Pitfalls of Blogging with Blogger

Most colleges provide some sort of learning management system (LMS) such as Blackboard or Moodle. There are others, as well. While these systems can be invaluable to teachers, they can also present frustrations. The blog tool in Blackboard is not very user friendly, especially if you want students to read and comment on each other's blogs. On the other hand, it is contained within a college system and password protected; not just anyone can happen upon it.

This leads me to stress some of the difficulties and frustrations with using Blogger instead of the college LMS.

1. Blogger becomes one more thing they have to check, including additional web addresses and passwords.
2. Blogger cannot be used with having a gmail account.
3. Even if your college uses gmail as their student email system, Blogger will only work with email addresses that end in @gmail.com, so students may need to create a new gmail account (see #1).
4. Your college firewall may make the sign up process a little frustrating for students by rejecting blog titles.
5. If your college uses gmail for student email, students CAN NOT be signed into their college email at the same time they are signed into their newly-created gmail account.
6. ** Finally, and most important, the same benefit of having their information out in the electronic world for all to see, also has the potential to be a serious problem.