Moderating & Ethical Blogging- 2/23/07

Hi!
I just finished reading the article Dr. Chatel posted on Blackboard. It is a very interesting article especially for teachers. The article, Moderating and Ethics for the Classroom Instructional Blog by Patricia Deubel, Ph.D., debates issues that we have been discussing in class on how can we use blogging safely in the classroom. It brings up a very good question of, What are the rules of engagement for blogging? Are we to give our students the free run to post their responses or are we to monitor their speech? I feel that blogging allows students to deepen their comprehension of material in a very important manner, peer communication. Peer communication is one of the ways that I have my students demonstrate their understanding of the lesson. In addtion, I feel that some students learn better from peer interaction than just teacher discussion solely. But how do you make sure that your students are following your expectations and more importantly respecting eachother's opinions? Dr. Deubel gives some pointers: 1.) provide posting guidelines, 2.) provide HTML support, 3.) give priority to student commentary, 4.) involve students in summarizing and moderating discussions. To conclude, I still worry about the monitoring of blogging however, it would help students develop their critical thinking skills and allow the students to reflect upon their responses and the responses of their peers. With good monitoring, would you allow your students to blog with eachother, if you know they are going to only be working on reaching instructional goals?