Well, in this seminar, we many discussed about How do you define an easily identifiable writing style that makes your post unique? And Is an engaging blog post defined by what readers want to read, or by the writer’s true self expression? , then analyzed a blog together.
Firstly about the first question:
How do you define an easily identifiable writing style that makes your post unique?
In my own perspective, this is a question that seem vague. Because every single person has a different writing style, and “ writing style” this concept wasn’t defined specifically, so it was vague about what to talk about. Such as we could talk about the use of some devices or tone inside the blog. These are all some sort of writing styles. I think a better question might be what makes your blog stand out and be unique, in xxx way/ perspective, or what are some tips that we could use to make our blog unique and identifiable?
Because during the seminar, we kind of drifted away and went to discuss something else, and it was quite messy with the organization, so that we weren’t able to be really focused on discussing.
The second question:
Is an engaging blog post defined by what readers want to read, or by the writer’s true self expression?
Is actually a pretty good question to discuss about, and we did discuss this for a long time. We went on to some questions about originality, and extended the blog to some videos and artworks, trying to prove that they are similar. A question I remembered was : When we add someone else’s style, but inputs our own thoughts inside it, is it still emotion? I wasn’t able to answer that in the seminar. But in my own perspective, this is something really common in life, that we could see this kind of thing every single day. Because style could be similar, and massive groups of people share the same view, style and perspective. Most styles come from imitation then develops into personal styles/ likes. And since that all of us are individuals, nobody could actually replace you even though they might share the same thought with you, and so what you feel, and think is your true emotion. Another point I heard about this question that I really liked was that the media will find an audience for you, and this point was picked up many times as we went through the seminar.
Then at last was the analyze of the blog. This part was the most efficient and direct part to answer what makes a good blog post. Such as using pictures to replace loads of environment description meanwhile to focus more on your own feelings. Also, adding some historical content would be something special, such as in the blog, the history of monks was used to show how precious the temple was and their ability to preserver for a long time to build the temple. We discussed on balance inside blogs too, making balance between it’s clarity and depth, the length of the blog etc.
As for my own performance, I got a 6 for analyzing, and a 7 (I think it wasn’t put on my grade book since only one criteria was assessed. I think I wan’t able to correspond to others that much, most of the time, I was just making some new points, and only saying something like “building on xxx’s point”. Also, my concentration wasn’t that focused, so even though I gave myself more time to think (As I reflected in my first reflection) the effect wasn’t significant. I just scored the same thing as last time, but the quality went up actually, so I did better.)
At last, for the leaders. I think it was messy overall, the order always changes, and that the leaders couldn’t remember the order that they just pointed on, so maybe next time record the names, and those that don’t speak a lot and include them inside. Overall, it was pretty good.