Edublogging with Passion

A friend of mine in Italy, Seth Dickens, has kindly asked me to talk a bit about edublogging. We had planned for an interview, but due to technical issues, we went for a recording.

Edublogging... How many times have I written about it, gave tips, presented, and tried to inspire others? Fact is the ones who endure the first stages of discoveries and experiments are the passionate educators, those who teach with heart and soul, who truly believe in their transformative potential as an educator. These are the ones who, later on, become passionate edubloggers.

The point of my talk was what I've been saying from the beginning and what I wrote about in the article "Blogging in the Classroom: It Doesn't 'Simply Happen' ". Persistence, fearlessness, being passionate and knowing that you have something that will add value to someone are key to make it a successful endeavor.

We make lists of how to be a successful blogger, but formulas are not in the core of Edublogging, conversations are. Conversations don't mean that you need to get tons of comments. They mean a talk to yourself, commenting on other people's blogs, and yes, getting comments when your readers feel the urge to interact with you. I sin as a blogger, for I am not consistent as I should be or as would be willing to. However, I've decided to let it go, for I have little ones and a husband to care for. I have professional projects and other ways to connect. Nowadays, Twitter is my means of quickly connecting to others, though it's not a substitute to blogging. Twitter is connection, blogging is reflection + connection. One complementing each other in my circle of learning.

Through blogging, edublogging my mind pours out, I learn, share, re-shape who I am and how I see things. But, my ultimate question is how could I show that to other educators? Maybe I can't. Just through their own blogging journey they will learn what passionate blogging is all about, some will just find the excuse for not even giving a try. Blogging is a transformational act one should be willing to undergo. It won't work if it's just mechanic, technical. No. It's humanistic, contextualized, personalized, collective, cultural, intense.

I'll never forget some memorable posts that show the power of blogging:

Marina's post - A psychologist talking about her experience about being a clown.

Having Dennis Newson as our class mystery guest

Motivating my adult students to predict a short story by Edgar Allan Poe we read in parts in class.

The rich cultural exchanges my group had with Dennis Oliver's group in the US due to our International Exchange blog.

Emerson, a quiet adult student in class, surfacing as a wonderful blogger and commenter.

Discussion with Russian students and readers about the Brazilian movie "The City of God".

Sharing Love Stories

Wow! Just so nice to travel back in the past through blogging. It's a record of a moment, a state of mind, it shows us and our learners in ways we'd never share in the old brick and mortar classroom in such intense exchange and connection. These are just some of the examples mainly with students in it, but there is the other side of edublogging as a professional and personal development. This is another story and certainly deserves another blog post!



This post was first published at http://explorations.bloxi.jp/a/edublogging-with-passionedublogging-with-passion