"'That's online writing, not boring school writing': Writing with blogs and the Talkback Project" by Shelbie Witte

Witte, Shelbie. "'That's online writing, not boring school writing': Writing with blogs and the Talkback Project." Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy 51. (2007): 92-96. 16 May 2009. (link)

In her article, Shelbie Witte discusses her experiences as a fifth grade teacher in Fort Riley, Kansas and how she implemented blogging into her curriculum as way to foster excitement about writing and discussion of literature.  Witte was inspired by a conference in 2004 where she learned of a project that took place at Indiana University, in which preservice teachers corresponded with middle schools students through two-way handwritten journals.   Taking this idea a step further, Witte created the Talkback project in the spring of 2005, which employed the uses of technology to create a blog where her students would discuss their reading assignments with preservice teachers at a local university.  Witte states that after the first year of the project, the students involved “far exceeded our expectations with their dedication to working collaboratively.  Many insightful discussions and text connections grew from the blogs” (94).  

Prompted to begin the Talkback Project due to a comment one of her students made that the hours she spent writing on the computer at home on Xanga was fun because it was not “boring school writing,” Witte realized that in order to encourage her students to become excited about writing, she would have to use a medium they already used at home in their free time.  By providing an online blog in which her students could write freely about their thoughts on the texts they were reading and a place where they had an expected audience of university students who would respond and facilitate discussion, Witte created a writing space that took the traditional form of handwritten classroom response journals to a new level.  Although the blog was eventually removed by school officials due to questions of privacy and safety for the students, Witte feels that the Talkback program and the results it procured from both the middle school and university students should “serve as an example of how schools can shrink the technology gap and better prepare students to become citizens of a global society” (96).

At the time of this article’s publication, Shelbie Witte taught at Fort Riley Middle School in Riley, Kansas.  She received her Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction/English Education from Kansas State University, where her research currently continues to focus on “multi-modal approaches to adolescent literacy learning, particularly at the middle grades level.  Witte’s project brings up interesting parallels between other studies and projects performed using blogs to encourage student writing in elementary classrooms, such as Lisa Zawilinksi’s  article “Hot Blogging: A Framework for Blogging to Promote Higher Order Thinking."  Since the Talkabout Project was eventually pulled down by school officials concerned about the privacy of their students, this project also brings up the important question of how to ensure student safety throughout the use of electronic media, which I have addressed through responses on other articles, such as “Student Blogs Mark a New Frontier for School Discipline,” by Elizabeth Kirby and Brenda Kaillio.