As the world becomes more dependent on technology, blogging is a tool students have learned to use. South students write blogs for their class assignments and teachers continually encourage students to maintain a positive digital footprint.
According to multiple students at South, Blogger is the easiest website to use in order to create a blog. Humanities teacher Scott Glass, requires his students to use Blogger. However, Jordan Arrigo, senior fashion blogger, uses Blogger because of a personal preference.
“After I was blogging for a while, I got more comfortable using [Blogger] and now I think it’s easier to make it look different than a typical blog,” Arrigo said.
According to Glass, throughout third quarter, status quo thinking and disrupting conventional thinking were two major ideas students incorporated into their current blogs. Students are expected to connect their own ideas with the topics discussed in class while writing their entries.
“More and more I’ve tried to open it up and allow to more student directed entries,” Glass said. “[Blogs were] a reflection tool […] It’s so easy to get overwhelmed with the day to day grind.”
Glass thinks blogs can equally express one’s day to day thoughts. Glass also has a blog of his own, which he started only a little before his students did.
“I find that writing helps me slow down and think about some of the ideas that otherwise would just drift away,” Glass said. “Once I started to see the value in that for me, I thought I’d like to see if the students find a similar value.”
According to Kaitlyn O’Brien, senior in Humanities, blogging is a way to showcase strengths and personality through a website.
“I think [blogging] is really great because it allows us to express our opinions on certain topics,” O’Brien explained. “It’s very open.”
Another student in Glass’ class explained the amount of effort she puts into her blog. Sierra Rivero has been blogging since junior year in English 363. According to Rivero, blogging has influenced her life in a positive way.
“I’m kind of lazy, so I was like ‘Great…I got to do another thing,’ but it actually turned out to be a really fun experience because I realized that I really do like writing and I want to pursue that when I am older,” Rivero explained.
Blogging is also widely used outside of the English classroom. Michael Sinde, teacher part of the STEM Learning Community, requires a blog for each of his students in Introduction and Design, Principles of Engineering, and Engineering Design and Development.
“We wanted kids to have a digital presence. Whether it be a website, a Facebook page, Twitter account, [but] we chose Blogger,” Sinde said.
According to numerous students at South, it is split between the pros and cons of journaling on the internet. According to O’Brien, writing off of the internet and with a pen and paper in hand is what she prefers.
“I keep a journal […] that is a hard copy, which I prefer to have because it’s something I know I am definitely going to keep,” O’Brien said. “For me, I wrote about my trip to Spain and it ended up being fifty pages. I just know that I’m going to hold onto that for the rest of my life.”
However, according to Rivero, blogging and journaling, which she prefers, are ways to talk to an open room and let her ideas out.
“I always look at every blog post as a challenge, an exercise,” Rivero said. “To get creative and see if I can take it to a level where people are genuinely interested in what I’m writing about.”
