Tag Archives: writing

My blogging journey⤴

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word cloud with words from my thesis title

I started my blog on 17th July 2012, originally as a WordPress.com hosted site. I blogged sporadically about conferences I’d attended, bits of philosophy that interested me (at the time I was a tutor in Philosophy as well as a learning technologist) and other random thoughts. Looking back at it in order to write this post I can see that right from the beginning I was using this as a way to find my voice and sort out my thoughts.

On Feb 16th 2016 I moved my blog over to one of N’s servers with a .co.uk url, with his help, and I’ve had the same ‘self-hosted’* blog since then, still using WordPress – and still using the Twenty Ten theme because I like it.

* I say ‘self’ as it’s not me that does any of it – N sorts out all of the hosting for me.

In 2014 my love of Deleuze and Guattari* and their writings about rhizomes led me to sign up for a ‘course’ that Dave Cormier was hosting called Rhizomatic Learning – The community is the curriculum – or #rhizo14 as we called it (as that was the hashtag that we used for this event).

* The name of my blog, and my name across social media, comes from a concept from D&G.

Rhizo14 gave me a community to bounce ideas off, and with, and helped me to really kick start my blogging into a regular practice. During the event we had various different places across social media where we chatted – a Facebook group, a Twitter hashtag and a G+ group, but no one central place. My blog gave me somewhere that I could curate my conversations and know that I’d be able to find them again later. It was also good for writing long form posts that I could take my time over.

Through the people I met during rhizo14 and rhizo 15 (the second iteration of the event) I was introduced to another community called Connected Learning Massive(ly) Open Online Collaboration CLMOOC,  who at the time were running annual CPD summer courses which I participated in for the first time in June 2015. In 2016 I answered a call for volunteers to help run the 2016 run of the summer course and I became a part of the core facilitation team. These events ran with a combination of Google Drive, a WordPress blog and a newsletter, with a lot of conversation happening over G+ and Twitter. Participants were encouraged to use their personal blogs to curate their activities and share these with others, as I do on mine. Later I also decided to use this community as the basis for my PhD The emergence of participatory learning: authenticity, serendipity and creative playfulness.  My supervisor appreciated my use of blogging for reflective writing and encouraged me to use my blog as a way of talking about my research, and this helped me to make my research more participatory because I could write about my tentative findings and ask the community to validate them. This also made me think a LOT about the ethics of participatory and open research.

During the pandemic I found it pretty hard to keep publishing my own blog posts as well as supporting others at my institution, so I started posting my weekly #SilentSunday photos as a way of maintaining some sort of posting presence – I am currently up to number 126 of these. That meant that when I did have the head space to start writing blog posts again it didn’t feel like resurrecting a dead place.

I don’t usually get huge numbers of people reading my blog, though there are sometimes spikes, so recently I was a little surprised to get a notification telling me that my blog was getting a lot of hits. When I checked I found out that these were related to one recent blog post. I’d taken a  quick photo of some street art as I walked through Glasgow one day, and posted it with the title A Glasgow Banksy. It must have been posted on social media somewhere, because a few days after I had published it I started getting over 1,000 visits a day to that post for a few days. So that might be my five minutes of blogging fame.

Through the rhizos and CLMOOC, and particularly thanks to my friend Ron Leunissen, I was introduced to #DS106 and the Daily Create.  As it says on its web pages, The Daily Create is a “space for regular practice of spontaneous creativity”. Every day at 5am EST a new challenge (Today’s Daily Create – TDC) is posted on a WordPress blog thanks to the technical wizardry of Alan Levine. This might be a visual challenge asking you to share a photo you’ve taken or photo edit one that is shared. Maybe you’ll be asked to write a poem or a story, produce a video or make a gif. Often the prompt just asks you to respond in a creative way without stipulating a medium. And, even if the prompt does indicate a specific medium you don’t have to comply – it’s up to you what you do (or don’t) do. Some people complete the TDC every day, others dip in and out from time to time. There’s no prizes, and  no sanctions. The only rule is to MAKE ART, DAMMIT!

After lurking for a while I completed my first TDC  on March 16th 2016, and have done this every day since November 22nd 2017 – that’s 2702 consecutive days so far. In 2018 (I think?) I answered a call to help behind the scenes, and I’ve been doing that on and off since then (and a lot more on than off recently). It’s not as hard as it sounds – a few of us submit ideas for the daily create and we make sure that there’s always about a week’s worth in the queue – either new ones that have been submitted or reposts of earlier ones (with over 4800 already published there’s a lot of really good ideas to reuse and I really enjoy using the random search facility to find these). I also find that this triggers the creative part of my brain in another way – as I am going about my life on the internet I often get an idea for a TDC which I submit to the drafts folder to queue up later.

