Posting hesitancy

[see: Benfield, 2000]

This is a paper I read during the Digital Environments assignment, and this is a quote I want to retain, and reflect on later. I want to think about the informal writing style that the blogoshere encourages bloggers to adopt, and whether students (as bloggers, or potential bloggers) are also hesitant/nervous about writing in this medium... as they evidently are about writing in a course discussion board.

"This may mean that, for some students anyway, threaded discussions are not conducive to thinking out loud, to tossing out ideas for testing, to speculation. Students may be initially more inclined to weigh what they say, to be more 'guarded', than perhaps they would in ordinary conversation. Others may find that the time they get to reflect and compose their comments invests them with a power they don't ordinarily feel in face-to-face communication."

[tag: community]