Questions on privacy

This year I decided to do something new with my composition classes.  I've decided to incorporate blogs.  Although I am aware of many people that have used blogs for years with their writing students and I genuinely like using technology with my classes, I always used technology in other ways in my classroom.

This year I decided to take the plunge for a number of reasons.  The textbook we are using is Mike Palmquest's Joining the Conversation which emphasizes the interplay among texts and the relationship and dialogue that takes place between writers and readers.  Naturally, online space allows writers a readership and access to a community of writers that have similar interests.

Another advantage of blogging over other forms of technology I could add to the classroom was the notion of personal space.   I want my students to have a space that is "theirs" where they can play with technology, explore various communities and find their own voice.   Learning how to write academic papers is an important life skill, but I would position it is not the best or only way to teach critical thinking, argumentation, research or even attribution.   It is possible teaching these skills as merely an academic exercise may not promote easy skill transference to other situations (writing or otherwise).   There is something amazing about having strangers read your writing especially when they leave feedback.  For good or ill it creates a "real" learning situation that it is difficult to replicate with classroom-based exercises.

However, there are also drawbacks to requiring this real-world activity in a classroom.   One that concerns me most are issues of privacy.  I asked my students to create accounts with blogger (aka Google).  I have had a blogger account for many years, long before Blogger was bought out by Google, and I have had a Google account for almost as many years.   However most of my students did not have Google accounts, and I discovered the many safe-guards Google has put in place to ensure real people are signing up for accounts ---like requiring a phone number--- causes me to pause.  We tell our students not to have their phones out or ringers on yet now I require one for instruction?   Is it a reasonable expectation that students will have cell phones?  And if they do, will they want to give their numbers to Google?  

I honestly believe that experimenting with a blog is advantageous, but students also have rights to privacy.   I personally have never had a problem with spam coming from Google; I have no reason to doubt their privacy policy.    Google has many tools that I may use with my writing classes so having an account will be helpful in many ways.   Is there a way to get around this need for a phone number or a generic phone number the whole class could use (perhaps google voice account on my end)?  This is something I need to research.