How blogging can make you a better catechist

By Tim Welch

As a catechist, I like to explore new technology to see how it might enhance my ministry. After all, I’m always looking for good ways to build up my tool kit. Sometimes I like to explore older tools to see how I can use them in new ways. Let’s take a look at Blogger (www.Blogger.com) to see if blogging can help us engage those we teach. If blogging is not appropriate, Blogger’s features may also be adapted to serve as a bulletin board, discussion starter, or assignment distribution site.

Blogger allows us to create a website or blog, that can be as easy to “author” as writing an email. It can also be as private or as public as you wish. Think of a web-site that logs messages—called “posts”—and allows readers to write comments and replies.

On Blogger, you can provide opportunities for prayer, interaction, and post classroom announcements. Blogging can be a way of meeting more often for shorter periods of time, so when face-to-face meetings happen, there is more time for prayer and sharing. Invite parents to visit your class blog to find out what their child is learning. An example can be found at tinyurl.com/rtjcc-blogexample.

Blogger is very easy to set up and use. Search “blogger tutorial” on YouTube, find help on the Blogger website, or ask your trusty teenage techno-saint to help.

Here’s one scenario about how Blogger might be useful: Imagine that your class is preparing for First Eucharist; one day you visit your great-grandmother in the nursing home to find a group of teen volunteers keeping her company. After receiving permission, you photograph the group and email it to your blog with a subject line that reads, “Becoming the Eucharist,” and a short description of how these visitors have become the Eucharist they consume by making time to visit the elderly. Your email will become a post on your website, complete with title, photo, and a short description for students and their parents to see when they visit the class blog.

By getting to know Blogger and all the ways it can be utilized, you will better understand how it can be a powerful catechetical tool to extend your class beyond your usual time and place.

Tim Welch

Tim Welch is the consultant for educational technology for the Diocese of Saint Cloud, Minnesota. You may follow him at twitter.com/timewelch