The Writing Principal: Tips for Administrators Considering Blogging
Before You Start Blogging...
Read other administrators' posts. Go to badgeradmins.wikispaces.com for a comprehensive list of recommended blogs. Emulate their style and structure when developing your own voice.
Determine your purpose for blogging. Do you want to communicate with families? Reflect on your own practices? Connect with colleagues? All of the above?
Think about what you want to say and/or jot down your ideas on paper first. Doing this prior to writing a post helps organize your thinking.
Connect with educators on Twitter to build your professional learning network. You will want feedback on your posts. This social media tool is a great way to share your writing with others.
Write, type, then blog. At least initially, write your post on a word processor and copy/paste your writing into your blog.
Choose your tool. Determine which blog service you want to use. I prefer WordPress. Google Blogger is also popular.
When You Start Blogging....
Focus on being a writer first, the writing second. This is a great tip from Regie Routman. What it means to me is, without being engaging, thoughtful and to the point, it doesn't matter what I am saying because no one will want read it. The messenger is just as important as the message.
Get your ideas down. Worry about conventions later.
Save it before you publish. I reread and revise my posts many times before publishing. Barry Lane's five steps for the writing process are revision, revision, revision, revision and revision.
Share your post with someone you trust before sharing it with the world.
You can be critical, but always be kind.
Add lots of tags. These are the breadcrumbs that allow others online to find your great ideas.
When you have ideas, get them down. Save your thoughts as a draft and come back to it later when ready. I have a draft I have been sitting on since August. It won't be ready to publish until May.
Put yourself in your writing. People respond to humor, questions you have and anecdotes.
Share your posts out on Twitter and other social media tools.
After You Have Started Blogging...
Thank those who retweet and recommend your posts to others. Reciprocate by reading and sharing their posts.
Check out your statistics and allow comments. This is precious feedback to help you get better at writing.
Don't change older posts. I have come around on this. I used to think that as my thoughts changed after unlearning and relearning, I should also change what I have written. However, unless there are glaring grammatical errors or a poor choice of words, it is important to leave your previous thinking as is. Add a comment to your post to clear up confusion or address questions. There is nothing wrong with saying, "This is what I thought then, and now I think...".
Share your posts with your staff, colleagues and boss. Can you think of a better way of modeling writing and sharing yourself as a learner?
Write posts in front of students. It can be as simple as writing a review after sharing a favorite book with them. Kelly Gallagher (@KellyGtoGo) said it best: "You are the best writer in your classroom."
Have fun. I hope I have not made blogging sound like you are writing a term paper. As Alan Levine states in his terrific post The Question Should Be: Why Are You NOT Blogging: "Blogging should be conversational. It is your own personal thinking, shared out loud". Thank you to Jessica Johnson (@PrincipalJ) for sharing this.
I would go into the rationale for why you should blog, except that Superintendent Christopher Smeaton already did this so well in his post Why Blog?. I know there are many more ideas and tips out there. Please share in the comments.