This post is being written as part of the first teacherchallenge for advanced bloggers in the Kick Start Your Blog.
- When did you start posting? June 27th, 2007
- What was in that first post? I had no idea what a blog was about or what I was to do, I was such a baby, so I started being a journal with random diary entries, documenting my owners’ adventures with the students as they experimented with podcasting and web2.0 tools as part of an Education Department grant.
- What makes you happy? Getting comments – I love to know that people are actually reading what I share and watching any red dots appear on my clustr map.
- Any devastating moments? Yes, the first time I lost all the precious re dots on my clustrmap, I was devastated. However, I found out that it is reset each 12 months and the dots started to appear again over time.
- Who has helped you over the past three years? My blog writer was able to establish a network through twitter, classroom2.0 and she got involved in global projects, providing a potential audience. Adding appropriate tags and categories to posts gets my work into search engines, bringing further readers.
- How have you matured over the last three years or so? I feel that I have become more than a journal and am developing into a digital portfolio and a platform for reflection.
- What has been the highlight of your career? Being nominated twice for the Edublogs awards.
- What frustrates you? Not being updated as much as I would like, knowing that people visit but dont leave comments (I love comments and feedback) and at the moment I need a good ‘spring clean’, dust and makeover (the blogroll needs tidying up, pages need updating, categories are all over the place etc) I do like to appear wel
- What are your sources of inspiration? – daily events in the classroom, twitter, others’ blog posts, search terms that have brought people to me (found in my stats section), questions people might ask my blogger through emails.
- Future directions?- would like to tell others more about the tools that are available for effective classroom use and eLearning, ideas for their use etc. I like being connected to many and would like to network further with global colleauges, encouraging the Asian educators to communicate learn from me, and in turn, I learn from them.
The word cloud below has been created with wordle displaying a visual analysis of this post.
Twitter/murcha
Del.icio.us/murcho
Skype/anne.mirtschin
GMail/Anne M
Blog/Anne M
/
On an e-Journey with Generation Y 
I think all of us appreciate getting comments. I tend to go through spells of commenting several times a day and then not taking the time to comment for several days. That’s another area in which I need to be more consistent.
Hi Elaine, the problem with commenting also lies with me. Sometimes I am so busy, that I will quickly scan through others’ posts and dont have time to comment back but that is something I really want to do in 2011, plus make sure I respond to those who do comment on my blog. Time is the key!
Thanks for sharing. I’m looking forward to your future posts. I think this challenge will be a great experience!
Hi Janelle, I am really enjoying the experience too. It is great to read other people’s reflections and it keeps us all motivated and engaged.
Anne
I can see you are a keen blogger and leader in ICT. I know what you mean about spring cleaning a blog. I need to do that to my class blog in next few weeks! Trouble is I need to ‘spring clean’ my house as well before heading back to school.
I look forward to visiting over the challenge and for times to come in the year.
Kathryn
New Zealand
Hi Anne,
Loved your blog interview. I’m looking forward to learning from everyone involved in this challenge. Good luck with the GTA submission. I applied last year but didn’t make the cut, but I will apply again in the future.
Hey Anne….your blog interviews very well! Thank goodness it survived the devastating dot loss. 🙂
With all of the educational activities you are involved in I am amazed that you even find the time to sleep.
Thank you for continuing to inspire us with your blog.
Cheers
Penny
I’m impressed with all you do with technology with your students. I’m still learning as I go, and want to get my kids much more involved, too. This year, I’m finally getting parents and other teachers to read and respond to my blog and my kids’ blogs. I saw just this morning that our assistant superintendent left comments on some student posts. Wowee!
Hi!
I am also participating in the challenge. I was going through other participant’s blogs just to get inspiration to write my own post and I saw what you wrote about not getting comments so I decided to comment here. I was about to commit the crime of going away without commenting he he . I confess that it also frustrates me when I have misterious visitors and they don’t leave a word 🙂
Congrats on your achievements as a blogger.
I think that the topic you’re all discussing here – TIME – is really essential. I found that sometimes we as teachers are put under a lot of pressure to go ‘online’ and sometimes it takes a toll on our personal life. And if we are women, at least in my case, the pressure rises since we need to take care of the house, the children and now work at home.
I do think that this online revolution in education needs to go with accompaning policies to protect us from being over pressured.
Sorry if I took too much space.
See you around, and congrats again for your work.
Thanks Kami for stopping by and commenting before moving on. You will never use up too much space here. I love comments as they provide feedback, advice and further food for thought. Time is a big factor and it is important to keep family first, sanity second and then dabble away online!
You’re definitely right, Anne, comments are a great incentive when writing a blog. Otherwise, you feel like it’s just a personal reflection whereas the whole point is to share with the education community. It’s on my list this year to comment more – I tend to read blogs quickly through Google reader, star them to comment later and not get back to it. But I’m going to try!
