Comments on Blogging to Learn by Anne Bartlett-Bragg and Educational Blogging by Stephen Downes
I think I’m beginning to get it! The set articles, Blogging to Learn and Educational Blogging were both enlightening. The latter was more so, and revealed a source of my own confusion: Until reading this, I had assumed that a blog was a log in the sense of dated entries (Captain’s log….) of what had been happening, placed on the web. If it is that, then it might be useful, but so would a personal journal, and why make it public? But the article revealed the other facet; a weblog as a log of web sites. That seems a much more interesting thing to share: Useful links with anotated comments. If you find a blog like that it could be really useful.
My main reflection form this is that I didn’t know enough about blogs in the first place. So, I think a good place to start is Stephen Downes’ idea of beginning by reading blogs, rather than starting with writing before really reflecting on the nature of the medium. In that sense, I would perhaps include a preliminary stage of “blog reading and analysis” before beginning Bartlett-Bragg’s 5-Stage Blogging Process.
The other interesting point that Downes made was about the legal implications of blogs and the resulting restrictions.