As well as my own blog, I also look after two for my Uni  and I run sessions to support colleagues who would like to try out blogging in an academic context. Our SoTL blog now has an editorial team to help us, but at the moment it’s just me looking after our Good Practice one. I try to encourage people to send me posts, and I wish I had more time to spend on it. That’s a project for future me.

As for my own blogging – I miss writing long form blog posts and I need to carve out some reflective time to do that. I do have a couple of posts that are bubbling away at the moment, and having this #blogging4life initiative has been fantastic for reminding me to get back to my own writing out loud. It’s nice to feel part of a community of bloggers.

Blogging Questions Challenge⤴

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Nobody’s asked me, but that’s never stopped me from having an opinion, so here goes.

Why did you start blogging in the first place?

I feel that I should say something deep or profound, but actually I can’t remember. I really started blogging regularly during #rhizo14 though, as that gave me a community to blog with and motivation to blog. So blame Dave.

What platform are you using to manage your blog and why do you use it?

WordPress. I know how to use it and I don’t know of anything better.

Have you blogged on other platforms before?

No, this is my first and only personal blog (though I am self-hosted thanks to Niall). All the institutional blogs I admin and have used are or have been WordPress. I did use Wikispaces a lot at one time though. I always much preferred wikis to blogs.

How do you write your posts?

It depends. Short posts are bashed out straight into the editing interface. I choose my Silent Sunday post every Saturday afternoon, and enjoy sifting through my week’s photos to find one to capture the spirit of that week. Longer posts are usually composed longhand, in dribs and drabs, with a fountain pen (I have many!) and lovely shimmery ink. I sometimes scrawl ideas on post-it notes and in the margins of other things I am writing. Sometimes I am in a meeting, watching TV, or reading a book when I get an idea I need to jot down to write around later. On sunny weekend afternoons I will pack a bag of pens and paper and sit in the back garden doodling and drafting something. And then, once I’ve written them, there’s the question of whether I should bother publishing them at all.

When do you feel most inspired to write?

Whenever I have the space to think. Sunny days (see above), boring Zoom meetings when I can get away with turning off my camera, when I am working with inspiring and interesting people who wake up my creative processes. Just before tea on a day Niall is cooking it. Whenever I am allowed to type or write (having two cats can be a barrier to these!). When I am on a long train journey or waiting for a plane. When I am amused, inspired or annoyed. When I want to know what I think. When I want to understand. When I am part of a community who are talking and blogging. After rhizo14/15, it was the CLMooc collaborative that inspired me, and of course the Daily Create/DS106 people. When I am walking, cleaning or knitting.

Do you normally publish immediately after writing, or do you let it simmer a bit?

I usually press publish as soon as it’s all in WordPress, then immediately spot typos and edit it. But it might be months simmering in my head and scrawled on bits of paper before it gets into a form that I can type up (see how I write, above and my post about being good enough).

What’s your favorite post on your blog?

I like my post about ticky-tacky feedback quite a lot, partly because I enjoy writing about things that give me ear worms and Little Boxes is a great track (and oh my, I love that uke!). I also enjoyed writing the one about Cargo Cults – I learnt a lot as I wrote that. I also learnt loads by writing my post about vicarious learning.

Any future plans for the blog?

Just to keep on blogging, and to return to more written posts. Heck, I miss writing long posts. And to add a blog roll. I am sure I had one once, but it’s not there now.

Who will participate next?

I waited a while to write this post because my husband, Niall Barr, was moving his blog to a new home. So over to him. I’d also love to see my CLMOOC pal Sheri join us.

Because Niall asked: I’ve been tracing this challenge back, and as far as I can see it starts here: https://blog.avas.space/bear-blog-challenge/

Easy Writing⤴

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Nearly there


Nearly there flickr photo by NomadWarMachine shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) license

People often tell me that they wished they found it as easy to write as I do – because, they think, it’s obvious that writing comes naturally to me. And, actually, they’re right – I do find writing easy. Whether I’m typing at a computer or (more often) writing with one of my many fountain pens, I don’t have a problem getting words onto paper.

