Commenting on Thing 11

All people want to be loved and validated for their ideas and thoughts. What better way to boost self-esteem by reading comments of others? Whether the comment is a simple thank you or an idea inspired by what was wrote, we all have this need to be heard. Blogs are a great way to do this.

There is this air of anticipation when you receive a comment. What will it say? Will it be a positive one or will someone write something negative? It is like getting a present. What will it be? I feel this same way when I get an email from parents during the school year-although for these emails, I unfortunately am not "anticipating" anything but requests, negative comments and/or more work. (isn't that sad? We all need to write more positive emails to our kid's teacher!) There is more or less an air of anxiety with these emails. lol.

Commenting creates a community- you feel a part of something. Getting no comments leaves you feeling a little bit left-out...the kid who is not picked for the team. It is interesting because I am going through this right now in a support group. I leave comments about this or that and write questions, but no one comments back to me. It is almost like the community has created its own little clique and I am not welcome. (this is a community of adults too!)

I believe that as teachers, we would have to watch for this if asking students to comment on others. Popularity would win out- some kids get more comments than others. One way to disapate this would be to assign kids certain students each time to comment on. This could be done randomly. In order to count for credit, students would have to follow some guidelines in their comment that I would go over with them. I could see how using comments would help students in their understanding of content in my class if I structure it correctly.

We all deserve to be treated with respect and be encouraged in our work!