Why I am not a blogvangelist…

Terry’s quasi religious fervour about blogging got me thinking what a normal staffroom would make of the term ‘blogvangelist’ when coming across it for the first time which led me on to the even more buttock-clenchingly embarrassing thought of how teachers might receive a blogvangelist in their midst. Surely with the same enthusiasm and deference reserved for OFSTED Inspectors

I’ve always been uneasy with the term because for me it conjures up an image of someone bringing good news about something quite life-transforming. From a blogvangelist I would expect something that will quite literally shake my teaching practice to the core, tranforming it into something quite wonderful that will ignite my students into amazing academic achivements that can be taken to the ends of the earth.

The reality is quite different though. The blogvangelist preaches his or her blogging Sermon on the Mount, inspiring great faith for educational revival but quickly moving on to the next group of willing listeners.

… And the teacher is left with a blog or two, a few reams of digital paper and a digital pen – the educational equivalent of a few loaves and fishes – and is expected to improve the lot of the audience-starved masses in the classroom. Unfortunately blogs are just tools and have no transforming power in themselves.

However, put a blog in the hands of creative and innovative teachers and then pupils can feel like they are walking on water, celebrating their achievements and collaborating to the ends of the world. The creative teacher has always been the key for me in providing the magic for educational blogging, not the blog itself. The technology plays a role, as do our students, but the engine for change is the innovative teacher.

I don’t think the term ‘blogvangelism’ adequately reflects the creative slog that is required from teachers to make blogs an effective tool in schools. Perhaps I’m a ‘creativeteachersmakeblogginglookeasyvangelist’