Ambient Connections via Ron Edwards

Technorati, a web-based service which tracks and helps users organise over 57 million weblogs (blogs) defines blogs simply as a personal journal on the web. With over 75,000 new blogs created a day and more than 1 million posts daily, it is likely that one can find breaking news and valuable commentary on subjects of interest. Searching Technorati for the terms 'learning', 'education', and 'eLearning' returns 1,000, 4,400, and 300 blogs respectively, with rankings of 'authority' (most linked-to), links to and from the blogs, traffic, etc. While this method of finding learning related blogs works, it can be more efficient to explore the links on a few blogs of interest to see who the authors are linking to or if the comment authors have blogs.

The Learning Circuits blog posed the question in October, 2006 'Should all Learning professionals be blogging?' and encouraged readers to post their answers on their own blogs and link back to the original question. There were dozens of responses which contained a range of opinions, of course - many of which were thoroughly written with compelling points backed up with references and links to more information. More than 50 comments were added to viewpoints which gave a sense of community and conversation as well as revealing previously unknown bloggers. It seems like there are more people commenting on learning related blogs than just a few months ago which suggests momentum towards openly participative online dialogue benefiting the ecosystem of readers and writers, a much different model from the read-only web of yesterday. As Dick Davies states when describing this Web 2.0 trend, 'the web is shifting from Take to Make'.

Blogging has benefits beyond being just a simple and inexpensive publishing mechanism. While educational uses directed at supporting training administration (course information publishing) and learning processes (students using blogs to complete coursework) are growing rapidly with an increase in 'buzz' as well as tools (have a look at Elgg.net for examples and practitioners), blogging benefits for learning professionals themselves are under-realised. Bloggers often find themselves considering how they will articulate what they are learning from other blogs, media, experiences and events while synthesizing what they already know or have heard, making new connections in real time. This process encourages active reflection whether or not the insight actually gets blogged. Learning professionals benefit this way too, of course, and also benefit from experiencing first hand what they are promoting for others.

The summary of responses from the Learning Circuits blog question articulates, 'it seems most everyone agrees that blogs are great tool for achieving some of the vital professional development characteristics that every learning professional should have: being self-reflective, being collaborative, being rigorous in supporting our positions, open to feedback, understanding our point of view and learning to share it, having working knowledge of new technologies'. It is clear that blogging (and commenting on blogs) has benefits. It might even be good for you.

About the Author:
Ron Edwards is the Managing Director of Ambient Performance, Ltd., specialists in helping organisations apply emerging technologies for better results. Ron blogs at ambientperformance.com/connection and runs blogging workshops.