Blogs

abbrev: weblog/blɒg/ verbgerund or present participle: bloggingadd new material to or regularly update a blog."it's about a week since I last blogged”

nouna regularly updated website or web page, typically one run by an individual or small group, that is written in a conversational style."he blogged the Democratic and Republican national conventions as an independent"

The thought of blogging seems to create panic and uncertainty in students.  ‘What is a blog?’‘I don’t know what to write about.’‘Who will read it?’‘Why do I have to do it?’‘How long does it have to be?’‘I still don’t know what to write about.’ We’ll deal with each concern one at a time.

‘What is a blog .....?’ A blog is an online personal journal or diary. It is a place where you can express yourself through words. On Kloodle, a blog is another way that you can evidence your claims and more importantly, your skills. It’s a piece of writing that will let a second reader know about your experiences, opinions and thoughts and the way that you see the world.

‘I just don’t know what to write about …..’

Getting the ball rolling seems to be the biggest sticking point. Don’t overthink it. Blog writing should be fun - it allows you freedom of thought and a place to express yourself. You are not stifled by a curriculum. We do understand though, that this ‘freedom’ is in itself quite daunting.

The next slide has some ideas of what you might like to write about.

• Have you covered an interesting topic in one of your lessons recently? Blog about it.

• What’s happening in the news? Are your friends divided in opinion? Blog about it.

• What did you do at weekend? Why? Blog about it. • What did you want to do at weekend? Why? Blog about it. • Have you mastered a new skill? Blog about it. • What are you reading at the moment? Blog about it. • Think about something interesting that you did on your last

holiday. Blog about it. • Go and read an article on an on-line newspaper. Blog about it. • Who do you follow on Twitter? What have they got to say about

the world? Blog about it. • What’s better a square or a triangle? Blog about it.

Still struggling? Let’s simplify.

Aim

• What are you trying to achieve with your blog? • Are you writing for fun? • Are you trying to provoke a reaction in the reader? • Are you trying to promote yourself to a future employer?

When you’ve decided exactly what you want to achieve, it will help with the blogging process.

Nosey neighbour

Make connections with your friends and classmates and see what they are writing about. At Kloodle we encourage transparency, we want you to be able to see what other people are writing about. We want you to think about it and even comment on it. It may well be that you were in the same lesson as someone else and they have blogged about it.

So, why haven’t you?

What are YOU interested in?

Write about something that YOU are passionate and enthusiastic about. Your blog will be dry and uninteresting if you are forced to write about something that you don’t care for or that you have no opinion about.

Consider broad topics like sports, politics, fashion, media, celebrity, music, gaming, art, literature or the news. And then break the topic down. What do you specifically want to say? Do you want to share your style? Do you want to promote a new piece of music? Do you want to comment on a recent news item?

Break it down

If you have a lot to discuss, break the topic down into sections. Begin with research. Make sure that you have your facts and figures. Make sure that you can predict the counterargument. Ask your friends what they think about the topic. What is their opinion? Create a mind map of the subject.

Would you want to read it?

When you’ve finished typing. Read back over the blog and ask yourself if you want to read this?

If you feel less than inspired - others will too.

‘Who will read my blogs .....?’

StaffThere are multiple readers of your blogs. If you are at school or college, you will be attached to various groups. This means that your teachers have access to your blogs and can read everything that you write. You need to consider this in the tone of your writing We certainly don’t want you to overly formalise your writing but slang and ‘text talk’ is not acceptable.

‘Who will read my blogs .....?’

ConnectionsIf you have made ‘connections’ with your friends or peers, they can also read your blogs. In fact when you post a blog, it will appear on your ‘connections’ newsfeed, so that they can comment on them if they like. You can change this to ‘Only Me’ if you don’t want your connections to read what you’ve written.

‘Who will read my blogs .....?’

EmployersFinally, the third audience is a potential employer. When you first start your Kloodle profile, your teacher will have most probably set the privacy settings to ‘Private’ but when you leave school or college or if you want to apply for a job, this will be changed to ‘Public.’ This is when a potential employer or apprenticeship provider can see all of your blog posts. This is another reason to use a semi-formal tone in your writing.

‘Why do I have to do it .....?’ Blogging is the perfect way to express yourself to someone who doesn’t know you. You can write about your achievements, your thoughts and opinions and still be able to tag in your skills. Like photos, videos and documents, it is considered ‘dynamic content’ and helps to make you ‘unique.’ No two blogs are the same because no two individuals are the same. Remember, when grades are the same - there has to be a way to separate candidates and blogging is a great way to communicate your personality.

When you post a blog, you will have the option to ‘Add Skills.’ The page will look like this.

You just need to tag the skills that you think the blog evidences.

‘How long does it have to be .....?’ To make things even more difficult, there are no hard and fast rules about the word count of a blog. We would recommend that as a starting point, you should aim to write around 250 words. We have read some blogs which are much longer and are very entertaining but sometimes the longer a blog is, the more repetitive it can become. Make sure that you carefully proof your work for spelling or grammatical errors and edit any repetition.

Still don’t know what to write about?  Ok. Here are some ideas to get the ball rolling.

• Who’s your favourite super-hero?• Do you believe in fate? • What was the last book you read? What did you learn from it? • What's more important: science or art?• What's your dream job? Why? • Favourite holiday? Why? • Are you a glass ‘half full’ or ‘half empty' kind of person?• Can we ever have a world without war?• Top 5 films and why. • What is ‘art'?• What do you know today, that you didn’t yesterday? • Is it better to play well and ‘lose’ or play badly and ‘win?’ • Is the world ‘fair’? • Can you have £5 and be considered 'rich'?• Is democracy fair?• What's better - a triangle or a square? • What is more important - being right or being nice? • Can a toddler break the law? • If you could have just one super power - what would it be and why? • Do you need to 'see' to ‘believe'?• If you had the opportunity to meet one person you haven’t met - who would it

be, why and what would you talk about?

One piece of advice.

‘It’s’ is a verb contraction. ‘Its’ is a determiner.

Make sure that you know the difference between the two when blogging.