What is much more difficult is letting go of those words. Often, once I’ve written a blog post I don’t think it’s worth publishing – because I write in order to understand what I am thinking, and once I know I don’t need it any more, and I don’t think anyone else will find it interesting. Other times the words I have written don’t feel like the right words to publish – probably because I was ranting to myself as I was writing (which is good, as it helps me to write the frustration and anger out of my head).

So, yeah – writing’s easy. But writing the right words – that’s harder.

The KISS approach to blogging⤴

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Tiny clanger

Tiny clanger flickr photo by NomadWarMachine shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) license

Reading Jim’s recent blog post earlier got me thinking. I half typed a comment, but then Teams started lighting up with notifications and before I knew it I was engrossed in the day job. Anyway, I digress.

While I admire those who can write long, complicated blog posts, as Maren says, and Taylor notes, it’s fine to post short blog posts. So to add to the slogans for our bloggers anonymous self-help group, I’m suggesting the KISS approach to blogging. Readers will no doubt be familiar with the KISS principle (Keep It Simple, Stupid – or Keep It Simple Stupid) and this approach riffs off that. I suggest that when starting out blogging, or trying to kick start your practice, you use the KISS approach. What does this stand for? Well, when I first had the idea, this slogan came to mind:

Keep It Small, Stupid

But, of course, there can be variants. Maybe you’d like to think of it as:

Keep it Stupid Small

or maybe you prefer:

Keep It Small (and) Simple

Whatever. But just remember, small is beautiful.

Nomad Blogging Machine⤴

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Well, it’s official – I’ve got the badge.

Blogging badge

Now I’d better keep on blogging. Inspired by Alan’s plugin I started to think of quotes about writing that I could use to explain why I blog and my thoughts turned, as ever, to Laurel Richardson.

“I [blog] because I want to find something out. I [blog] in order to learn something that I did not know before I [blogged] it. I was taught, however, as perhaps you were, too, not to [blog] until I knew what I wanted to say, until my points were organized and outlined.” (Richardson, 2000, p. 924)

And then I remembered a passage from Virginia Woolf – how perfect is this?

“So long as you [blog] what you wish to [blog], that is all that matters; and whether it matters for ages or only for hours, nobody can say.”
Virginia Woolf, A [Blog] of One’s Own.

To be continued …

Richardson, L. (2000). Writing: A method of inquiry. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), Handbook of qualitative research (2nd ed., pp. 923–948). Sage.

Woolf, Virginia (1935). A Room of One’s Own. London: Hogarth Press p 159

Reflection on an ongoing collaboration⤴

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OEGlobal Postcard

“Postcards on Pedagogy” flickr photo by NomadWarMachine shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) license

It’s a couple of weeks into the UW/UofG collaboration, and I thought I’d take a few minutes to reflect on my experiences so far.

It started out very low-key for me. Mum died on 10th October 2024 (I still can’t type that without having to pause to wipe my eyes). So when the collaboration ‘officially’ began at the beginning of November, I knew that my participation would be interrupted by my need to travel 470 miles south to attend her funeral in early November, and all of the emotional upheaval that would entail. But I thoroughly enjoyed meeting my group (Debs, Alka and Mary) over Zoom and coming up with an asynchronous activity for us all to add to before meeting again on the 18th. On my return from England, after pushing through the mountain of work that had accumulated in my absence, I enjoyed a brief hiatus that I allowed myself in which write. Sending a quick email to Debs, Alka and Mary on Tuesday evening (my time) resulted in three lovely replies in my inbox on Wed morning – that really gave me a boost, and I have found a little more time to plan my next contribution to the collaboration.

I also found time to catch up with a project initiated by Carole, who is sending out prompts asking people to respond with a digital postcard. Carole had sent a card around to the group with a picture of her typical classroom. I have had neither classrooms nor students for years now, so I responded with a postcard remix from the amazing Bryan Mather’s remixer. However, this did get me thinking about my own learning environment, and an idea for my next remix.

Both of these activities have helped me to reflect on what I was hoping to gain from this collaboration, and what I was enjoying. I think that one thing that I have realised from my online communities is to enter experiences like this without rigid expectations, but with high hopes. I hoped to meet good people, to have interesting conversations, to participate in ways that I had not anticipated, and without rigid rules (no facilitators telling me that I am doing it wrong).  And I always hope for the opportunity to play with remix.

