I haven’t written too much here about a friend and a colleague who has without question become my main offline teacher in terms of thinking about the Web and how it can influence teaching and learning. He is one of the brightest people I know. We’ve had all kinds of lengthy conversations over the past year ranging in topics from Dewey to school reform to (guess what?) blogging. Of course, I keep urging him to start a blog, and I think he may be ready to give it try. He reads blogs, has a Bloglines account, and I think understands the potential.
So what’s the problem?
My friend regularly pushes back about blogging, saying that it’s not as easy both technically and psychologically for most as it is for others, that the tool requires a significant change from how most people work and think. He says that it’s easy for me because I’m a writer by training, a journalist specifically, and that the transparency of content is familiar. For most, however, it’s not so appealing.
So it was on a couple of levels that I thought of him when I read a post from Leigh Blackall which pointed to this post from Doug Noon which pointed to this post from Miguel Ghulin. On one level, I thought about the time and effort it takes to follow and try to connect the ideas in these extremely interesting and thoughtful posts. All these guys are pretty brilliant and pushing my meager brain in any number of ways. It’s work, for me at least, and requires a pretty high level of engagement that I wonder how many educators have the time or inclination for. (And I do not mean that to sound holier than them in any way.) Second, the theme of this very distributed conversation goes to the heart of what my friend has been saying, that blogging and read/write webbing may be for a select few and not for the masses. Doug’s post ends with
I made a presentation about blogs to a group of teachers last summer. After I talked for probably too long, a woman raised her hand and asked, �Why would anyone want to do this?� I didn�t know what else to say. You either see it, or you don�t.
Which of us who has tried to bring these tools to a wider audience hasn’t heard or sensed that?
So my brain goes to this…in my echo chamber, I read lots of stories about kids who are getting it, even in Doug’s post, where they are reading and writing and commenting and learning. You read Bud or Clarence or Vicki or any number of others and there are stories that border on transformation. (In fact, Vicki’s latest post is titled “My students inspire me as they “get” Web 2.0.”) But I don’t read much about the kids that aren’t engaged. And I’m wondering to what extent that happens as well. And further, I’m wondering to what extent they compare to the adult educators we’re trying to teach about these tools who choose not to engage. The simple view is that this is generational, that kids are more available to the tools because they live in a connected world or because, well, they’re kids and more open to new stuff than adults…but is it?
I am struggling trying to get going into this medium of blogging and some of my students are as well. Part of the problem here I feel is that blogging is a transformation of journaling. I enjoy writing but have never enjoyed journaling–find it useful and can do it for a period of time but then completely get away from it. Now the only thing I think that might help me and some others get into this is starting at it from the commenting/coversational point. So here I am trying to get involved but not sure how I’ll do. Hopefully if I focus on the read think write aspect for a bit and respond like this eventually I’ll get going in it.
On a separate note, when would a comment like this be something I would cross post in my own blog?
For many of us (myself included), blogging fits nicely into what Plato, and most recently NYT columnist David Brooks, describes as the thymotic urge, i.e., it appeals to our desire for recognition.
I realize this is only one facet to the multifaceted motivation to blog, but it is one that should be clearly acknowledged.
My dearest friend is similar to the colleague you describe above. He’s bright, tech saavy, a good writer, and can quote Hegel and Homer Simpson. We have discussed why he doesn’t blog many times. He says he just doesn’t have the desire to put his thoughts out there in such a medium. We’ve talked about fear of rejection, of putting your heart and soul into your writing, only to have no one acknowledge it.
I wonder if bloggers in general have thicker skins than others?
Bud, Vicki, Leigh, Dave W., you, me, all feel we have something to say to our audience. One one level, we write because we are motivated by motivating and helping others, and sharing our thoughts with the world. Part of what makes blogging so cool is because we can get feedback relatively easily, which feeds into a certain level of recognition we desire. But I also think we all write/blog because we want to be recognized for our contributions. This same desire can make teaching kids quite challenging. Our society doesn’t give teachers much credit for what they do. I know several teachers who give every ounce of their energy to their everyday. They say all they expect from their kids is for them to do the best they can. These teachers are burning out quickly and struggle to make financial ends meet. They desire recognition for their efforts and say they get it in small ways everyday from their students. So I ask them why are they feeling burned out? Why are they leaving the profession? Apparently the recognition they are receiving is not enough.
Now I know I am oversimplifying a bit, but I am curious how the concept of thymos or the desire for recognition is related to both of these areas. Why did you start blogging? Why did you enter the teaching profession? Why did Dave, Vicki and Bud start blogging? Your reflections could prove interesting for many!
Chris
P.S. Sorry about not being able to follow up in Orlando. The new job has had me running ragged as of late.
Will,
You may be interested in this blog that I just came across, called “Why do I blog?”
http://bknittle.blogspot.com/
I had at least one student not engaged at all. And the recognition factor that Chris mentioned may have been part of it. She was an extremely popular student. We did the little test of connections that’s in the Tipping Point, where you go through a list from the phonebook. She was off the richter scale. In her Facebook account, she has something like 1000 friends. That’s her motivation–to be popular. On the class blog, she wasn’t popular. A couple of students who wrote well and dug up good information became popular. And she also wrote primarily about herself, more like a diary or gossip than like journalism. I’ve been dying to talk to her, to ask her why she didn’t take to the blog, what she didn’t like about it, but I haven’t had the opportunity yet.
