The idea seems very relevant in a course on Public Health Science Communication, which will also cover how social media can play a role in communicating science. At least the idea is very inviting to me. And several universities have already tried out the concept. For example the University of British Colombia used student blogging for their course on Social Media in Health and Medicine.

Since I myself have no experience with using blogs in teaching situations, I was happy to learn that Science Online 2012 had several sessions relating to using the blog as a tool in lecturing. Unfortunately, I only managed to make it to one of the four sessions that circled around the topic. Blogging in the Undergraduate Classroom. As with other sessions at #scio12 there was no ‘fixed’ agenda or presentation, but more an informal sharing of experiences, ideas and questions, led by two moderators (Jason Goldman and John Hawks), who both have used blogs in their teaching.

I have tried to but together a small Storify of the tweets from the session. A link to the Storify is here and at the end of this post. I’m not sure that I managed to capture all tweets, so apologies to those who feel their tweets have been overlooked).

In summary some of my main take-home-messages were:

Advantages

• The goal of having the students blog is to teach them to communicate themselves – it is as simple as that!
• Blogging can also be a tool for teaching students how to read papers! By asking them to blog about the papers they read it teaches them not just about writing but also about reading papers and commenting on them.
• Students are much more aware of their audience (their peers and others who had access) and therefore work harder at their writing. (As someone commented: Their mothers might be reading along!)
• Using blogs, Twitter etc in the classroom makes you the teacher where it’s OK use mobile devices during class – you’re the cool teacher and may create a new classroom culture, which in return can be inspiring/motivating for the students.

Challenges

• Consider the privacy issue carefully. Should the blogs be public or restricted? Should the students blog under their own name etc.
• One of the risks of introducing blogs is that you may end up spending all your time training to use platform, become technical support. Take this into consideration and choose your platform carefully
• In grading it is important to be sensitive to the students technical skills, internet access, time frame for assignment etc.
• The blog may invite to more informal, loose behavior. Make sure to make deadlines for “handing in” assignments – and stick to them.

Suggestions for how to use the blog

• Forming student blogging teams can be an advantage. Eg. in teams of three where on student posts a blog, one person edits it and, one person comments on the final product. It can also be a way of involving the more shy students and give them room to express themselves
• Let the students choose a topic of interest to blog about. They write much better if it is something they have an interest in and care about. Highlight that If they wouldn’t want to read it no one else would!
• Blogs can be used to assign readings and students may be required to post and comment
• Start out with a scaffolding the process, eg. Reading & commenting, later on write blogposts
• Wiki-entries is a good alternative to blogs.

Other experiences

Doing a Google search of using blogs in the classroom, reveals that there are lots of experiences to learn from and also tools made available. (as with any Google search it can be a little chaotic to find out what is useful and what is not). One thing that looks useful that I just came across is something called Edublogs.org, which is an educational blogging services. Will have to explore that some more. There seems to be many ideas and services. And should any of you have experiences, lessons learned etc. you’d like to share they’ll be more than welcome!

Link to the Storify (Collection of tweets from the Session Blogging in the Classroom)

[View the story "Blogging in the classroom" on Storify]

A SketchNote

Before I end I thought I’d also just share this SketchNote that, one of the participants in the #scio12 bloggin session (Lali DeRosier) did the below SketchNote:

The first event, ‘Making Balanced Bodies: From Leeches to Pills’, will be on Thursday 22nd March at 19.30, when you can meet doctors from the past and present and encounter the tools of their trade. And we have more exciting encounters with the stuff of medicine coming up in April and May, including a hands-on art workshop exploring the everyday aesthetics of medical devices, and a rollercoaster ride through the process of turning samples of saliva and blood into genetic data.

What are we trying to do?

Like most research groups that study science (though perhaps not like most science museums), we  don’t think of research as involving disinterested scientists following a clearly prescribed method to arrive at true facts, independent of context. Rather, we think of science ‘as culture’ in many different ways – as constantly in dialogue with other ways of understanding the world, from philosophy to alternative medicine; as having particular social, material, and aesthetic cultures of its own; as influencing (and influenced by) media cultures and political discourse, and so on. This perspective presents new challenges for science communication, which has traditionally been defined in terms of the problem of accurately translating technical terms for a monolithic public audience. How can we communicate medical science as culture, and engage people in discussion about the implications for understandings our bodies and health practices? How can we bring to life science-in-the-making; from the complexities of the laboratory to the experience of research participation? How can we talk about social and cultural contexts of medical research without seeming to undervalue its importance in understanding health?

In this event series we are trying one route: a focus on things… The intriguing objects of medicine that attract, confuse, frighten, bore, or repel us – from those we can viscerally imagine in relation to our own bodies, like needles or knives, to ‘black-box’ laboratory equipment that can seem opaque and cold. This focus builds on the fantastic collections at Medical Museion, and on previous events and exhibitions that have focused on their material qualities. It also draws on the research we do behind the scenes – on topics such as the materiality, phenomenology, and aesthetics of metabolic science, the role of health monitoring devices in patient identity, and the representation of the social contexts of science in the media. We’d love to hear from readers of the blog if you have experience with putting together, or attending, similar events.

Below are five goals we’re using as a roadmap, which we’ll be returning to to evaluate the events as we go along – watching out for poor map-reading, and considering when we might need to revise the map itself:

• Open up the glass cases of the museum and laboratory, and let the objects out…

• Bring the weird past, the opaque present, and ambivalent future of medicine together.

• Explore medical science as part of our culture, sensation, and everyday speech.

• Unwrap medical science in the making – finding not finished facts but evolving knowledge.

• Matchmake curators, researchers, publics, scientists, artists, doctors, and patients.

Yesterday, I decided to call upon my fellow bloggers and new acquaintances from Scio12 and tweet them this simple question: Why do YOU blog? Within a few hours, I had received more than 20 responses. Here’s a few of them:

Blogging is teaching, whether it’s yourself or others, and that’s the best feeling in the world (Joe Hanson @jtotheizzoe)

To provide an interesting source of accurate sci stories for general readers. To practice writing. Because I’m addicted (Ed Yong @edyong209)

I blog bc I am a compulsive writer w/advocate, didactic, & argumentative tendencies & wanting to contribute to community (Emily Willingham @ejwillingham)

Helps me work through ideas & then refine them through responses from friends+commenters. Also to learn to be a better writer. (Marie-Claire Shanahan @mcshanahan)

I can’t help myself – need to write, contribute to the community (Bora Zivkovic @BoraZ)

(a Storify of all the responses is available here)

The list of reasons why a scientist/researcher should be blogging is long. So why is it still so hard? What are people afraid of?

(featured image derived from Blogging by xkcd)

Risk. How do we communicate it? What is it really? What happens when a calculated, objective risk on paper is processed by a human mind? This is big challenge when communicating science – and perhaps especially in communication health research. Two of the sessions I attended at Science Online focused on risk. The first one, “Science Communication, Risk Communication and the role of social networks”, moderated by David Ropeik was a great session. David Ropeik pointed out that risk may very well be something that can be calculated to a percentage but to people it is a feeling. And feelings operate differently – and are not rational. I myself experienced that today. Being nearsighted I had a preexamination today for later lasic surgery. I had in advanced received a small folder explaining the procedure and of course – the risks. Even though the risks are relatively small, and despite the fact that I know several people who have had it done and are very happy with the result, when I read the small information brochure, I did all of a sudden have a feeling of “yikes – is this risk too big?” “How much is 1% really?” “If there were a hundred of me out there would one have worse eyesight after the procedure? Or would it look different if it was a hundred different people and not a hundred me? It is true, risk is a feeling. I felt like asking the doctor, if he would do it if it was him. I wanted his feeling on this too.

Risk really is a challenge to communicate. And perhaps particular in health because disease and sickness is something that is very real to us and easy to imagine. In this regard, social media can be a challenge. Things have the potential to spread like viruses when they go online. Rumours of risk a radiation from the Fukushima nuclear plant made friends and family in Denmark fear for my wellbeing when I was in Kobe, Japan although I was more than 600 km away from the Fukushima plant. People in Denmark even feared that with wind coming in from Japan they would too be at risk, if the situation got worse. And fears like that may be reinforced with unimaginable speed once they go viral.

So how do you balance communicating the facts when you at the same time risk steering fear? Are there ethical obligations to communicate all available research or the  opposite – should researchers be obligated to hold back certain kinds of information in the interest of public health, and the interest of the individual? Communication in public health is central, and reflecting on how to deal with risk should be a requirement for any public health researcher or professional (and for journalists too!). The web’s role in this is tricky. It is important to get the facts out there – and try to illustrate the proportion of risk, but the web also provides a fora where you can find confirmation of the risk of almost anything you like.

The discussions at Science Online didn’t give answers to how with deal with risk, and there most certainly is now magical solution. But the discussion triggered reflection, which should be required by all public health professionals when they communicate, whether to the public, to a journalist, at decision maker etc.

And as an end note:  I did decide to go ahead with the lasic surgery – after carefully evaluating the risk and interpreting the doctors attitude and behavior. So in April, when I am without glasses, I will hopefully be able to say that it was worth the risk