Sleeping
This blog is sleeping again. Please visit the main blog for everything that I'm up to right now.
An online journal is somewhere someone posts their thoughts when they hope that someone will see them. A blog is where someone posts their thoughts when they hope that someone will think about them.
It seems that the only real prompts are things that we read. Could you post interesting links? Maybe furl a bunch of articles that students could read and comment on in their blogs?
What I have noticed in my own blog is that I blog less when I don't have/take the time to read other blogs. That is what has been going on for the last few weeks. So it isn't the habit of writing in my blog that is concerning me but the habit of reading. I need to make more time for that. When I do, the blogging comes naturally.Both she and I are working on our "blogging habit," trying to make blogging something that we do regularly. I hope that you, too, will continue to write regularly and thoughtfully after this class is complete. Writing is the key solid thinking. Reading is the key to good writing. It's all about reading, writing and thinking.
And I know not every student was born to be a blogger. But, I would argue that every student, every person was born to be a contributor, whether that's via blog or wiki or podcast or whatever. We need to create a culture of contribution in our schools where our students' work is non only celebrated but put to use in meaningful ways. Don't just e-value-ate what they do but provide ways for what they do to have long lasting value.
Whether it's wikis or blogs or podcasts of whatever, I think my new clarion call is that educators must start creating content, good content, and that their students should share in that creation. Tom's also right to say that teachers and students need to learn collaboration with each other, and what better way than to share in the creation of and reflection about curriculum. But regardless the purpose, we need to get our teachers on this train...the sooner the better.