My own CIO said to me when I suggested we set up a better system for people to upload their podcasts and screencasts, “Why would people want to do that?” I tried to explain and tried to tell him that we have 3 people doing it regularly and more people asking about it. We have 3 or 4 classes blogging now. It’s happening. And not everyone has to get it. But you can’t just ignore it.
I was actually confronted with the same question…”Why do this?”
Feeling just like you did, very uncomfortable, I really reflected on the question and came up with one guiding reason.
Although you do have to “get the concept of web 2.0”, this link will take you to a video that show us why we should be ready to harness the information that is on the web and make it work for us.
Being contibutors to the global knowledge construct puts us one step ahead of those who are at the mercy of what they read.
Check it out and let me know your thoughts:
http://epic.lightover.com/
Will,
You ask a critical question that we need to examine carefully–who is really benefitting from classroom blogging– are some students being left out.
I think for me the crucial moment in classroom blogging is the first one-the setting up of the community, of Pierre Levy’s reciprocal apprenticeships or Etienne Wenger’s community of practice in which every member of the community has something to contribute to the collaborative’s learning experience. Not all of us will be fabulous bloggers, or oral presenters, or readers, or emotionally intuitive. But if each of us will bring our own expertise to give to the others, we will be engaged–our learning will be efficacious. In return, we all take on our own learning challenges and work hard in those areas. The natural bloggers help those loathe to blog by commenting and modeling. In my nearly five years of classroom blogging (albeit in a college environement filled with motivated learners) I have seen that patience is important, and persistence, on the part of the teacher with our reluctant bloggers–if I show them well enough how blogging with their peers will help them to learn what they came to Middlebury to learn, they all use it well according to their own learning styles. They do not all have to like it or do it equally well–but if we set up the learning environment carefully, they will all be engaged. I’m convinced of that.
And now you’ve got me all fired up to do a blog post on setting up that blogging environment. Thanks for stirring the pot.
This is too strange. I know when I read you, I often read things I have thought but just yesterday morning while waiting for a Lacrosse game to begin, I took advantage of the hour wait to catch up on overdue blogging to my high school staff -wrote it in the car, posted it with coffee this morning- the title “To Blog or Not to Blog” check it out on my classblogmeister account. I set it up for my staff with me as the teacher, the teachers as students, to tempt them to “put your toe in the water.” Hmmmm- my sentiments exactly. http://classblogmeister.com/blogphp?blogger_id=5226
Will,
As usual, you’re asking good questions and getting the community to share their answers. There’s an angle to your post that I want to address — namely, the idea that my blog, and others like it, are in danger of becoming best practice texts that don’t adequately acknowledge the weaknesses in our personal pedagogies. More on this is a post I’m drafting over at my place. I’ll send a trackback.
Except I can’t find a trackback address . . .here’s the post:
http://budtheteacher.typepad.com/bud_the_teacher/2006/03/no_stories_left.html
I love blogging. I think it is great, but I also don’t think it is for everyone. I have encountered many adults who are leery of blogging mainly because they are timid about putting their thoughts “out there” for others to read. I even receive e-mails from my staff who will “comment” on one of my postings through e-mail instead of on the blog because they feel more comfortable this way, and that is fine with me. Not everyone is a writer. Hopefully these people can still find a place in the “blogosphere” by reading other people’s writings and discussing the information they read at lunch, with their colleagues, etc. Because so much great information is exchanging hands through blogging, I would hate these timid individuals to lose out.
I think the same is true for students. Some students do not enjoy writing. Yes, they need to write anyway and practice, but they may not be as motivated as other students. This is the whole reason we differentiate. So, yes, blog with your classes but allow students the freedom to also express themselves in other ways (podcasting – audio, digital storytelling – visually, etc.) Blogging is a great tool to get kids writing, discussing, connecting, etc. but it is not the only tool available to motivate and engage students.
Gee, I don’t think blogging is something you have to “get,” or be brash or young enough to “try” or “risk.” Most people think they have important, deep thoughts to contribute…and to someone they probably do, but not to everyone. Most people who appreciate irony and syntax think they are brilliant and superior, and reading and posting in blogs confirms it in their minds.
This is just the beginning. Accessing new mediums doesn’t empower a brain or a person. The senior citizen who calls his congressman instead of emailing may have more pertinent things to say than the digital loudmouth.
What blogs, forums, AIM, chat rooms, and letters to the editor allow is a soap box. Willing listeners and intellectual peers congregate, and it is all very satisfying. It is educational and enlightening. It can be disappointing–but on blogs, rarely do posters feel inferior or rejected to a large degree. Only the visitors and readers may wonder why their eyes seem so big yet their brains so small.
Niche blogging as it is emerging is wonderful. I learn as much from the uninspired as the brilliant people who trip over their own plentiful thoughts. It is now so easy to discuss, wrangle, share, and expound. Just when critics thought that TV and the Internet were going to isolate us from “real” life, along come reality shows and blogging.
This is a place for the shy to shout and bold to bow. It’s a secret place everyone knows about. It’s nothing new, just more of it. It’s just swell, ain’t it?