What do you think are the characteristics of a good blog?
My goal for today is to put together a handout for my Travel Literature students, who will be blogging next semester as one of their major projects. Before they begin, I'd like to give them a list of criteria for a good blog, focused on the criteria on which I'll be evaluating them.
I found this wonderful list over at "43 folders", and I'll be handing this to them as an additional reference, but I'd like to give them my own list with more simple and concrete guidelines. Here's what I'm starting with:
- A good blog is personal. It's about things that interest you. It doesn't have to be about the intimate details of your life (although it can be), but it discusses things that have caught your attention and that you want to give more thought to.
- A good blog is regular. I'll require you to write in your blog once a week, but popular blogs with loyal readerships are usually updated at least a few times a week. You're welcome to post to your blog as often as you want, and you may find that writing regularly about class topics helps you retain and understand them better.
- A good blog is focused. Some interesting blogs may seem to be random, but they usually have some sort of topic: "my family" or "stuff I do for fun" or "this is the place where I practice writing" or even just "my day-to-day life." The topic of your blog will be this course, Travel Literature, and that can include a lot of things: thoughts about the readings we've done or the ideas we've discussed, thoughts about travel in general, thoughts about travel blogs or other travel texts, etc. If I can't find a link between one of your blog posts and the course topics, that's a problem!
- A good blog is well and clearly written. You may be writing online, but that's no reason to be sloppy. LOLspeak and emoticons are fine on MSN or in emails to friends, but your blog is a place where you need to establish your credibility and skill, so that people can understand your ideas easily and will want to read more. You don't need to use a formal academic tone - it's fine to be relaxed and conversational; in fact, it's often preferable - but you need to spell correctly and use clear, well-structured, grammatically correct sentences.
What would you add to this list? I want to keep it fairly simple, but also thorough, and in my experience, I always mess up criteria the first time around and leave out something important. If you can help me out, I'll have a better chance of starting the students out on the right foot.
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In other words, a good blog is one that the blogger feels the burning need to write--not one that's assigned.
(I used to struggle with the same issues when I taught; assigning students to journal seemed out and out ridiculous, tantamount to telling somebody "Go sit in that corner and INTROSPECT." Which I know is not a word.)
Agreed: I think all good writing comes from the place you describe. I think that deep down, whenever I give an assignment, I'm hoping that some students will discover, through doing the assigned work, that they DO have a burning desire to say something, and they'll take that burning desire away from the classroom. There's no doubt that this assignment will result in a whole lot of dull blogs, but it might bring about some good and long-lived ones!
Yes, that's a tricky one. My students are much more likely to write too little than too much, and I'm not going to penalize them for writing a lot if the material is all relevant and connected, but I'm going to include some comments about length in the grading criteria.
Juli:
Yes, clearly these criteria are 1. ideal and 2. geared toward creating a blog as a school assignment that can be graded; there are plenty of good blogs out there that stray from one or more of these criteria. I don't always follow all these rules, but I think they'll be useful to first-time bloggers. As for "interesting," I totally agree; the trick is knowing how to describe what "interesting" means in concrete terms. I hope that "personal" encompasses some of it.
Thanks to all of you for the comments so far!
The homemade blogs should be an opportunity to stretch formats and think out-of-the-box. Guidelines like this thwart creativity.
"Introspect" is indeed a word however not an active verb--although it most assuredly should be. I drive my wife nuts some time telling her about that about what my "introspection revealed". (Yes, occasionally I get that stilted!)
This blog is a classroom assignment, and so there need to be guidelines so that students know what they're being evaluated on. And I have never subscribed to the idea that guidelines thwart creativity; on the contrary, working within guidelines can be one of the greatest stimuli to creativity, as one needs to figure out how to say what one wants to say within a particular format. I get students to write sonnets for the same reason.
Yes, I like the bit in the "43 folders" guidelines about paragraphs - these are the things we sometimes forget about, especially as students are likely to approach any school assignment like a 5-paragraph essay.
I like the blogging idea.
Yes, the audience is important. They are going to be divided into "blogging circles" comprised of 6-8 students, and me; however, they'll have the option of opening their blogs to the general public if they wish. Even so, I think we may brainstorm the question of who the "ideal audience" is for each of them - in fact, that question might make a good topic for a blog post, so thanks for bringing it up!
