Examples of authentic learning in Internet Communications II: WEB206
See also other posts including the first one, on Web Communications 101, which explains more of the context.
Web Publishing 206
Students doing the BA (Internet Communications) learn, in WEB101, to create a web presence that acts as the primary locus of their online identity, with links to other services and applications. In Web Publishing 206, the focus moves much more directly to writing effectively for the web (where writing can also including other media, but emphasises the written word).
The authenticity of the assessments in Web Publishing 206 are principally mobilised by requiring students to write regularly, on their blog, exploring different aspects and techniques of good online writing. The blog is assessed in its own terms, and also as the basis for students’ reflective essays which ensure that students are thinking about (as well as doing) this crucial online communication task.
Some examples of students’ blogs are:
- Eighteen Songs – WEB206 Weekly Blog
- Percussive Sweet Spot
- On the Internet, No-one Knows I’m A Blog
- Damien’s Web Publishing 206 Weblog | The Worlds of MMO’s
Notably, most students make virtually no reference to the ‘study’ component of these blogs: these are genuine blogs addressing audiences outside universities. Use of the tag Web206 however enables academic staff to look into them to find relevant content! And one student cleverly ‘colonised’ the name WEB206 : WEB206 | a Curtin University of Technology unit
While in WEB101 there was a strong sense that other students were the audience (along with the teacher), in WEB206 students are developing a much greater awareness of real audiences. In this respect, if no other, the assessment task is significantly advantaged by making it public knowledge networking.
As before, the blogging linked with other services and tools, pricipally delicious, as in these examples:
- Annoted Bibliography Feed (on the blog)
Once again, we see the value of the tag – the tag Web206 enables just the relevant links to be pulled from delicious into the blog, enabling a student to also use delicious for many other purposes. In this way, knowledge networking drives the nature of the assessment completion.
More findings from Web206 (which has only just run for the first time in late 2010) will emerge over time. Thanks to Dr Helen Merrick, chief wrangler of publishing.
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Hi Matthew!
Thank you for linking up my student blog (On the Internet, No-One Knows I’m a Blog). However, my actual blog for WEB206 is found here: http://bokehlicious.wordpress.com/, which got freshly pressed by WordPress during the course of the unit!
P