So here’s the thing:
I’ve been meaning to write for a long time.*
Since my last post (egads– scary how long it’s been), I have written 6 drafts. Yes, 6. The most recent of those I did in May of this year, and it’s a doozy (stay tuned — it involves some post-reflection reflection — how’s that for getting meta?). But I haven’t published any of them. Why? I present to you… The Excuses:
- Because I’m not good at publishing without revision. (Should I be? is this a Web 2.0/3.0/21st c. skill I want?)
- Because I didn’t have time.
- Because I’ve been too busy.
- Because I didn’t have anything to say. (Okay, that’s a lie — I always have plenty to say. Whether it’s of substance is another story.)
- Because family was visiting.
- Because the weather was nice and it’s more fun to be outside than inside writing.
- Because I moved my blog and it was complicated.
- Because it’s easier to tweet.
- Because I write or contribute to other blogs.
- Because I have 340840198408 pages of reading to do and this grad program does not leave enough time for decompression and reflection.
I’ll let you decide which of those excuses are valid enough to be reasons.
But now this #gradschoolalliance thing is up and running and between me, Sava, and Leslie, I’m the last one who is posting. Me! ME! Me… whom many of my colleagues (former and present) know as She Who Promoteth Blogging the Mostest.
It’s true. I think blogging is da bomb. So much so that I (along with an NYU colleague who is nowhere on the interwebs for me to link to, ironically) designed an online collaborative writing platform for “learning” writers called Beyond Blog.**
But here’s the OTHER thing:
Good writing takes time.
At least for me it does. This very post that you’re reading right now (you’re still reading, right?) began as a bunch of notes on a page that grew from:
- watching a recorded webinar on Community Best Practices in the U.S. Air Force, and being awed at how spot-on it was in terms of leveraging social learning for developing a community of professional learners. (For real: why does the U.S. Air Force have well-connected, pedagogically-driven educators but the U.S. school system is so broken? What is wrong with this picture?)
- reading my notes.
- reading some Wenger, White, and Smith.
- participating last-minute in an Elluminate session with Jen, which I was unprepared for but still psyched, and from which I felt more like a lurker (ironically, which I openly criticized) than a participant.
- reading my notes again and realizing I wasn’t following my own advice.
- zeroing in on THIS:
Yeah. Don’t you hate it when you’re your own best teacher? It occurred to me that by not blogging, I was not participating fully.
And that’s when I realized the OTHER OTHER thing:
I had taken all this time developing notes for a part of my thesis…
… and I now had something to write about.
I’m back.
(not in black)
Hold me to it, please.***
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*Don’t go stealing our ideas, now. I’ve got a prototype, even. Pshaw!
**It’s not like I haven’t written anything, btw. What do you think I am, a total slacker? There’s been this thing called g-r-a-d s-c-h-o-o-l. Would you like to read my article annotations? Yeah, that’s what I thought.
***Gently. No wrestling-grip strength, please.
Hi, there. Found your blog from a twitter buddy (I’m @audiochik)… I’m current in an Education Technology Master’s program as well. I’ve been poking around your blog and I love it! Looks great, easy to nav, and your writing style is right on my level. *steals RSS feed*
So, welcome back to blogging and best wishes, fellow grad schooler!
Thanks so much, Nicole! I really appreciate the positive feedback. Now I feel even more compelled to continue. I loved following the links to your twitterfeed and blog and look forward to getting to know you more!
Welcome back! I’m stoked to have the #gradschoolalliance underway. I’m glad you’ve gotten yourself (and me!) into it.
I had a moment with my blog where I reread a post I’d done and I had a grammatical error. It took all I could to resist going back in to edit the post. While I wouldn’t encourage a complete deterioration of good writing in blog form, there needs to be a little wiggle room for errors, messy thoughts, and just plain writing. In this space, I hope to find a place for more coherent thoughts than sticky notes, but also less pressure than submitting for publishing. In short, I hope for fun!
I like to see things as continual works in progress, so it’s hard for me to see it “published” — it feels so final. And when it’s final and there are errors… gaaaahhhhh… I have difficulty with that. Maybe y’all can help me loosen up a bit in that department. The thing is I’m not as bothered with it when it’s other people’s writing… but with mine it’s a different story.
I also am going to try to post to my Posterous blog more often, which I had originally used (and intended) for those little “blips” that are either personal or too short to develop into blog posts.
Thanks for the reminder to make it fun!
Participate in the Practice sounds like a movement. I for one am looking forward to seeing more of you than your Tweets. Not that they are great, but who doesn’t apprecaite some depth, even with some typos and jumbled thoughts
I just hope we see some posts about yoga, singing, and whatever else lurks in there….(I left apprecite misspelled on purpose. yea twice!)
Participate in the Practice does sound like a movement! I hadn’t even thought of that.. hmm… now you’ve got me thinking! And you are right about the depth vs. breadth — I was just discussing that with Sava the other day. I really do need to listen to myself more. Let’s hope that this (resuscitated) blog becomes a place to facilitate that kind of self-reflection and make it more thorough and explicit.
Thanks so much for your encouragement. Indeed it helps to know that somebody might like to read these thoughts, even if there are grammatical errors… 🙂
yay! she writes! and makes me write! I feel you, girl – as I tell people I have so much work and so much procrastination, but not enough time for either.
it’s all good – I constantly make grammatical errors and spelling errors – we are but human. and showing our humanity makes us better humans =)
also, just as a teaser, I iz gonna rite teh blogpost in teh kitteh pidgin. kthxbai.
ps: I fear that blogging is going to be my new form of procrastination.
Procrastination… it’s the new productivity… right? 😉
I’m not sure that blogging is true procrastination, though… we are still thinking as we write. Hmm… maybe there’s a blog post in there somewhere, Sava. Looking forward to reading more, esp now that you’ve changed your WP theme. haha.