Check out dy/dan here if you’ve never read his blog before. This guy won Edublog’s “Best New Blog” award last year, and he has been linked by a number of the sites I’ve visited so far. I figured he might be a good example of what to do as a new blogger.

Conducting a blog audit mostly consists of visiting the site, roaming around for several minutes, and answering a handful of questions about it. Here goes my first audit…

What are your first impressions? Pretty traditional blog design. The content is pretty succinctly written.

What do you know about the author from the “About” page?
Very basic intro to who he is as a person/teacher. Mostly focused on his motivation for the blog or his goals for the blog. Kind of abstract.

How was the site navigation? Not notoriously easy, but not frustrating, either.

What grabbed your attention? Meyer has a Most Read Posts section, navigable from the top menu. This was VERY helpful for learning what the blog was all about. He also listed awards and nominations which the blog has received. I like that, and it feels more proud than self-congratulatory.

What did you pause to read? Short, “chunked” text, and posts with an image or two.

What did you skip over? Long paragraphs with big words.

What did you like/dislike about his posts? I liked the use of visual aids in his posts, as well as the occasional use of videos. I didn’t care for some of the posts that felt terse and too short. I didn’t fully understand every post.

How can he improve his blog? Perhaps prominently displaying some introductory posts, so that new readers can get a feel for what the recurring series posts are all about. More notably, however, he could merge some sidebar content so that it doesn’t feel so intimidating. Lots of personal information on the sidebar which could become a page by itself. Would save some valuable front page real estate.

Disclaimer: I am by no means an expert on blogging. I may be the farthest thing from a blog expert, actually. I am simply using this audit (and those that will inevitably follow it) to learn what works and what doesn’t when it comes to EduBlogging.

Again, visit dy/dan. In case you missed it, the blog can be found here.

I’m a young guy who is just trying to make it through his first year of teaching in an inner city high school. Meanwhile, I’m also trying not to fail at my first year of marriage. In my excessive amount of free time (yeah, right), I thought it might be entertaining to others if they were able to read directly about my trials.

About My Career (So Far)

I graduated from Middle Tennessee State University in May 2008 with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in English, licensed to teach English (grades 7-12) in the state of Tennessee. Being told that “they need teachers EVERYWHERE,” I assumed that the job search would be a cakewalk. Three months later, I finally found an interim teaching job in North Nashville. I would be teaching 5th grade Language Arts for two months while the “real teacher” was on maternity leave. This middle school had 87% of the student body on free lunch. I would have blogged about this school teaching experience, but I came home with a headache every day.

When the teacher chose to return, I set out for another job search. This search didn’t last nearly as long…like 2 weeks. I found myself accepting a job at Stratford High School in East Nashville. At this point it may be interesting to note that I do not actually live in Nashville. I live about 40 minutes away, in Murfreesboro. It’s quite the daily commute, but it’s worth it…so far.

My name is Bryan Cook, and I have just wrapped up my second week of instruction at Stratford High in Nashville, Tennessee. I teach English IV, as well as a (currently untitled) elective literature course which focuses on studying film as literature.

This is my first attempt at blogging as a classroom teacher. Hopefully this site will become a venue not only for my thoughts, but also for conversations with many of my students and colleagues.

If you choose to make a comment, please include some way to identify yourself. I would love to know that someone in the “real world” is reading this blog!