fi network, a free access unlocked digital platform, transmitting within the urban environment of various cities during a series of specific time periods and events. The artists carry the network through space and time, as an unrevealed, private, performative act within the realm of the public urban space, leaving only temporary transmitted digital traces/data within the vicinity of the transmission range, thus producing interactions and exploring the boundaries between the private and the public, the physical and the digital space and challenging the notion of surveillance in urban environments. New action patterns are introduced, which look into new ways of performing the physicality of the body within a digital nomadism. At the same time the artists address themes and invite the visitors of the network to engage, participate in and reflect on commonly shared experiences and contemporary questions regarding our sense of belonging in both the private and the public sphere