Blogging on the Shoulders of Giants

This is the day I have been anticipating since I agreed to join the 21 clc team last spring. Actually, I suppose that is not completely accurate. I have been both excited and nervous about beginning my own blog. Excited because I believe the possibilities are endless for learning and education through these means. I also feel that I have some real thoughts and ideas to add to the eternal conversation and that I actually have a verse t contribute to the "powerful play." However my trepidation is deep seeded and powerful. You see, I have a real problem with stability. I moved around a lot as a child, and even more as a young adult. I have never really had long term ties to anything. Most projects I have been involved with, even the very successful ones have firm beginning and most importantly, ending, dates. Blogging doesn't. It goes on and on. I have on at least two previous occasions attempted to blog and both times I stopped soon after I began. And that is to say nothing of the numerous times I tried to keep a journal, the longest of which I kept for three months while studying abroad but stopped keeping as soon as the trip was over. I already feel like I'm going to fail to continue blogging once I get it started. HOWEVER, one thing feels very different about this attempt at blogging for me which I think bodes well for my success this time. The difference this time is purpose. I have a clearly defined purpose for keeping this blog and that is to create an interactive learning community in order to further oral communications education and theatre instruction on the high school level. I also hope to explore educational ideas in general, specifically technology and arts in education.

Thing three for our 21 clc project asks us to read some blogs and talk about them. I noticed that the format of the blog itself was not particularly important, as long as the information is interesting and accessible and the site is interactive and user friendly. Of course the sites that are more aesthetically pleasing feel more professional, but the main focus of what I saw was the information itself. That is very encouraging to me because I am an endgame kinda person. I want to know what the point is and what needs to be done to accomplish the task at hand. In this sense Blogging can cut to the chase and get right to the matter at hand. While learning how to make the site more appealing visually over time, you can start right off with deep issues and discussions and let those discussions drive the blog as opposed to having to create or perform for people.

Having said that, creation is an important part of blogging and really the part that fulfills our artistic needs as well as the innate human need to communicate. In his new book, "Eating the Dinosaur" Chuck Klosterman interview Errol Morris, award winning documentary film maker and asks him why people answer questions. Klosterman opines that he does not really understand why humans respond to questions, but that we most always do. He comes to no definite conclusions, but ultimately decides that we as humans have an innate need to talk. This need may be something that is hardwired into our DNA and might be one reason that blogging is inevitable, but i digress. The point is that blogging must in some way at least provide a starting point for discussions OR continue discussions from other blogs. The key being the interaction of ideas and more fundamentally, albeit virtually, people.

So if we accept the assertion that blogs are content or information driven and require interactivity for survival, then the implications for education are simple. Obviously to create content one must first learn it and understand it. This simple point is leading me towards what I am sure is going to be a controversial but I believe universally true statement: Our jobs as educators is no longer to try to facilitate the accumulation of knowledge. It is to teach students that they should be using the available knowledge to create, to encourage them to connect with others in a healthy manner, and to be responsible for what they create. The days of spending instructional time imparting facts are numbered. I really feel like this is the point I am going to come back to over and over again as I move through the 21 things and begin creating my own personal learning network. At any rate, today it begins and so really the day I have been fearing may be close at hand. The day when i stop blogging again. However, if my recent life achievements are any indication, this just might be the start of a new day for me.