Blogs and FYC

Tyron, Charles. “Writing and Citizenship: Using Blogs to Teach First-Year Composition.” Pedagogy  6.2 (2006): 128-132. Web. 19 May 2012.

This article discusses one instructor’s use of blogs in an FYC course. The article is begins by stating that his particular goal is "for students to take charge of their writing, to provide them with a sense that writing matters” and makes the claim that blogs have the ability to do this. He has assigned different blog activities in different FYC classes that focus on both reading and writing blog for the purpose of rhetorical and critical analysis. He argues that by directing students to a variety blogs that are politically charged and having them analyze them, he allowed his students to consider issues of citizenship, argumentation and audience. While it’s not something that can be created on the fly, Tyson was lucky enough to have several of the bloggers that his students were reading begin to interact with his students. These outcomes have helped his students to take charge of their writing by giving them their own writing space and allowing them to form opinions on the writing of others, but at the same time provide a sense that writing matters because of the public nature of the blog.

I chose this article in particular because I use blogs in my online classroom, and I’ve used them a few different ways at this point, but still feel that I’m floundering in my use of them in a FYC class. Each semester, I consider removing them as a required part of the course because I don’t want to create busy work and question the value, but the students (in their end of semester reflections) all claim the blog to be their favorite part of the course because they’ve learned about audience. Right now, I require an “informative researched blog” and have found that the results are much like Tysons: my students own their writing and appreciate audience (even the small audience of the classroom-I used to require Blogger, but tech issues and anxiety made me move it into Blackboard). The blog, its pedagogical implications, and the “how and why” are things I’m still struggling with; however, Tyson’s article will help me rethink my approach as well as guide me (with his references page) to other sources for both support and reproach for using this tool.