Who let the blogs out?

Who, who, who who? Yes. Exactly. I have unleashed my blog.

It was about time. For all these years I have been focusing mainly on content. It was substance over style. Focusing solely on content at the expense of context is a mistake. In my previous blog posts I discussed the age old debate about the tension between the two, but I have come to the conclusion that content and context are not a binary. They are dependent upon each other, and need to be balanced. So I have balanced the two here on this new look blog, I hope.

But context is still vitally important. In education, if all learners receive is content, content, content, then they will be... well, discontent. They will feel overwhelmed, hemmed in by the continuous onslaught. Students need to be given some time to reflect, digest, ask the 'what if?' type questions. They need context for the content they have been given. All too often in formalised education settings, there is no time built into the programme to do this, because curriculum comes first. But we need to challenge this. We need to start asking the questions that will cause our leaders to stop and rethink the constraints they are imposing upon the teaching profession. Teachers are doing their best, but with the best will in the world, how are they going to inspire young people to get excited about learning, if they have no time themselves to teach creatively? We need to ask what exactly are schools for? Why are there so many subjects covered in the curriculum? Why is so much time spent on testing, and so little spent on the development of critical skills, creativity, experimentation?

So I gave my blog a makeover a few days ago. I invoked one of the new templates that Blogger has just started to offer its users. You can see the difference it has made. I have unleashed my blog, and now it's free to make as much of an impression on my readers as they are to ask of it. I think it's a cleaner context, a more open and accessible format for the content to sit within. Many others have already agreed, and interestingly, my blog traffic has almost doubled. I'm not claiming that this solely because I have changed the context, the format of my blog. But it seems strange that in the last two days, all I have done is alter the look and feel of the wrapper, and have added no new content. Yet, in the last two days I have received over 10,000 views, up from the normal 2500-3000 views per day I would normally get during the week. For me, this is at least an indication of the power of context. It holds the content, and presents it in a manner that is more accessible, easy to explore and in a more dynamic way. Can we do the same with school content in the given constraints? Success will rely on the tenacity, determination and inventiveness of creative teachers, but as I have always said, teachers are the best society has to offer, and somehow we will find ways to do it. Doctors save lives, but teachers make lives. Let's unleash the content.

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Who let the blogs out? by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at steve-wheeler.blogspot.com.