To blog or not to blog?

Last class we took a look at some of our positive and negative opinions about blogging for our beginning free write. Thanks to this reflective process, I have realized that I have some very contrasting feelings towards blogging. In my life I try not to be hypocritical, but when it comes to blogging, I can’t decide which of my points of view outweighs the other. On one hand, I think that blogging is a great way to interact with technology and is a pretty cool skill that is actually useful in the real world. On the other hand, I completely deplore doing it.

It may be because the two times I’ve ever had a blog were because they were required for composition classes. Whenever you HAVE TO do something, it completely sucks the fun out of it. Kind of like how eating ice cream is awesome, but if you were required to eat ice cream for a grade, it would totally suck. Something about that required factor makes me dislike blogging simply because it is. Specifically to this class, I am having an absolutely terrible time coming up with a topic to blog about. When I am given no direction my mind shoots off in about a million different ways. I could write about ice cream (check), or maybe about technology, or about my outfit today (isn’t that what people blog about??), but OH WAIT, I’m supposed t be blogging about education!!! Currently, I am really struggling with figuring out a topic that is important to education, but can still be written in this “fast and loose” blogging style. Any topic I find that is of any substance ends up sounding more like a book report than a blog. Ultimately, my frustrations have left me, personally, feeling very bitter about blogging.

Here’s where the hypocrisy comes into play; I would really like to incorporate blogging into my future classroom. I believe that blogging is a great way for students to practice informal writing. All too often kids get bogged down by the endless assignments of essays, book reports, research papers, and the like, and forget that there are other types of writing that can actually be enjoyable and used in their everyday lives. I also think that blogging is a great way for students to interact with technology. Rather than keeping a writing journal, students could post to a classroom blog and be able to share their ideas informally with their peers using a technique that many people use in the real world. Being able to interact with technology successfully makes students marketable and better prepares then for life in the real world. I think that blogging can also be a great way for shyer students to get their ideas and opinions across. Some students have a hard time speaking out in front of a large group. Blogging allows those students to present their ideas without being singled out.

Lastly, I can’t deny that blogging makes you seem really hip and trendy. I recently found myself telling a new guy I’ve been seeing, “yeah, I’ve just spent all afternoon working on my blog…” His response was something like “wow, you blog? That’s so cool.” I know…I’m pretty cool…

So something I am going to have to come to terms with over the next two years is how I am going to make my students posts blogs, while secretly resenting them myself.