Bud the Teacher on Blogging

I want to steer you towards a post that you may find interesting. It starts with a post by Colorado HS teacher, Bud Hunt, who uses blogging with his English students. He himself blogs at a site called Bud the Teacher, and his work is well worth a look. The issue in this particular post seems to reside somewhere between supporting student writing as a tool for expression, and the notion of "teaching" blogging as a kind of act of connective communication and engagement with the world of ideas. The interwoven issues are nicely articulated and then, even better, several teachers respond to Bud's post (including Mr. I, whose classroom blog was one of those that we looked at) and complicate the issues still further, in lots of good ways.
This discussion fits very nicely with the conversations we started on Friday, in which some of potential benefits of blogging (being able to go deeper on a conversation, including the quieter students, slowing down the conversation) were mentioned along with concerns around privacy and that we not forget how to have good face-to-face discussions. Bud's experiences, even as a believer in the power of blogging as a tool, seem to indicate that "getting there" takes time and thought.
Here's the thread...your thoughts are welcome (whether here or on Bud's blog) Jeff