What is a Blog?

Posted by Jim

November 7, 2008

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I am an Elementary School teacher. I have worked with all different grade levels. We have covered the water cycle, the food chain, and the rock cycle. We talk about how kindness begets kindness. “What goes around comes around.” Life, it seems, operates in a circular pattern. A good blog, in my experience, should operate the same way. It functions best as a cycle. Return back to where you started. Like the water cycle and the food chain, it is essential for growth.

Let’s look at this blog as an example. The first part of a blog being cycle comes from responding to posts. If you just go to a blog and read passively, there is no give and take. No opposing thoughts or additions to the thoughts that were posted. If it never goes anywhere, it becomes stagnant. Once it stagnates, there is no longer a reason to return. On the other hand, if you respond to posts, conversations begin. Other viewpoints are presented. New resources are shared. In an active blog, subscribing to an RSS feed or email updates can keep you in touch with the changes that occur as they occur. This is a very essential part of your job, as the reader and visitor. On that note, take a moment now to scan through the postings here and respond to at least one of them. I’ll wait.

Oh…are you back already? Thanks for doing that. Your job doesn’t end there, though. Watch for responses to YOUR posting and respond to those, as well. You will watch the wealth of information grow exponentially on a Blog when readers are active.

So why HAVEN’T you responded before? Maybe the post just didn’t seem to apply to you. Maybe you came in search of specific information and that particular posting was not it. That’s OK. We can’t be all things to all people, but we can try to meet as many needs as we can. Although I AM an Elementary School teacher and a father of four, my mind reading abilities are severely weakened by the narrow bandwidth of the Internet. My feelings will not be hurt if you reply to a posting of mine by saying, “Although this was probably useful to someone, it wasn’t me. I REALLY needed to find out more about…..” (OK….don’t everyone rush out and start posting that response to all of my postings! That WILL hurt my feelings.) Go ahead..reply to someone’s posting on this Blog. I’m just going to rearrange my desk until you get back. Hey…glad to have you back. Thanks for taking the time to make this a great place to be.

Another great way to get the most out of this Blog (or any Blog) is to check out the links that they have share with you. Sometimes we try to put them into the postings. Other times we will add them to the Blogroll located on the right hand side of this Blog.) Take a moment to read through some of the links over there. I have always particularly enjoyed Lifehacker. It has been a source of technology links and ideas for several years for me. Check out ELearner.Com News Blog. You will find all kinds of links within the articles, or postings. You will also find additional links on their menu on the left for additional Blogs. And now you are off and running. One link leads to another to another to another. It reminds me of the children’s story books that allowed you to choose the direction that you would like to go. In that way, you and I could both go the Elearner site and end up in an entirely different place. How wonderful it would be for you to come back and tell me where YOU went. Share with me something wonderful that YOU found that I might have missed by going off in my own direction.

And so, I am going to share a link with you. TOP 100 Education Blogs It is a link to a page of links. It covers a wide range of topics that deal with online education. I don’t have the time (and my wife would kill me if I took it) to go off and explore ALL of them. Go find something useful. Bring it back here and share it with me. Keep the cycle going!

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