I started blogging for my classes last year but somehow it didn't turn out right. I read about class blog, teacher's blog and student's blog and jumped into it trying the new resource available.
In my blog for EFL class for intermediate students ( I added links to additional resources, listening tasks connected with topics we discussed in class, some interesting reading material. But only 4 out of 12 students actually followed me. I did realise that most students are just overwhelmed with material we cover in class and the amount of work they have to do as a hometask. Besides, our system of education in general is not very logical and thought-over as freshmen have too many general classes which prevents them from concentrating on their major. Of course, I couldn't require obligatory participation in my blog and I do believe it should be voluntary. Another fact that may have prevented students from regular online presence in the blog is obligatory Moodle tasks they were to complete. That was more than enough for some of the students who didn't have regular Internet access in the dormitory.
Another example is using a blog with my journalism students which also wasn't very successful. It was meant as a tool for sharing works before publishing and adding comments. Now I see that the choice of resource wasn't right. What I needed was a collaborative tool like wiki or nicenet. So it ended in students sending their works to me by email and me publishing them in the blog.
This year I intend to use students' blogs as an obligatory tool to access their individual reading project. I took an article from English Teaching Forum as a model for creating tasks. Reading logs will substitute mid-term and final report and final presentation on the book. We'll see how it goes. But even now at the very start I see that for some students it's a great opportunity to develop their analytical and writing skills and express themselves.
