It's not really a big secret.

Writers like knowing that they have been read. I don't care how loud the protestations of bloggers who insist they write "only for themselves" or "for personal growth," every public scribbler likes knowing other people have considered what they have written. If they didn't, they'd be writing in a spiral notebook - probably locked away in a garret. I just don't envision Emily Dickinson having a "Because I Could Not Stop for Death" blog.

Anywho, if you would like to make a blogger's day, leave a comment on a post. Agree, disagree, add, or just say thanks, but make it heart-felt. Make it relevant. Don't be a troll.

If you are a blogger and receive a comment, I've always thought it polite to say thanks to the commenter when possible. This is not a universally practiced - or endorsed - practice. Somehow, I just think if a person has given up a chunk of life to read and craft a response, I should be grateful. 

• To encourage you to make commenting a regular practice, check out Kim Cofino's 31 Day Comment Challenge. (It's day 3 and I am already a week behind - how does that happen?) For those who really like structure, see the Comment Challenge wiki. Check out using coComment, even though it doesn't work on the Blue Skunk.
  
• To help guide your commenting "etiquette" check out Darren Draper's Edublogger Etiquette - Responding To Comments. Actually read his entire etiquette series. Interesting stuff.

http://www.teesnthings.com

Oops, that's probably NOT the right attitude on the t-shirt... 

I love rants. I love to read them. I love to write them.

But I am not so sure I like to be the subject of them.

Rob Rubis at the Internation School of Bangkok takes me to task big time for some comments and assumptions I made in regard to the program there in response to blog posts and commentary written by the TLCs (technology and learning coordinators) at his school. Please read Rob's post. His comments and frustrations may resonate with many teacher-librarians around the world.

If you have been following the Blue Skunk at all, you know I asked why it seems that technology cooridnators seem to be reinventing the same wheel that ibrarians have been rolling for sometime, with the efforts at ISB as an example/springboard. My comments were never meant as a criticism of ISB's particular program, but as a means of exploring why this seems to be a general trend in schools around the world.

Every now and then I do something so insensitive that my 6'3" frame shrinks to about 3" tall. Once it happened when I teased a woman about how important she must be to have left her cell phone on during one of my workshops. She later apologized and told me that her husband was in the hospital doing very poorly and that was why she left the phone on. I shrunk then and  I've never mentioned a ringing cell phone in my presentations since that day.

I'm feeling pretty much the same way now. Looking at a situation in the abstract, as an exemplar, as a philosophical touchstone may seem harmless to me as a writer, but it obviously touched a nerve with those commented upon at ISB. All I can do is apologize and hope that I remember the lesson and become more sensitive in the future. Behind every generality are real people.

I've always said that while we are born homo sapiens, it takes a lifetime to become human. I am still working on it.

Check out the nifty new graphic on the lower right side of this page.

It links to a new resource being started by Patricia Donaghy in Dublin <edubloggerdir (at) gmail.com> to:

...to provide an up to date directory of edubloggers from around the world. The site will provide an easy way to find out what other edubloggers are blogging about.

To be added to the Directory, visit the site and click the Add tab at the top. Follow the directions.

Thanks to Miguel's http://www.edsupport.cc/mguhlin/archives/02-13-2008_02-11-2009.htm on this resource.