Checking in again live from C&W 2003. Charlie Lowe is discussing the role of open source content management systems. He's demonstrating the weblog he uses for his courses and comparing it to proprietary systems such as Blackboard. He points out that when a classroom operates in a public space, students experience a more realistic writing situation: their audience is real, not imagined. Charlie has also blogged about his session.

He has also found that students use the site more frequently than they do a blackboard site. I've done similar things with my own classes, but rather than using a dedicated system, I hijacked the slashdot personal journal feature to create a class blog.