I am both excited and somewhat nervous to have joined a group called Blogger’s Alliance. Thanks to Kelly Tenkely for starting this group. I joined to jumpstart my writing on this blog and to meet and talk with other educators. I keep reading about PLNs (personal learning networks) and want to explore this more.

But what have I gotten myself into? I have spent the last two hours reading some recent posts from members while simultaneously making a roast dinner, preventing my 3 yr old from breaking down his older sister’s door, and finishing the laundry. I feel like I have walked into a class where I must have missed the first two weeks because EVERYBODY’s blog seems so polished, so pretty, so perceptive. What I am doing wasting everyone’s time here? Where are the other beginners?

Part of me wants to quietly slip out the back door, head to admissions and see if I can still enroll in “Tetris Revisited”, but I’m going to stick around and see what happens. I know that since I have started reading blogs on education I have learned more and been more inspired than most of the traditional pro-d sessions I have attended. And from the posts I’ve read so far, I’ve stumbled upon not a group of beginning bloggers and tentative technologists like myself, but some very dedicated and talented teachers. I feel a bit like a kid in a candy store with a stomachache from trying to many new things, but can’t wait to come back next week and do it all over again.

I see the purpose of this blog to clarify my thinking and progress on projects I am working on (online writing workshop, using voicethead, creating class blogs) and the role of our DL program with our district. If I’m going to ask my students to blog and be part of an active online community, I want to have experienced that personally. Not to mention having an immediate audience will get me off my procrastinator’s duff. A theory I’m hoping will work with my students also.