News & Views
My views on blogging
By Terry Freedman
Tue, 30 Jun 2009, 08:53

As part of the Teachers as Bloggers Mirandamod, I was asked to say why I blog and what my approach is. Here is the gist of what I said, with some additional information.

 
• I have started a number of blogs in the past, many of which were private. For example, I started one as a means of keeping a record of my reading and assignments for a course, one for posting information and photos of a trip to the USA for a NECC Conference, solely for the benefit of my wife; and a blog for PGCE (teacher training) students for the purpose of maintaining a course journal.      
       
  However, the only two I really pay attention to these days is this  one and My Writes.  I use the latter for creative writing and just about anything other than educational technology. But I don’t update it as often as I think I should.
  
• The reason I say that is that I see lots of things I'd like to write about, and when I leave it too long (eg because of work deadlines) I start to forget.     
  
 
• I love writing, so in that sense blogging is a nice activity in itself, regardless of audience. Interestingly enough, through reading Stephen Downes' Online Daily newsletter I came across this post by Jay Cross about moving on from blogging  and going on to something called ‘lifestreaming’, on the grounds that blogging is too introspective. Well, I am with Cyril Connelly here:      
       
  "Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self."      
       
  This is interesting, isn’t it? We are always telling pupils they must learn to write for an audience, and for different audiences. While I would agree that those are important skills, I also think we should encourage them to write for the sake of writing, ie for self-expression  -- which can itself take many different forms.      
  
 
• Blogging also has the advantage of being relatively safe and always available – I have lost loads of stuff in the past through moving and as disk formats have changed, so it’s nice to be able to store my stuff in a place I can get to any time and anywhere! I think the internet is stable and reliable enough these days for me to be able to say that.      
  
 
• Blogging is a way of connecting with people. For that reason, I try to see it from a (potential) reader’s point of view:      
       
  -- What do they expect to see and read when they come to my blog?      
  -- What would just be a waste of their time?      
       
  Is this approach compatible with my (implied) view that it’s ok to blog primarily for your own enjoyment? I think it is, from the point of view that if you don’t enjoy writing then I think readers will pick up on that anyway.      
       
  Besides, having two outlets for my writing means that I can use one as a means of communicating what I think is useful information and discussion points to people who have kindly decided to give me some of their time, and the other for pure self-indulgence.

We had an interesting discussion at the Mirandamod. Much of the video is still being edited, but there is a Flashmeeting recording of some of the discussion.

What are your views on these issues?

© Terry Freedman Tue, 30 Jun 2009