September 02, 2004
Blogging Students
The course on chivalry that I'm assisting with this semester requires the students to choose either a web-based project, a paper, or debates. Why anyone would choose anything but the debates is beyond me, since those are, by far, the ones requiring the least amount of work. That said, the professor, aware of my IT background, asked me to come up with some ideas for the web project. I suggested a group blog where the students will take on the personae of various medieval knights and ladies. At least once a week they'll post entries detailing either their adventures or thoughts in ways that are both historically accurate and reflective of some principles of chivalry. I'm actually pretty excited to see how it turns out as the content will be entirely out of my hands and the form seems somewhat experimental to me. I'm certain there are other class blogs out there, but this particular incarnation, if not original seems at least unique. About 25 students chose to do the blog project, so it should be a very active one as well. Once it's up I'll post the link so you can all follow the experiment if you want. Maybe I should start handing out grades to my fellow bloggers here to motivate more posts. Of course, considering how lax I've been lately, I'd probably get no better than a gentleman's C myself.
That sounds like a fun idea. Good luck with that!
That looks like fun, assuming the participants are particularly creative. Please do post the link for us!
The medieval period meets the new media. Rock on. Hope it works out well!
My prediction of the students' response:
"Gaa-aay."
Unless they're big D&D fans, that is. Is this class particularly self-selecting, or is it a requirement? That might be the biggest determinant of the students' engagement.
It's not a requirement. It's, as the professor says, a "baby class" and involves very little actual work. About half of each class (it's a once-a-week three hour class) will be spent watching movies like "Fisher King" and "First Knight". Given that 20+ students chose the blog project over two other choices, I don't think that was their reaction.
And, if they decide later that it's a stupid idea, tough for them. They can't change their selections and have to do a good job to get a decent grade in the course.
Btw, I'm going to take on the persona of Merlin for the blog. Not that I'll be posting much, but I may write up a little introductory post to get things going, explain the purpose of the blog, and break the ice a bit.