Well, so far I’ve not been disappointed, and I’m looking forward to the rest of the month.

Who am I?⤴

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Question postcards

“Question postcards” flickr photo by NomadWarMachine shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) license

I’m a Scot (now), but I’m English (born)
I’m PhD Education, but I’m a Philosopher at heart (20 years teaching, I miss it at times)
I’m on a professional services contract, but I feel like an academic (developer)
I’m a reluctant, grieving matriarch with two cats (who I adore)

I’m an awful uke player, a lapsed pianist, an ex-coloratura soprano
I’m an avid knitter, an intermittent gardener
I’m a remixer, a tinkerer, a bricoleur
I’m a would-be poet who doodles in meetings

And I’m counting down to retirement, because I am tired to my bones.

N+ Sonnet⤴

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Today’s Daily Create asks us to share a poem in celebration of National Poetry Day, with this year’s theme being counting. I chose a Shakespeare Sonnet:

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date;
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm’d;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature’s changing course untrimm’d;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st;
Nor shall death brag thou wander’st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow’st:
   So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
   So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

And used a N+ generator to remix it. Here’s the N+8 version:

Shall I competition thee to a summer’s deadline?
Thou artist more lovely and more temperate:
Routine windpipes do shampoo the date buffers of May,
And summer’s lectureship hath all too short a daze;
Sometime too hot the eyepiece of heed shines,
And often is his goner composition dimm’d;
And every falcon from falcon sometime deductions,
By chant or nature’s changing courtyard untrimm’d;
But thy eternal sunbeam shall not fade,
Nor lose postcode of that falcon thou ow’st;
Nor shall debt branch thou wander’st in his shallot,
When in eternal linguists to tin thou grow’st:
So long as mandolins can breathe or eyepieces can see,
So long lives this, and this gives lift to thee.

Vanishing thoughts⤴

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Where do some ideas go to? Yesterday I walked up the road to Uni, my head filled with an idea for a blog post. I remember that it was something I’d been thinking about for a while without having a firm idea of how to approach it, and as I walked I found my angle. I crafted sentences as I walked in the sun, watching the world as I walked and enjoying the autumn day. No need to write this all down, I thought – it was such a familiar topic that it would be clear to me later.

Then a meeting, and another, and then some news that held my attention for the rest of the day. When I sat down later to write I realised that my idea had gone – it had softly and silently vanished away. Was it a Boojum, or will my Snark return?

The Hunting of the Snark (cover)

Lewis Carroll (author), Henry Holiday (illustrator), Macmillan (publishers), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Blog or die?⤴

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Thesis word cloud

“Thesis word cloud” flickr photo by NomadWarMachine shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-SA) license

I used to write here regularly, and at some point I stopped. Maybe it was the pandemic, maybe it was the pressure of writing up my PhD, maybe it was a lack of inspiration. Recently I have been posting a #SilentSunday image here every weekend, but somewhere along the way I stopped using this as a place to write. I don’t know why, but I know that lately I’ve been realising how much I miss it. So the session ‘Blog or Die’ at the DS106RadioSummerCamp was just what I needed to get my motivation back. I won’t summarise it here – you can listen to it yourself or read the transcript, but it got me thinking about why I blog – and how difficult I was finding it to get back into the habit after a while away. And when I thought about why I blogged, I remembered about discovering Lauren Richardson, and writing about it in my thesis:

As I struggled to find my voice and articulate my thoughts, a friend from my community suggested that I look at Laurel Richardson’s writings, and sent me some suggestions. I had no time to read, no time to change my methodology, no time to reframe this research – I felt under pressure to have this thesis submitted so that I could take back my evenings and weekends and relax. Yet, as I read her words, I knew that I had found the approach that I needed. Richardson suggests that writing can itself be a method of enquiry: that as well as telling you what I think, I can write to find out for myself what I think:

“Writing is also a way of “knowing” – a method of discovery and analysis. By writing in different ways, we discover new aspects of our topic and our relationship to it. Form and content are inseparable”(Richardson, 2000, p.923).

So, that’s it in a nutshell — that’s why I blog, and why I have missed the practice of regular blogging. I write not to tell others what I think, but to find out for myself what I think. And if others read what I write and respond, then that’s a bonus.

Richardson, L. (2000) ‘Writing: A method of inquiry’, in Denzin, N. K. and Lincoln, Y. S. (eds) Handbook of qualitative research. 2nd edn. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications.