I Am Not Hamlet

My dear 63 readers (how many of you are regulars?),      I am not abandoning this blog, but I have created a new one here .  This new blog will concentrate more on ecology, which I have dealt with on IAnH, but now exclusively so.  Now you have two options to read me.  Please comment. Adieu.

What do you like / dislike about leaving comments? How did you feel when you received your first comment? Why do you think commenting is so important in online communities? What might this mean for students who share their writing online? The only thing I dislike about leaving comments is when some glitch occurs and my post that took 5.5 minutes to write won't post. When I went online with my blog in July of '07 my first comment was from some stranger. While her words were positive and encouraging I was a bit pissed because none of my friends or acquaintances posted. To this day, I still have friends who have never posted a comment on here. It's a bit narcissistic, but I want to know what they think. That's why I write. Well, I also write because of some strange compulsion to tell a story (with fiction) but yes, there's that painting of Narcissuss hanging here too (how do you spell his name?). Commenting is important because feedback is important in thinking ...

How might you use a blog with students? How might they respond to a blog assignment? What concerns about blogging with students do you have? How might you use a blog for other educational purposes (other than with students)? I like and dislike the democracy of the web. I like the fact that nearly anyone (those with the means anyway) can publish music, poetry, or even run a business on the web. I hate the web for the very same reason--some of the foulest tripe, both morally and from a craft perspective find a residence on the web. Blogs are the same way--they allow an avenue of writing previously only available to those with either lots of capital or a sympathetic editor from a publishing house or magazine. If I could employ blogs in my district I'd probably start with my creative writing class because then their writing has the possibility of being critiqued by someone other than me. Of course, there are probably more people out there who would write " Nice " (see or...

I've operated this blog for about 1 1/3 years now. It came about because I used to send out some gigantic E-Mail at the beginning of every year listing my favorite reads, listens, and views from the previous year. That became so unwieldy to write so I thought I would keep up a blog to regularly comment on my choices as well as any other ridiculous thing that crossed my mind. I haven't used this for any sort of classroom connection (other than occasionally mentioning to students that I have a blog) because sometimes I post a rant or two and I don't want to be screened by my district for off-hours comments. Not that I criticize my workplace or anything of that nature, but I have been known to drop an Anglo-Saxonism or two (though I strive to limit those). Essentially, the blog has taken the place of my journal--though I occasionally write noodlings of a non-public nature in my journal. I'm not sure how to make the connection of my blog (or anybody's ...