Be less polite

I’m reading a piece in which Aliza Sherman recaps a ‘golden rule’ of online discussions – Listen before jumping in. Of course this is fine for joining ongoing discussions, but it is no good when you want a group of students to –start– talking!

The full quote, from a piece called 10 Golden Rules of Social Media, is

In the ’90s, the Golden Rule of posting to a Usenet Newsgroup or other online community was to listen first before speaking. Listening thoughtfully gives you a better sense of not only what people are saying but also how they are feeling.

Now this is indeed great advice in ongoing discussions, and I do wish people would pay attention to it in some places. However, whenever I try to get students talking about anything online (unless it is for grades and under a deadline!) they mostly sit back politely and wait for others to say something. So I guess I need to encourage them to be less polite and a more pushy. How do I ‘carrot’ this – extra marks for early posting in the first three weeks to get them in the habit?

Hat tip to Zen Habits who flagged the item on Twitter


Posted

in

by

Tags:

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

css.php