Going back in time

            I have enjoyed perusing my early blog posts and having flashbacks to January when everything was so new and I was so worried about how this course and this semester would play out.  As I look back, I am pretty impressed with the quality of my first blogs.  They were definitely written with an informal tone and included quality thoughts on the topics we were reading about and discussing in class.  However, I feel like I tried to hard to make them too informal at first and my tone became more professional and sophisticated as the semester progressed. This is even apparent my blog titles- “Mature Reasoning is going extinct!” to "More complex than it seeems" and "A surreal world of perfection."  I think the biggest difference was the depth of my ideas and application to what I was interested in and curious about.  At first I would discuss the readings and my thoughts on them, but I eventually began to include ties to my research, other classes, and my own ideas. I found blogs to be much more enjoyable when I took up the challenge of finding my own angle to the blog prompt instead of passively regurgitating what we discussed in class.

I am proud of how my blogs progressed the idea of bridging the gap between academia and the general public.  I would consider this the major theme of my work this semester and it has made me more aware of this phenomenon and what should be done about it.  My blogs also evolved in respect to the audience I was addressing.   At first I tried very hard to maintain a blog that was not obviously written for a class.  I wanted it to be a credible and thoughtful blog instead of being an obvious online assignment that may turn readers off.  However, the specificity of the prompts made this very difficult and I eventually conceded and had to reveal my identity as an English student.  I still tried to keep it focused on my interests and ideas but it definitely developed overtones of academic writing. 

Finally, the way that I wrote my blogs evolved over the semester.  In the beginning, I would spend quite a bit of time writing and revising my blog posts.  However, through the semester, my blogs became more of an organized journal on a topic rather than a polished piece.  I know that this is the idea behind blogs, but at first it was difficult for me to publish posts that I didn’t feel like were up to my standards.  However, I believe my better ideas were in posts that I would do more writing and thinking than planning and revising such as my brainstorm about using blogs as a teaching and communication tool at the University.   

Ultimately, I would not change the way I set up my blog or my early blog posts.  I think the way my blog posts evolved is interesting and this progression is more important than having sophisticated blog posts from the beginning.  Overall, I think it was a valuable experience and introduction to a unique media form that I will use in the future.