Crane's Thing #4

How does commenting on other people’s blogs develop a community?  Well, if no one ever commented on blogs, they would only serve as open journals for people to read.  One of the main purposes of a blog is not only to share thoughts and ideas, but to create a far-reaching forum where people can respond and contribute.  When people regularly comment to a blog, they enable the discourse of the blog topic to progress further than even the original author could have hoped for.  These individuals that regularly return to a blog to share and interact with others truly form a community; one in which people’s thoughts are valued, readers learn, and members of the community help one another.

 The two main points I found important from reading the blogs on commenting are encouraging discourse and the proper etiquette in disagreeing.  First, if a blog is to work as a vehicle to encourage community interaction, it is the responsibility of the author to ensure this as the facilitator of discussion.  This can be a range of actions from responding to comments yourself to asking open-ended questions to illicit comments, to knowing when to let others lead the discussion.  Just like in teaching a class, I suspect this is a skill that takes practice in order to do well.  Second, I found it important that the topic of proper etiquette when disagreeing with others on a blog was addressed.  It is only natural, and sometimes desirable, to have people disagree with the author’s or other commenter’s viewpoint.  However, many times the dissenting opinion is given in a very disrespectful way or the person being disagreed with gets very defensive.  There is a body of research that concludes that schools often time fail at teaching students how to disagree (or be disagreed with) in a proper manner.  Like all things, this is a skill that must be learned and practiced, and the blogosphere seems to be a great place for current students to practice!  Once again, this falls on to the blogger to intervene when necessary, or even model proper responses to disagreements.

In an effort to increase my own frequency of commenting on others’ blogs, I have listed the blogs of five of our classmates and two outside blogs that I commented on and why.

Vanessa Green 23 Things

I chose Vanessa’s blog because I recently met her as a fellow GA, and I have always had an interest in fine guitar playing.  I commented on her blog that I appreciated her sharing her experiences applying the 7 ½ habits to her learning the classical guitar.  I think it is important to remind students that are struggling to learn a difficult task that it is okay to struggle.  How else to do this but by sharing your own experience with struggling with a task.

EDUC 5540-81 23 Things

This blog is by Jeri Thomas, and I chose to her blog because I like her sense of humor.  I commented on her blog that describes how she would like to use a blog to help her students learn a foreign language.  I commented that I thought the process was very similar to how my wife assists her violin students.  By creating a video of themselves practicing, it allows them to not be as nervous and better focus on their practice session.  I would think the approach described by Jeri would be very applicable to providing one-on-one instruction across many disciplines.

Wordwhiz23things

This is a blog by Miranda Coots that I chose to comment on because I liked her approach and enthusiasm for teaching English.  I also thought she has a great name for her blog!  I commented on her blog about how I thought her enthusiasm for the English language will serve her well as an English teacher.  Being able to effectively communicate is often overlooked by students, but it is a vital skill that employers actively look for.

Samples of Learning

This is a blog by Elizabeth Paige Samples.  I chose her blog because I think she is having the same type of experiences I am having in starting my own blog for the first time.  Just like me, she had a hard time trying to come up with an interesting name for her blog.  Unlike me, she actually succeeded!

Adventure in Learning
This is a blog by Jessica Miller that I chose since she wants to be a social studies teacher like me.  I liked her ideas on how she planned to use her blog to communicate with her class.  She also plans on providing extra resources to her class through her blog like video clips of famous speeches.  That reminds me of how many professors provide additional material to students with D2L.

 

Dangerously Irrelevant
I chose this blog because it discusses current issues and thoughts on today's teaching climate.  A recent post posed an open question and discussed why do we have separate teaching standards for every state.  An earlier post discusses reasons that teachers may be resistant to incorporating technology into their classrooms.  I can certainly appreciate a blog like this that takes a candid look at relevant issues and views in education.

 

The History Blog
This blog just feeds you with stories that relate to history that often get lost in normal news feeds.   It does not necessarily approach topics from a pedagoical stance, but does provide content that can enrich classrooms or help a teacher make a topic more relevant to students.