At the suggestion of Dr. Coop and the others at cybersalonaz.com, I accepted the NaBloPoMo challenge: one blog post per day. The first complication clearly surfaced when naming the blog, probably because I'm not sure of the goal of my daily post. Coop said, "I know not everyone can keep up with that hefty goal, but how about committing to one a week? It sure beats trying to do NaNoWriMo." Having failed at that once in 2009, I figured I could give this a whirl.
Rewind to the beginning of the summer while studying global education in preparation for a two week language immersion in Granada, Spain, as part of my doctoral studies in education. Dr. Fischman said in his lovely Argentinian accent, "First, you must write. Every day, at least once per day, you must write your ideas." Well, my ideas about contemporary literacies on the final paper garnered comments such as, "Once you know where you are going, you will know better how to support it with empirical evidence." Ok.
So, where am I going? I have two more classes to complete next semester, then I will begin writing my dissertation. When people ask what my topic is, I answer "technology" because they nod and are satisfied. Really, I'm interested in technology's effect on literacy in secondary education, but I don't like the furrowed eyebrows that response receives. Ah, much more work to be done.
In order to know where I'm going, as Fischman suggested, I will blog. See, in mine, and I'm sure many other doctoral programs, they encourage memo writing. In fact, a whole section of my qualitative research text explained memo writing. My first shot at a memo began with this quote: “to imagine literacy education as not only a pathway for professional membership, but one of development for engaged citizenship, positioning adolescents as learners of literacies of power and participants as agents of change” Morrell (2005). I love the sentiment, just not the format. I keep thinking that I don't have a commitment to memo writing, not even if it helps me find my topic. But, with NaBloPoMo here, I have agreed to make the commitment to blog each day. I've failed at NaNoWriMo, maybe this will be my success.
Which brings me back to my blog title: Literate Liza. Because I teach high school seniors, I hope that they use literacy gained from my class to become "agents of change." Next quarter, I expect them to blog their entire research process while writing a literary criticism of a famous author and two of that author's works. If I expect it of them in their research process, surely I can do it during mine. Therefore, in order to write, every day, to find my way to my topic, I shall blog.
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