Linky love, snark attacks, and fierce debates about teacher quality? A peek inside the education blogosphere.

Linky love, snark attacks, and fierce debates about teacher quality? A peek inside the education blogosphere. If I mentioned Thomas Friedman Thomas Lauren Friedman, OBE (born July 20, 1953), is an American journalist. He is an op-ed contributor to The New York Times, whose column appears twice weekly and mainly addresses topics on foreign affairs. and George Will George Frederick Will (born May 4, 1941) is a Pulitzer Prize-winning, conservative American newspaper columnist, journalist, and author. Education and early careerWill was born in Champaign, Illinois, the son of Frederick L. Will and Louise Hendrickson Will. , surely you wouldknow that they are among the nation's most influential newspapercolumnists. But what about Markos Moulitsas Markos Moulitsas Z��niga (born 11 September 1971), often known by his username and former military moniker "Kos" (kōs), is the founder and main author of Daily Kos, a weblog focusing on liberal, and Democratic Party politics. and Michelle Malkin Michelle Malkin (n��e Maglalang) (born October 20, 1970) is a socially and politically conservative American columnist, blogger, author and political commentator. She makes frequent guest appearances on national syndicated radio programs and on television networks such as ? Ifthese names don't ring a bell, you haven't explored the worldof web logs, or blogs for short. They are two of the nation's mostinfluential bloggers. Likewise, if I asked what Diane Ravitch Diane Ravitch is a historian of education, an educational policy analyst, and former United States Assistant Secretary of Education who is now a research professor at New York University's Steinhardt School of Education. , Jack Jennings, and KatiHaycock have in common, you would say they are all contributors to K--12education policy debates, oft quoted in the nation's leadingnewspapers. But what about Will Richardson, Joanne Jacobs, andEduwon-kette? If these names are unfamiliar to you, it's time It's Time was a successful political campaign run by the Australian Labor Party (ALP) under Gough Whitlam at the 1972 election in Australia. Campaigning on the perceived need for change after 23 years of conservative (Liberal Party of Australia) government, Labor put forward a tovisit the education blogosphere The total universe of blogs. See blog. . As a relatively new education bloggermyself (at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute's Flypaper blog), let mebe your guide. Blogs burst onto the scene in the late 1990s and gained majormomentum in the middle of this decade. By some estimates there are nowmore than 100 million blogs worldwide. But while reading and writingblogs is extremely popular--two blogging sites (blogger.com andwordpress.com) each receive more web traffic in the United States United States,officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. thanthe number-one online newspaper (nytimes.com)--no single blog isreaching a mass audience. For example, Daily Kos Daily Kos (IPA: /koʊs/) is an American political blog, publishing news and opinion from a progressive point of view. , one of the mostprominent political blogs on the net, pulls in only 0.027 percent of theglobal web audience in a given period, versus 0.87 percent that readnytimes.com. More than 1,600 web sites in the U.S. get more traffic thanDaily Kos; nytimes.com, meanwhile, is ranked number 24. (These data allcome from alexa.com.) Blogs represent the "long end of thetail" of the media; a new form of mass communication this is not. And at the far end of that long tail sits the educationblogosphere, a niche within a niche, with as many as 30,000 blogs.Joan-nejacobs.com, written by a former San Jose Mercury News The San Jose Mercury News is the major daily newspaper in San Jose, California and Silicon Valley. The paper is owned by MediaNews Group. Its headquarters and printing plant are located in North San Jose next to the Nimitz Freeway (Interstate 880). reporterand columnist, is among its leading lights, yet is ranked lower thanabout 140,000 other web sites in the US. (Compare that to edweek.org,which is ranked about 40,000th.) But Jacobs is a big fish in this smallpond. Table 1 shows that her site, along with Richardson'sweblogg-ed.com, significantly outplaces all competitors when measured bythe number of other blogs linking to them recently. This isn't aperfect indicator of a blog's influence (while daily or monthlyreadership measures might be better, they are not available for allblogs) but it does show the "authority" given to a site byother bloggers. In this world, links are the coin of the realm, and themore the better.Tracking the Top Blog (Table 1) Education blogs by rank, August 2008Blog Author (s) Technorati Authority ScoreWeblogg-ed Will Richardson, author, Blogs, Wikis, 850 Podcasts and Other Powerful Web Tools for ClassroomsJoanne Jacobs Joanne Jacobs, former San Jose Mercury 788 News reporter and columnistCool Cat Vicki Davis, teacher in the Westwood 531Teacher Schools in Camilla, Georgia2c Worth David Warlick, former teacher and founder 529 of The Landmark ProjectSpeed of Wesley Fryer, former teacher and now 462Creativity director of technology and education outreach for the Oklahoma Heritage AssociationDangerously Dr. Scott McLeod, coordinator of the 443Irrelevant educational administration program at Iowa State UniversityEdu.bloqs Ewan Mcintosh, teacher and professional 406 development provider in Edinburgh, ScotlandFischbowl Karl Fisch, teacher at Arapahoe High 323 School (Centennial, CO)Students 2.0 K-12 students from around the world 266The Thinking Jeff Utecht, technology specialist, 243Stick Shanghai American SchoolNote: Authority score is the number of unique blogs that havelinked to that blog within the past 180 days, as measured bytechnorati.com.SOURCES: Selections culled by author from a list of the "Top 50education blogs" available at Dangerously Irrelevant. Authority scoresfrom technorati.com. So what are these education bloggers blogging about? WillRichardson, whose site is the top education blog, informs teachers abouthow to integrate technology into the classroom. That's a commontheme: 6 of the top 10 education blogs focus on technology-relatedtopics. Joannejacobs.com is more ecumenical, linking to and commentingon daily