शुभ आरम्भ (An auspicious start)

Hello,

I am excited to write my first ever blog post. First, acknowledging the people who encouraged me to start writing- PaSha*, my husband, and Saigal*, a dear friend in India. My brother,  Tumpa*, also in India,  will probably be the reason for me to continue writing and contributing to the blogosphere.  Except for the creation of the blog, today has been an unproductive day. I am preparing for my PhD qualifying/comprehensive exams which are due in less than 3 weeks. This is a 2-day examination wherein I would write essays on the three core areas my program focusses on: Research, Educational Leadership, and Learning Technologies. While thinking about what to write, I created a short topic list that I will focus on in the upcoming blog entries. This, I believe, will give you a peak into my infinite sources of meanderings:

1.  Learning Technologies (Sharing ideas from Learning, working and playing in the digital world [1999] by John Seely Brown- http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/sci_edu/seelybrown/seelybrown4.html)

2. Volunteering (Thoughts from Association of India's Development [AID]- http://www.aidindia.org/main/)

3. Our humble experiment at kitchen gardening. 

And then, I also made another decision when thinking how to personalize this blog. At the end of every blog entry, I will leave you with some thing to explore. This may be an image, a video, a quote, a website, a recipe, a comic strip, a DIY activity among others. 

For today (yes, I am hinting you that I have nothing else to write for today), its going to be CommuniTeach (http://www.communiteach.com/). This is a free to use, social network for learning and teaching.  I have registered myself and cannot wait to use this reciprocal service. While I am not confident what I can help someone with, I sure know I would like help learning to play the guitar, develop and use a blog effectively, learn vegan cooking...(the list is long).

So, go figure! Go wander!

अलविदा (good bye),

Mamta

*Note: Pseudonyms have been used.