It was with both relief and regret that I posted my final assignment to WordPress’ Bloggers U class called Writing 101.  The idea behind the class was less to improve blogging than it was to improve writing in general.  As with many writing classes before, I wanted the writing aspect of the class, not so much the blogging aspect, and I came away from this intense class wondering if I should maintain an educational focus to this blog.

In truth, I have an education blog that I’ve barely used recently called Teacher Talk and hosted on GoDaddy.com.  This class made me wonder if one education-related blog site was enough for me to maintain, and maybe this site should be geared more toward developing my writing skills based on prompts that can be found in several books I have on writing. Maybe you can help me decide.

In many ways, exposing my journey through the writing process can be educational in nature, as I commented in an unrelated (directly) post some time during this class. I wanted to explain to anyone following my education blog that my journey through this class might be helpful to teachers and learners of writing.  My intent was not to become a professional writer–I think at my age I’ve missed the boat on that one–but to show how a writing class can help one’s own skill with words grow when involved with a group of like-purposed individuals.  In all, there were well over 100 participants from around the world taking part in this class, and there was much to learn from each in terms of style, interpretation of prompts and “twists,” and general intra-participant comments.  Some participants posted comments directly to my blogging site, while others posted on the class “Commons.”  The latter were for use strictly by participants, while the former were posts left directly.  In both cases, I learned a lot–about what people like, what they say in their comments, etc.  Too often, regardless of where posted, comments tended to be complimentary or simply “liked” as one would approve a post on Facebook or other social media.  That is not a lot of feedback, but in a 101 class people tend to be reluctant to give constructive criticism.

That leaves me in the continued dilemma of whether to turn this into sharing my writing progress or continue as an education-oriented only spot.

Your response to this post is much appreciated.

#educ_dr