I've been using Posterous for a while, and if you are considering blogging as an option to keep your thoughts, ideas, resources, comments, audio and video files in one place, Posterous might be what you're looking for.
Its main advantage is its user-friendliness. It is so simple to start using it that the whole process begins with an email. You send an email to Posterous and your blog is ready to go! Then, you can keep blogging by email. If you attach photos, Posterous creates a slideshow. If you attach an audio file, it automatically embeds a neat player.
However, what I'd really like to highlight is the group feature in Posterous. You can have a group of people blogging into one Posterous blog once the administrator invites the contributors to collaborate. It nicely aggregates all the posts into one place, which makes it very easy for the group to keep track of the updates without understanding much of feed issues (as shown in the image above).
Posterous makes blogging easy, effective and social. Try it and you'll see what I mean.
Kids are an endless resource of learning. They teach us every single day with their body language, words, funny sentences that make sense.
In the second activity of the Teacher Challenge, we were asked to analyze a blog post in terms of its effectiveness.If there's one blogger I don't miss, Darren Rowse from Problogger is the one. He just knows the drill.
One of his recent blog posts that grabbed my attention was
Here are some of the reasons this is a catchy effective blog post:
Darren tells a story. He is personal, he connects.
He starts by grabbing readers' attention through the title. Though it is a big one, it is totally effective into driving his audience to the text and video.
He gives choices to readers: multimedia with the video, plus the video transcript.
The video has a professional look, high-quality end.
The reader feels as if you were there with him in the room just as if we knew him face-to-face.
He has momentum in his story and he gets to his main goal stated in the post title. He doesn't disappoint the reader.
He gives his message in one sentence "Tell something important to the world". He asks for action.
The next time I or you write a post, we'd better take into consideration Darren's 4-year-old son advice of telling something important to the world. Plus, using Problogger's author strategies to masterfully deliver a message. So, I bet you have an important message to the world. We all do. What's yours?
Though I'm late, it is never too late.
As being back to consistency in my blog is a desirable and attainable goal for 2011, I'll follow the Teacher Challenge and kickstart it with the ten things I've learned and wished all bloggers knew about blogging.
1. You never know how your posts will affect readers. Even when they don't comment, you can be assured that there are people out there who care about what you are writing and saying.
2. At first, blogging can feel like a lonely endeavor, but it is not. It is a networking weaver, a reflective step towards your personal and professional life. Through blogging, you connect to yourself and to others.
3. Blogging raises awareness. It empowers. It asks for movement.
4. Through blogging you'll look into yourself and find out what your passions and drives are. Never miss the chance to do it.
5. The three main things I love to blog about is education, gastronomy and culture/people. All that using lots of images, my own images. Does that give a clue of what my passions are?
6. Blogging is not the act of writing. It is all about reading, thinking, connecting, commenting, joining in. Blogging cannot be summarized into your own blogging, but a whole networking ecology that comes with it. In fact, writing is just part of this ecosystem.
7. Blogging is addictive and transformative. That's why I have a personal mission of helping others blog as much as I can. Blogging can change the world, our world. Believe me, I've seen it.
8. There is no formula in blogging if you are passionate about it. No constraints. No right or wrong.
9. Blogging is an open-ended endeavor waiting for new possibilities, opportunities and twists.
Though this post was made in November 2008, it still holds so true that I decided to repost here mainly for my Webtools4Educators group who is exploring the power of blogging. Some might think that blogging is outdated, but I still believe in its power of connecting, reconnecting, learning about yourself and the world out there.
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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.
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!
Much has been said, written and commented about blogging for pedagogical purposes. However, never has it been enough. There's always more reading, more experimenting that can take blogging with students to another level. That's exactly what a group of new educator-bloggers has been discussing in an online session, Webtools4Educators. So, if I were to give any piece of advice, I'd stick to some ideas that have been part of my own blogging experience:
Be personal. Write a post that inspires you first and then one that compels others to interact with you, your ideas, your thoughts. Here's one fantastic example of what I mean. Luiz Claudio is one of the participants of our educators' online session, and I challenged the group to blog for interaction. Here's his post that makes us get back in time, retrieve dormant memories and feel like sharing with others. So, when were your first bitten by the music bug?
Challenge the mind and the senses of your audience by adding an element of surprise, unpredictability. Vary the way you post even if you've found your tone. If you blog with your guts, chances are you will stimulate others to interact with you, to express themselves. There's no formula, just a million different ways to awaken people's gregarious tendencies. One example? This post my student wrote about being a clown doctor. It was totally out of the common sense of what pre-intermediate adult students learning English would share about their lives.
Promote intercultural exchanges. Blogging is about getting from the inside to the outside, pouring words out, letting yourself be carried away. Many times it has been said how blogging gives the chance for students to connect to a real audience. However, more than a real audience, I'd add the idea of a real mixed multicultural colorful audience. Find online partners that are willing to commit to your blogging projects with your students. It makes a whole difference to learn about the world having your perspective as the starting point and spinning the globe with other cultural-enriching views of the world. I just love this blogging interaction I had with a group of students in Russia and some of my former students joining the conversation. And, certainly, one of my most dear international exchanges was with a dear friend. Different groups of ours interacted on a blog for one year and a half. Not only did the students write, interact, reflect, had fun, but we, the educators-facilitators guiding the blogging experience were the ones who probably gained the most from those exchanges.
And closing the blogging cycle, be personal by becoming a great storyteller. That's what blogging is about - a story told, another retold, conversations blooming everywhere.
5+1 . If you let me close with this +1 bonus tip, read these two stimulating posts that inspire us to give blogging a try with our students:
And thanks Sue Waters for once again inspiring me to go beyond, to reflect and add a bit to this online community that helps me become a better person and professional every single day.
Thanks to the wonderful group of educators who have been inspiring me every single day since our online session started 5 weeks ago.
I'll be back home to Brazil soon. I thought. This is an opportunity for reshaping, resizing things in my life. Here's the plan. I'll make the change not just physically, but also digitally with one single motto. Simplicity.
Though I love my Explorations blog, and could still write stuff there, it takes me a great deal of effort to blog there because of bugs, layout that doesn't follow my commands... I'm never satisfied. I have the great support of the guy behind Bloxi, Gary, and I've been faithful, loyal to him for his invaluable and prompt help. However, at this point, I need to be realistic with myself.
My life will change drastically when I go back to Brazil in terms of schedules, free time to blog and do other stuff that I love. So, simplicity and quality of life are key.
That's why I'm starting this new blog, fresh, blank, simple, from the beginning again. I have no idea where it will take me, but that's what I want now. Simplicity, quality of life, meaningful connections with myself and others. Moving back home and forward, physically, mentally and digitally.
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.
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!