Pingback: Tweets that mention Down blog’s memory lane! 10 Questions to ask my Blog | On an e-Journey with Generation Y -- Topsy.com
Hey Murcha 🙂
You commented on my blog posting so I am going to post on yours.
I noticed you collaborate on your Blogger but have your main blog on WordPress. I would be interested in hearing about which blog program you prefer and why and how collaboration works in a blog. (Perhaps another posting 🙂 ) I like the look of WordPress – very professional looking. Have you tried Edublogs? You asked a question about what is a MOOC on my blog – just thought I would weave the web a bit more and post an answer here as well. See my dive into MOOCs posting here http://connectingcommunities.blogspot.com/2011/01/taking-plunge-into-mooc-lak11.html
A MOOC is a Massive Open Online Course 🙂
Cheers Viv
Pingback: Kick Start Activity 2: Posts – the heartbeat of a blog! | Teacher Challenge
Nice to put a name to the blog!
I completely agree that comments support and encourage us bloggers, as it helps us to network, and share our experiences with other teachers around the world.
Hi Anne. Your blog has definitely gone through a huge transition, and is certainly more than a journal now. I think all blogs need a bit of a spring clean now and again. I’ve just restarted my class blog ready for the 2011 school year and had to delete a load of links from my blogroll as they were no longer active. Of course i also had to add a new counter so my students will have to build it back up again! The challenge is to get to over 6,000 and then there just may be a celebration 🙂
Thanks Pam for sharing your spring cleaning ideas. I have so much to do and it is the blogroll that needs it most of all as I know some are now extinct or at rest. As this is a wordpress blog, I want to know how to add media etc to it as ordinary embed code just will not work. I love your challenge of 6000 visitors, but I dont think you will have much problem getting that number. All the best for 2011.
Anne,
How do decide on tags? I always feel that I either tag too much or too little. Do you go back and re-tag older posts? How about a post with the list of the Twitter feeds you’re following?
Thanks–Jennifer
Thanks for visiting my blog. Your question about Grab…it is a utility for screen captures that comes on every Mac. Not sure if it is available in any other way.
Three years is a long time to hang in there. I’m inspired! It is a struggle to start and try to build a network, but the little bit that I have has been very helpful.
Hi Anne, thanks for leading the way in blogging for so many of us. I was glad to get the warning that my beautiful red dots are going to disappear soon! It’s been almost a year since I added my ClustrMap.
The reset of the clustrmap was quite unexpected, but I now take a screen dump near to the time it gets reset, so I have a record of it. You have done well in less than 12 months.
Thanks! I’m going to take a picture of my map. It’s going away in two days! 🙂 Guess what? I had around 458 visits on my blog in 11+ months, and since I started the blogging challenge, it’s up to 579–more than a hundred visits in two weeks. I’ve joined the conversation! 🙂 Thanks for all you’ve done to help me!
I love reading this comment of yours. It is really pleasing to know that the blogging challenge is having such a positive impact on everyone. My visits are up too and I love reading what everyone is doing and how they are going. The conversations have been sensational at times, so I hope that they do keep going.
Hi! If there was any doubt whether to comment or not, it sure disappeared quickly while reading your post!
Thanks for introducing me to your friend, Jess. I’ve initiated a registration for her technoLanguages network. And thanks for the nice comment on my infant blog!
Pingback: Posts of the Week – Visit these blogs – Week 1 | Teacher Challenge
Hi Anne. I enjoyed reading your post. My blog also started as a journal, I suppose a lot of blogs start that way. Some of the things you mention are on my list of blogging resolution for 2011 – spring cleaning, creating a blogroll (I haven’t got one, shame on me, though I do read a lot of blogs every day) and commenting more. See you in the Challenge.
I am glad that you wrote about the red dot disaster. I have added a cluster map to my blog and am now pre-warned that in a year’s time my dots, which hopefully by then will have grown, will all disappear. A distressing thought as the dots are a great motivator.
Wow Anne – it took me ages to scroll to the bottom of the comments. The Kick Start Your Blog Challenge has certainly inspired people. I think it is really working for me as my blog was sitting a bit idol until this week. And I too have begun the spring clean of blogs, RSS readers and my physical office. I’m trying to work on the principle of keeping only 20% – hard for me because I’m such a hoarder.
Do you think that most blog writers go through the same stages? I think they probably do and that’s why it is important that teachers keep a blog if they want their students to be bloggers. It will help them understand the process.
Thank you for your comments on my blog and your inspiration in all things ICT.
Lois
Pingback: Adding muscle to my blog – Before and after the spring clean! | On an e-Journey with Generation Y
Hi Anne I can’t believe there was ever a time you didn’t know how to blog. Look how far you have come!
I have come across, many wonderful posts and blogs through Twitter but don’t know how to work it the tweeting properly (i.e. how to RT someone else’s post or suggest someone looks at mine. I don’t know how to link someone else’s. Would you mind suggesting an effective site I could read up about it please. (Only if you have time).
Thanks Oona