DISQUS

Barn raising can be popular for wiki building too. Andy had one for the DAR wiki when it first started. Great fun. Hope yours goes well.

First to Arthus:
I agree many Newly Qualified Teacher (NQT in the UK are not students) blogs are basically hogwash. Some are not. Some are very earnest attempts at using a blog to explore the scary learning curve of the first year in the classroom on the other side of the great divide. Almost all are unheard and ignored by the 'edublogosphere' I still contend that yours would be too.
I understood that it would be a parody. There's much rich source material around. I just questioned why someone in their teens and with an internship to look forward to would be bothered to do it.
I used to read your blog. I'm afraid I dropped it as it got a bit boring. Sorry, I'm not exactly a teacher and my interest in some aspects of the US centric debate is waning. I don't read many US edubloggers either these days. I still read Clay and enjoy some of your comments there.
I can vouch for Doug BTW, he isn't someone else in disguise. I've eaten pizza with him at TeachMeet 08. He's a serious thinker, someone trying to explore and make sense of the world of blogs and all that it might mean for schooling.
I don't always agree with him but he doesn't question things lightly and when he is occasionally flip he usually corrects himself, as in the video.
Now back to talking to Doug:
I'm not seeing any strong pro student power arguments in your comments yet. I might have to blog this one myself. I almost think by using Arthus as an example you undercut and misdirected the opposition. Hmm.
What I'm not sure about and would like to explore more is how exactly you would limit the influence of the handful of students like Arthus? What practical steps would you take? If any.
BTW disqus is vile, messes with your comment feed, and I hate having to click again to see more than 10 comments. I liked the video comment though.

I think Arthus or anyone who can write a bit could make a convincing NQT type blog. I just question why they'd want to, unless it was to parody, which I admit could be fun to read. I find his arrogance that people would try to find this 'joke' blog quite amusing in that most NQT or student teacher blogs languish unread on blogspot or edublogs. I comment on quite a few as they often find the Classroom Displays blog and link to it, possibly as a result of being told to by who ever got them blogging.
I just have this vision of lots of 22 year old girls called "Mindy" or similar being accused of being a 14 year old boy in disguise :-)
To be serious for a moment I share your unease about the whole arthus cult. I have no desire to stop him blogging or joining the conversation. That's fine. I just have this faint feeling that he's being patronised, wholesale.

This post had me just about cheering. It's many years since I was involved in Youth Work but I think the guidelines you suggest are spot on! Actually it made me realise perhaps things had not changed as much as I'd thought. I totally agree about the need for discipline, it's all about clear boundries and knowing that you need to stand firm while the young people test them. They actually need you to be a fixed point sometimes whilst all around them is chaos. You are not their friend - they have friends, they don't need another infinately less cool one! You are not their parent, they have those, don't need new ones (though sometimes you can't help thinking they might...!) It's a hard job but I did enjoy it all those years ago :-)