Before we talk about what to write on your blog, let’s talk about why to write. If you already have your own blog and are a confident blogger, feel free to jump down to the the ‘what to write for Thing 3’ section of this post.
Why blog?
People blog because they want to share something. For some people, that ‘something’ is cats or holiday pictures, but blogging can be a great development tool for sharing research and professional insights. It’s a great way to incorporate reflective practice into your work, and it also helps you share your work with others, making professional contacts and extending your online network and presence.
Before you start, it may be helpful to think about what kind of things you want to share and what kind of blogger you want to be. Do you want to share research? Connect with those in your field? Increase your online presence? Develop an online presence for a project? Simply reflect upon your 23 Things experience? The answer to these questions will help determine the tone you take and what kinds of things you want to share on your blog.
Blogcraft
There is a certain set of expectations around style and tone that comes with blogging. Generally you should simply be yourself and write clearly. A certain level of personality and informality is usually fine, and often welcome. A few more tips:
- Be concise. Short is better. Use subheadings and images to break up the text.
- Know your audience (or your intended audience).
- Ask questions! Get your audience involved.
- Allow your personality to show, and don’t be afraid of humour.
- Blog regularly. This doesn’t have to be every week, but it should be consistent.
What to write for Thing 3
For your first 23 Things blog post, we’d like you to write a short piece about your experiences with social media and what you hope to get out of the 23 Things for Research and the Engage: Social Media Michaelmas programme. If you’re new to social media and digital tools for communication, do you have any ideas about how it might help or affect your work? If you’re using these things already, what do you use? What are you hoping to explore?
Note: Please ‘tag’ or ‘label’ this post ‘Thing 3′ so that others can easily follow your progress and find specific posts. For each post you make in the 23 Things programme, please make sure to label or tag it ‘Thing [?]’ for the number of the Thing it relates to. You’re welcome to add other tags if you would like to. If you’d like guidance on tags and labels, there are instructions online for Blogger or WordPress. If you are using another service, have a quick Google or feel free to ask the 23 Things team.
Further reading