Edusphere Rodeo Roundup

 …Some pretty cool education blogs…

I’m still reading through the overwhelming amount of education blogs and education resource pages.  Thanks to all of your emails, I am now overloaded with reading material.  Over.  Loaded.

And here’s where it all starts at one of my new favorite blogs: The Education Wonks.  They are currently having what they call a “Carnival of Education: Week 123″  It’s great because they provide categorized blog entries from all kinds of education bloggers.  It’s a cornucopia of “free exchange of thought and ideas.” 

I read some terrific and timely blog entries about how teachers feel about teachers who are not performing and how to get rid of them.  This is timely because there is an article in the ABQ Tribune about Polk Middle School’s former principal, Theresa Baca’s efforts to push out teachers who wouldn’t commit to reforms and the APS administration “rejecting” her improvement plan.  It was interesting to read the entries from The Education Wonks because it was clear that the teachers writing were extremely frustrated with having to deal with a colleague who was bringing them all down.  Check it out for yet another perspective.

Further down the “midway”, I found a really interesting blog entry (under the category “EduTechnology”) by blogger Dy/Dan about a sure-fire method for engaging students.  It was really cool, interesting, and he’s a funny guy.  Read it; he actually IS engaging.

This new blog is definitely goin’ on the old blogroll.  I still haven’t figured out how to categorize the blogroll so I finally said the heck with it and just kept reading.  I spent hours reading from just this one post because of all the links.  Plus, there are some great links on their blogroll.

I’m learning this WordPress blog thingy fairly quickly because I have a lot of help.  (First and foremost, many thanks to my partner “S” for all of the help.  Especially for all the patience required in teaching me.)  And, I happen to love Lorell on WordPress because she has so may handy tips.  Today I found Edublogs through her advisement.  Here’s what she says:

“Edublogs.org - Providing Free Blogs to Educators and Students

Edublogs.org was one of the first WordPress.com style blogs based upon the multi-user blogging program, WordPressMU. Recently, it was announced that Edublogs.org now has almost 17,000 bloggers signed on, an amazing number.”

What does this mean?  It’s a free blog website exclusively for educators.  I signed up today.  (Oh.  My.  God.  I know, right?  Another blog!  And I’m not even an educator!  I am, however, a kindred spirit.)  I haven’t actually done anything with it because you have to get a blog to be able to log in.  I emailed them and, amazingly, James Farmer, the founder, emailed me back.  Anyway, read Lorell’s take on it… she even mentions New Mexico! 

So, today I’m bloggin’ about education bloggers and/or educating bloggers on how to blog.  You know, if you say the word “blog” too many times… people expect you to eventually begin drooling.

I’m just sayin’… sssth’aying… sss’ayin’…