newspaper articles and other blog posts and providing a forumfor others to do the same. Some write about instructional practice,typically with a clear progressive bent. The Fischbowl, for instance,describes itself as "a staff development blog for Arapahoe HighSchool Arapahoe High School can refer to several different schools: Arapahoe High School (Centennial, Colorado) Arapahoe High School, Arapahoe, Nebraska [CO] teachers exploring constructivism constructivism,Russian art movement founded c.1913 by Vladimir Tatlin, related to the movement known as suprematism. After 1916 the brothers Naum Gabo and Antoine Pevsner gave new impetus to Tatlin's art of purely abstract (although politically intended) and 21st century learningskills." Perhaps the most interesting among the top 10 education blogs isStudents 2.0. As its name implies, the site is penned by pupils fromaround the world who submit entries to the blog's editors. In someways, its credo is radical, decrying the expectation that students be"widgets for the vast machine of industry." Yet the site isalso refreshingly committed to high standards. Consider this statement."Every post is reviewed for quality: not just anything will beaccepted. You will find no improper grammar or truncated ideas here. Infact, you may well learn a thing or two about excellence in writing; wecertainly hope you are willing to learn from a generation of studentteachers." If none of these blogs is familiar to you, don't fret. Readersof Education Next are probably more likely to be drawn to educationpolicy sites, none of which reach "top 10" status amongeducation blogs overall (see Table 2). Here the masters of the (blog)universe are all wonks: Eduwonkette, Eduwonk, and The Education Wonks,and two of the three are anonymous wonks, or used to be. The story ofEduwonkette is particularly illuminating; she was recently revealed tobe Jennifer Jennings, a graduate student in sociology at ColumbiaUniversity Columbia University,mainly in New York City; founded 1754 as King's College by grant of King George II; first college in New York City, fifth oldest in the United States; one of the eight Ivy League institutions. . Rather than merely toiling away in the vineyards of theAmerican Educational Research Association The American Educational Research Association, or AERA, was founded in 1916 as a professional organization representing educational researchers in the United States and around the world. , writing papers for fellowacademics, she recently overtook o��ver��took?v.Past tense of overtake. Eduwonk as the top education policyblogger, even though her competitor is a former Clinton White House aideand cofounder co��found?tr.v. co��found��ed, co��found��ing, co��foundsTo establish or found in concert with another or others.co��found of a major Washington education think tank. It'scliched cli��ch��dalso cliched ?adj.Having become stale or commonplace through overuse; hackneyed: "In the States, it might seem a little clich��d; in Paris, it seems fresh and original" to say that the Internet evens the playing field and makes thetraditional trappings of power and influence obsolete, but so it is.Wonkfest (Table 2) Education policy blogs by rank, August 2008Blog Author (s) Technorati Authority ScoreEduwonkette Jennifer Jennings, doctoral student, 179 Columbia UniversityEduwonk Andrew Rotherham, cofounder, Education 165 SectorThe Education Anonymous (EdWonk, TeacherWonk, and 129Wonks TeenWonk)The Quick and Kevin Carey and others, Education Sector 103the EdIntercepts Mike Antonucci, Education Intelligence 89 AgencyMatthew Tabor Matthew Tabor, independent college 82 admissions counselorSchools Jim Horn, PhD (affiliation unknown) 82MatterThis Week In Alexander Russo, former Capitol Hill 82Education stafferFlypaper The Education Gadfly team (including 79 author), Thomas B. Fordham InstituteJay P. Greene Jay P. Greene, University of Arkansas 76 Department of Education Reform (and others)Note: Authority score is the number of unique blogs that have linked tothat blog within the past 180 days, as measured by technorati.com.SOURCES: Author. Authority scores from technorati.com. Further to that point, it's also striking that the majoreducation interest groups aren't yet bigtime big��timeor big-time ? Informaladj.Significant or important; major: a bigtime comedian.adv.To an extreme degree; very much: Sales are expanding, big-time. players in theblogosphere. While the United Federation of Teachers, the AmericanFederation of Teachers American Federation of Teachers(AFT), an affiliate of the AFL-CIO. It was formed (1916) out of the belief that the organizing of teachers should follow the model of a labor union, rather than that of a professional association. , and the National School Boards Association allhave active blogs, none makes the top 10 lists. And while the teacher-oriented blogs seem to skew (1) The misalignment of a document or punch card in the feed tray or hopper that prohibits it from being scanned or read properly.(2) In facsimile, the difference in rectangularity between the received and transmitted page. toward aconstructivist con��struc��tiv��ism?n.A movement in modern art originating in Moscow in 1920 and characterized by the use of industrial materials such as glass, sheet metal, and plastic to create nonrepresentational, often geometric objects. worldview world��view?n. In both senses also called Weltanschauung.1. The overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world.2. A collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group. , the policy blogs are more balanced betweenLeft and Right. Eduwonk and the Quick and the Ed write from thecenter-left; Intercepts, Flypaper, and Jay P. Greene come from thecenter-right. (The latter two were launched this past spring and aresteadily moving up in the rankings.) In this way, the blogosphere seemsto mimic real life, where most teachers skew progressive in theireducational philosophy, but policy debate is more evenly balanced. There's one other way that the Net mirrors reality: the lackof a prominent parent blog. This isn't to say that parentsaren't Hogging; there are plenty of local or issue-specific parentblogs around. But there's no significant parent voice in thenational online conversation, just as there's no national parentadvocacy group in Washington. That's a real shame; someone shouldblog about it.