Thing 4

Commenting is a great way to interact with other people who have the same interests as yourself. Commenting helps build a community because when you interact with people and show an interest in what they say then they will in return show an interest in your. It basically helps makes everyone feel like they are connected in some sense and share a common interest.
In the article "How to comment like a king or (queen!)" I found it interesting that they advised to teach children how to comment. Even with growing up in a "technological" age I never really have thought of teaching children how to comment on a blog. I remember my English honors/French teacher telling us a story about when she was a girl she learn phone etiquette in school. I suppose today's blogging etiquette lessons are yesterday's phone etiquette lesson.
I also found it very important that the article included how to criticize kindly. I find that to be one of the most important rules of blogging. A comment on a blog should not be a total put down or make someone upset. I've read blogs about someone's struggles with depression where someone posts "just go kill yourself already" type of comments. I find that for one to be totally disrespectful to the author of the blog. Comments such as that one is not funny, cute, or cool to make...it can change a life from "bearly hanging on" to death. I know that's a harsh example, but I think that's a great example to make my point.

Blogs I commented on:

• Mallory Johnson's Thing number 3. In comparsion to my thing number 3, Mallory thought outside of the box about how she would use blogs in her classroom. I would have never thought to use blogs for students and each other...that was probably too obviously for me to think of lol.
• Haley Cauthen's Thing number 1. I comment on Haley's blog because like her I am a perfectionalist and doubt work. I can relate to her struggles.
• Markesha McCombs's Thing number 2. I loved Markesha's quote about teaching is a gift that not everyone is blessed with. I think that's a great way to describe teacher's talents.
• Holly Hudson's Thing 1. Holly said she wanted to become more confident using technology. Even though I feel like I know about technology I think this class with help enhance my technology knowledge and make me more confident in front of students.
• Stephen Smith's thing 5. Stephen said he didn't know how well technology would work in a elementary or middle school classroom. I don't know about elementary school but I observed a middle school in October and saw how technology was put to use in there. 
• Calla Carpenter's thing 3. I like how Calla said she would going to try to get parents to participate by giving them every opportunity.  
• Brittany Maybray's Thing 1. I like how Brittany said that if the material was boring for her that she couldn't learn it well. I had the same problem in my English honors classes, one book out of every class would be super boring for me! I want to give my student a variety of subjects to do projects on so they will learn and not be bored! 

Comments:
On Mallory's I commented about how much I loved her idea to use blogs with students. On Haley's I commented that I can relate to her worries about work not being good enough. On Markesha's I comment about how I loved her quote and talked about how I was blessed with teaching history but not something like math. On Holly's I commented about how even though I know about technology I still don't feel confident to demonstrate something in front of students because I doubt myself. I feel like this class will help me with my confidence levels. On Stephen's I commented about how I saw technology being put to use in the middle school that I observed. On Calla's I commented that I too was going to give the parents of my students every opportunity to participate. On Brittany's I commented about how I became bored and did not learn if I had to read something I did not like.