Wikiversity:Colloquium/archives/December 2006/Learning Blogs

Learning Blogs

Yes, no? I'm seeing them start to pop up, and I remember blogs have been used as educational purposes. However, there is a huge potential for abuse. If we keep them, we might want to set up some guideline about what can and cannot be posted about.--Rayc 20:29, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I think we need to be supportive of all types of communication that are intended to support the learning goals of Wikiversity participants. Wikipedia has been able to limp along with simple discussion pages, but discussions and commentaries can be an integral part of Wikiversity main namespace content. If we are serious about the importance of using the power of wiki-based collaboration to support learning, we need participants to be communicative about their personal learning goals, frustrations, plans and wiki-based activities. --JWSchmidt 22:32, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I think that there is a place, and perhaps even a need, for so-called learning blogs. For instance, it is an integral part of the Learning to learn a wiki way project. I would guess that many blogs like this would evolve away from the standard blog format or wiki discussion format into something that is more unique to wikiversity. What kind of abuse are you concerned about?

Knew there was a reason that people seemed to be doing them similar --Rayc 23:22, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I think learning blogs are a fantastic idea - in my view, the more reflective we become, the better we can understand our learning, as well as our impact on others' learning. People can start their blogs within this limited Mediawiki format (and it is no harm if people are critical, just possibly not excessively disruptive*), or they can start a blog elsewhere, and link to it from Wikiversity - both of which options are being pursued at the moment... Cormaggio ^talk 19:19, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

* Hmm, this possibly needs to be defined somehow - do we need a policy on blogs? Or is this against their very raison d'etre? Cormaggio ^talk 19:19, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

No doubt Wikiversity should be represented upon the "Blogosphere" as they call it, but I think this Colloquium is the key. As a learning community, we have a centralized discussion here that a lot of blog sites would die (or kill) for. What frustrates me about blogs is that they consume time and effort many times for no useful purpose (except maybe to vent) and it's difficult to find things I'm looking for.

The flexibility of the University context allows things like opinion, especially here in the colloquium and on talk pages, plus there is room for original research, collective reflection, essays, question and answer sessions and a myriad of other communicative activities. The neat thing (neat as in tidy) is that a university context facilitates organization and topical relevance like no other structure can. Topical disscusions are right there "beside" the topics covered. As Wikiversity grows (in quality and quantity) topics and subjects should become easier to find. Furthermore, people can actually assosiate and relate to one another as they learn to learn.

So, How does this Colloquium and the cumulative "Talk:o:sphere" at Wikiversity differ from a "Blog" (weblog)? I think we have it all! CQ 13:23, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

I very much agree with what Charley says above, but I also think that personal blogs are a vital way for each one of us to keep a record of our personal thoughts and feelings about what's going on from our perspective on Wikiversity. The Colloquium serves a crucial purpose, but people are not going to detail the minutiae of their personal thoughts on the Colloquium - that's more of what personal blogs are for. So, I think all of these things can work in tandem with eachother - to continue to develop Wikiversity into a collaborative, reflective, learning community. Cormaggio ^talk 15:26, 29 December 2006 (UTC)