Blogging has come into view as one of the well-accepted forms of literacy. The simplicity and cost in setting up a blog has raised interesting possibilities to good learning in classrooms.
Its unique nature has not only affected the fact that students can publish and share their work to a big audience, but also to the fact that they perceive themselves as authors.
Blogs have an open architecture. They can be viewed, if preferred, by anyone connected to the Internet. Hence it carries a good amount of audience with it.
Blogging is not a new phenomenon. It has been around for a long and used as a mean for designing hypertexts, online journal, company information etc. But in recent years it has gained standing as a way of literacy.
Blogging can be done either by students or teachers. It can be setup by an individual student, or group of students or sometimes even the whole class.
Reasons for blogging to become a popular form of literacy
- It can contribute to discussions on issues on public sphere all over the world. It has an essence of democracy where one is able to publish his opinions in spite of status and is liberated from traditional gatekeepers.
- Student blogs can be used as a means of connection in the vernacular forms of literacy and academic forms of literacy in the classroom. Students can write for both personal and academic purposes.
- Blogging gives a space outside the classroom for students to work together.
- Bloggers can create text that is used to express students’ own viewpoints as well as used by other students to evaluate or hold their views.
- Students write about their personal experiences which allow them to be more ahead in their vernacular forms of literacy. This form of literacy gives blogger a sense of authority and authorship.
- Blogging promotes a sense of development for social communities. This is important because of the contrasting backgrounds of students.
- Publishing and sharing personal information in blogs can be a way to overcome all barriers where students feels isolated.
- Students can learn to merge their own ideas.
- Blogging can help to create social communities where readers and writers can interact.
Blogs are more than software tools. Blogging can be a form of literacy, and it is valued as what we call a “literacy act.”
