Weblogs are personal web pages written in a chronological order, where entries are made in journal style. They emerged in the past decade as an internet applications genre, providing a platform for the development of critical, individual voices within the context of internet resources.

 From an educational view according to Jo Ann Oravec (2003), weblog consumption has become increasingly popular in higher education contexts as individuals seek ways to locate Web content of quality and relevance to particular topics or themes. He says the character of weblogs as a genre is in part related to collaborative efforts (including the sustained interaction among bloggers in discussion of the genre and critique of each other’s productions). Weblogs can be quite powerful supporting the maintenance of individual voices as well as fostering a sustained social and intellectual interaction that can extend facets of the genre itself. It allows to reflect on the localized evolution of the weblog genre even in the limited context of a University course. They can further play an important role in sense making and assisting student in specific content areas including arts, politics and literature. Weblog genre can help students and faculty experiment with some basic notions about media ecology, presentation of self and social construction of information, as well as speculate about the future of the internet.

Throughout my experience as a student about blogs I have encountered few blogs which have contributed to my knowledge not that much. I thought they were for people who wanted to be popular or for intellectuals who wanted to promote their articles. Weblogs are not popular that much when compared with other social networks like Facebook and Whats App this is all because of people tend to think that weblogs are too formal and strict.

The effective use of blogs can be improved by making students to be aware of their importance, for example educators should at least to give students topics, which they can write about, encourage debates and avoid using blogs just for delivering a task about a certain content. Blogs should be seen as one of the valuable opportunities for learning. When students have access to this information, they develop an awareness of their learning, and are more easily able to recognize mistakes and eventually develop strategies for tackling weak points themselves.

References

Oravec, J.A. Journal of Computing in Higher Education Spring (2003) Vol. 14(2). 21-44.