10 years ago today I wrote this. Brilliant. Not really but I continue to believe and advocate this kind of a space both as a way to reflect, but to collect. My enthusiasm for this medium early on was a result of discovering what it was to connect and learn from strangers. I spent a great deal of time over the next 5 years in particular trying to get others to share in my zeal. I assumed everyone would jump in and see the same value I did. I managed to get many teachers and students to create a blog, but few stuck with it. The last 5 years I’ve had my students create them and have had a slightly better success rate. I don’t consider myself the most resilient person in the world but I did stick with it. It wasn’t because I had a huge audience or popularity. There are lots of things within the web that I’ve started and stopped but blogging has stuck.
It has been the single most important space in my professional development.
This is still true today.
What I will tell you is that I need to blog more. Not for you, but for me. I need to get back to sharing more frequently, my thinking. Not for you, but for me. Unfinished thoughts, marginal insights and conversations that have sparked my interest need to be shared and explored here. Not for you, but for me. This is the space for me to mull over ideas and thoughts (see what I did there) which is what I intended this to be 10 years ago.
Sadly, I’ve seen too many people stop blogging because, well there are lots of reasons including these which I’ve written about in the past:
The Impact of Twitter on Blogging
Why You Can’t Click Publish part 2
I’ve also seen people shift from a focus on their own learning and write more for others than themselves. There’s nothing wrong with that, but that aligns more with traditional publishing than what blogging was for me: a conversation.
So I’m going to get back to more conversations. Not for you, but for me.
But if you’re reading. Thank you.
cross-posted at http://ideasandthoughts.org/
Dean Shareski is a Digital Learning Consultant with the Prairie South School Division in Moose Jaw, SK, Canada, specializing in the use of technology in the classroom. He lectures for the University of Regina and is the Community Manager of the Canadian DEN or Discovery Educators Network. Read more at http://ideasandthoughts.org.
