SMART CH 7: Creative Content - Writing

When I started to learn how to type in elementary and middle school, I never thought how much our world would have changed and how much we depend on our writing on a computer. It's interesting to see the development of our writing systems throughout history. I can think of the feathered ink pen which had to be dipped in the ink every few seconds, to the regular pen and pencil, to the typewriter, and now the keyboard which depending on how fast you can type, can be the fastest way of getting our words down on "paper" (not talking about the voice to type recording systems which are out there now where you speak and it transfers to typing, that will probably be the future but for now, we'll stay at typing.

Because of the fast nature of typing, in our society we have put many of our writing content on the computers. Lately a big fad is blogs. I remember from an English class trying to figure out from what two words blog came from. I think in our text book it said it came from weblog. The difference from blogs to other writing features is that blog is online and it is like a journal of dated entries that appear in chronological order. Now our blogs are so advanced that we can embed videos and pictures into them so it is like a high tech journal and diary. Students can write as much as they want on their blogs. I have had a variety of experience with blogs from my high school years of xanga and now with my own blog chronicling my after grad years. I am a big fan of blog for students and I feel like it would be a really good tool to see what they are thinking and how they feel about different subjects and to chart their own learning. Kids who also struggle with writing can use blogs as a way of letting out what they are thinking and the teacher could allow the students to type the writing promps into their blog.

Wiki's are something that I don't know much about. I have used wikipedia for quite a while, since high school if I remember but I didn't know the connection between the two till very recently. In high school the use of wikipedia was not very appreciated and the teacher warned us about using it. Even with wiki's are discussed in class, I get a sour taste in my mouth. But now, I have learned that wiki's are just websites where visitors can add, remove, and edit the content. With this simple definition, it seems like a very good tool for educators where students can add, remove, and edit the content. Wiki's can also work like regular websites where a someone personalizes it and uses it for educational or personal use. Wiki's can be set up for individual classrooms to organize and chart assignments as well as allowing the students to have sites where they share their research.

Web-Based Word Processors is another one where I have some exposure to this but not enough. I have used word processors all my life but not any web based ones. I didn't have a gmail account until this class so I never had explored the area of Google Docs. Through this class, I have gotten to enjoy google Docs and can see how powerful of a tool it can be. Web based word processors allows sharing of files so that collaboration can take place in editing and creating. This files can be easily published online or printed out whichever is needed. Most of these programs are free though some are not. Students can access these from home or school because they only need the internet in common instead of another application. Google Docs would be very good with peer editing since everything is done in real time and updates could be seen in the process as well as comments made on the writing.