KCF and I had a very productive (and fun) day together discussing our dialogue/diablog project. We also enjoyed tea (and laughing at the elaborate descriptions of the coffee)at Angry Catfish and lunch at Bill’s Garden Chinese Gourmet. Remarkably, we also managed to find the time to create a rough sketch of our article, complete with assignments for each of us!

Here it is:

Section One: Introduction and Theorizing about Project

1. About (KCF)
2. About (SLP)
3. Explain the Writing Project (SLP)
4. Describe the Format (SLP)
5. Accessibility (KCF)
6. VCR (SLP)
7. Busting Binaries (KCF)

Section 2: Dialogues/Diablogs about our 4 Topics

In this section, which will involve an “experimental” format, we will offer up our reactions to/reflections on each of these bullet points. We will use the following questions as our guide:

1. Reflections – what does [insert idea] mean to you?
2. How do you see this as relating to your own political investments or positionality?

Each of our responses should be roughly 150-200 words (yikes!). This is a rough estimate because we also discussed the need for flexibility–we might have more to say about visibility than training, for example. Regardless of how many words we have for each section, I think we should aim for about 2700-3000 words total for this entire section. Sound good, KCF?

Topic One: Visibility

• Making thinking/writing/pedagogy process visible (exposing process, making us vulnerable)
• How we choose to make our own processes visible to others

Topic Two: Training

• Instilling confidence and desire to experiment with blogs
• Using links and tags subversively

Topic Three: Engagement/Evaluation

• The benefits and drawbacks of comments for engagement
• How to evaluate students and give them public feedback

Topic Four: Community (specific bullet points TBD)

• Establishing community through authenticity and accountability
• Engaging in shared knowledge production

Section 3: Conclusion

1. Reflect on the value of diabloguing together and on the process of doing this project (what have we learned from each other and what we have learned from experience of blogging/reflecting on blogging)

Note: As I was writing the above statement, I realized that it sounded familiar–a lot like Freire’s idea of praxis (practice + continued reflection on practice = praxis).

2. Describe how this project is enabling us to access our feminist selves in new and exciting ways.

Section Four: Actual Assignments

We want to include a few actual examples of blog assignments or blog pages that illustrate the ideas that we are reflecting on/promoting in this essay.

Section Five: Bibliography

Provide a list of links (to current articles/blog posts on technology and teaching) that have informed our discussion and our reflections on the four topics.

KCF: Let me know if there are key things that I have missed or if you have suggestions on better ways to articulate our bullet points. Any other thoughts on this rough sketch are welcome too.