Why Blog?

Recently, I met with a teacher to discuss a project involving a web 3.0 application.  I asked the teacher if they would blog about their experience?  The immediate reaction to my question was that the teacher was not a fan of social networking tools like Facebook and feels somewhat the same about blogging.  We continued our discussion focusing on blogging and a comment that eventually came out identified that the teacher was self-conscious and thought colleagues would see blogging as arrogant and boastful.  This somewhat set me back, as I never really thought that others would look at blogging in this manner.

So, what is the purpose of blogging?  For me blogging allows me to organize my thoughts into a single location accessible from anywhere on the Internet.  These posts can include many forms of media including text, images, videos and sounds.  Going back and reading posts allows me to reflect and potentially gain a greater understanding of the topic.

Now, the previous reasons for blogging were mainly for me.  What can it do for others?  Blogging can provide insight into your experiences, allowing others to learn from your experiences.  When you share your experiences with others it helps to build capacity allowing others to build on your experience and knowledge.  It is because of this reason I would never consider blogging to be arrogant or boastful.  In fact I see it as informative, helpful and supportive.  So, I ended my discussion with the teacher by saying, if they won't blog for themselves please blog for the rest of us so we can learn from their experiences.

Why do you blog?

Resources:

• Resources for Blogging in the Classroom ( Jamie Tubbs)