Blogging

Blogging and the learning experience?  A very unique step towards innovative approaches for language teaching in the classroom.  What does blogging offer that original/traditional classroom instructions do not already?  First off, the internet!  The internet enables students to expand their learning environment beyond the classroom walls.  Students are not limited to just the teacher & textbook knowledge as a source of input.  However, with exposure to other speakers of the language, native/non-native alike, through interaction on the world wide web, the students are at an advantage.  The level of proficiency/fluency/and to what a degree of native like speech an online user has, is irrelevant to a point such the students are only looking to interact and practice their audio/lingual skills on line.  At a deeper level it will matter if we seek to describe the language and effectiveness of its use, however, for practical purposes, if will suffice to just have students interact and explore.
Blogging will give students an opportunity to express themselves freely.  Sometimes students are intimidated if one of their peers answer more than average in class.  From that, they resort to silence fearing that if they ask a question, their peers might regard them of being redundant ("he just said that") or they fear making a mistake.  With blogging, everyone gets a chance to share.  I've read some of the student blogs in our classroom website, and some of the thoughts expressed are best brought up in class to fuel classroom discussion, but nonetheless, the thoughts have been shared.
Technology is taking its toll and place in society as the proprietor of new and innovative teaching.  Therefore, I strongly feel that it our duty as future SLS instructors to embrace it, understand it and share it with the world.  We must not fall stagnant to the limitations produced by budget cuts, lack of materials etc.  We must do our best to make do with what we have, and create our own means of technology to accomplish our goal.  Technology is created and we give life to it.  It is a tool to be used.  And like the words of construction and engineering, a tool is only as effective as the user.  You and I.