Regardless of all that, though, I think that any assignment for which a student receives a grade - whether it be in primary school or at university - needs to have clear guidelines unless students are experienced enough to know exactly what the assignment entails and what is expected of them. It is unlikely that most of my students have that kind of experience w/ writing blogs.
Agreed. Do you have any tips on how to help students "find their voice"? A lot of them are unlikely to have any idea what that means.
I had an English Teacher who made the time to explain to me that an essay is not just a five paragraph non-fiction format for writing. An essay is also an attempt to try something, it can be a test of an ore to see how much value is in it, it can be a test run of a new design, or a field test of a theory or device.
I like a blog that contains essays like that. A writer pulls out an idea and bangs on it, examines it, tastes it, and forms a conclusion or theory. Maybe not a final opinion, but a good temporary opinion that may be adjusted in the future after more exploration. There is a beginning, middle, and end format, but the structure is there for the writer to allow a few observations and explorations to gel into one piece. The structure is not the purpose of the piece.
Also, good post titles - a good blog draws readers in with creative titles that are on topic so as not to frustrate readers who thought they'd be reading about something else. It also makes archive browsing more likely and fruitful.
One of the things I did was to require that they write each week on an assigned topic from a news magazine (a short opinion piece). They were to state their opinion and defend it.
When the class started some of the students could barely write a sentence. I was totally pleased when 4 months later these same young people could now write a cogent sentence and string them together into a paragraph which nicely stated their opinion and why.
Expressing oneself in writing is first a mental process but beyond that, like any skill from writing to throwing a ball, it's a matter of practice.
What a great way to present the concept of the essay. I too enjoy essay-style posts, and they're also one form of Web-specific communication. I definitely intend to be flexible when it comes to how students structure their posts.
Titles - excellent point. We could dedicate one whole class to coming up with titles.
I'm starting to think that, rather than making the blogs a class project, I should really be giving a whole class on blogging.
Exactly. I have always been loath to assign journals, because they constitute so much reading and feedback, and I have such large numbers of students. Also, it seems that the purpose of journals is never entirely clear to students, and I couldn't figure out a way to justify the work. Nevertheless, any English teacher knows that the only way to teach students to be better writers is to make them write a lot.
I hope that the blog will fulfill the same role as a journal, but that the online form will make it easier for me to give more detailed feedback (I have an injury that makes writing by hand almost impossible, but typing is no problem.) And having an audience is one way to feel that your writing has some sort of purpose.
Athena gives this criterion above, and I agree with you both - maybe you have some suggestions for how I can explain to students in concrete terms what "a unique and identifiable voice" is, and what specifically they should do in order to provide "a perspective the reader can't get anywhere else"? There's no doubt that these things are criteria for an excellent blog, but they are much more difficult to define and teach.
Also, you might give them a handout or links in the blogging site to exemplary academic/student project blogs you find that you'd like them to emulate.
You're brave: I'll start offering "non-traditional" assignments the day I am ordered to do so in writing on official letterhead, though I know a lot of folks make them work.
Good luck with the project!
So it's great that your class provides a context for blogging, in the form of travel literature. That's an example of the "something" I mention above. It's possible to be personal about travel, to convey travel experiences to readers so that they feel some of the same things the blogger does. And making a connection to readers is the name of the game in blogging.
(This is all in my arrogant opinion, of course--I could be wrong.)
Of course, that might just work for me.
The father (Tom Skerritt) was teaching his son to write, and each time the young boy would present his paper to his dad, he would say, "Shorter."
I'm new at blogging, but I think about that line every time I post, asking myself which details are really important to the piece.
People who are too impatient to do this can have a voice too - Rush Limbaugh is a good example.
1. A good blog is visual, interactive, but responsible. It links to and identifies sources clearly.
2. A good blog is a great way to develop ideas. One way to get your students working is to let them know that they are free to take their research and ideas and develop them into longer assignments. This will set them up on a process that they may be able to use throughout their academic or professional careers.
clarity (think about the words you really want to use)
conciseness (points about length made earlier)
vivid writing (strong nouns and verbs; the active voice)