I wrote 106 blog posts in 2014, or about two per week. The actual number is higher, but I wrote a bunch of drafts that are either living in the trash folder or shivering in the drafty darkness, and I removed one post from public view.

I like writing on my blog. I write here to think, to share, to socialize, to converse, to have fun, and to avoid getting down to work.

It’s interesting to look back on the last year’s posts and see what I did, and how it was received.

For instance, the blog received about 11,000 views this year, up from about 3000 in 2013.

My Favourites

When I flipped through the list of post titles, these are the ones that I remember liking more than others, or that I thought were important. They’re mostly about education, but not all. Not stats, exactly, but still neat-o.

• February 28: What’s the difference between e-Learning, online learning, Blended Learning,…?
• March 4: Why I’m leaving the Board Office and going back to the classroom
• March 24: Painful reminder
• April 3: “Being an independent practitioner is inconsistent with professional practice.”
• May 30: Who owns your final exam?
• June 4: What if ebooks had come first?
• June 4: My thoughts on DRM: Digital Rights Management
• October 15: Why Aren’t Students Engaged?
• November 7: Improving report card comments with a checklist

That’s nine posts; not one of those arbitrary numbers we call “round”, but still a nice number.

All-Time Greatest Hits

I find the most-accessed-posts list interesting. I always wonder whether the readers were “satisfied”: whether they got what they were expecting or wanting.

You can read my entire blog just by scrolling on the homepage, but these are links that were clicked directly:

• November 7, 2013: Should I have separate Twitter accounts: professional and personal? (1354 views)
• January 21, 2014: A Sample Proof Using Mathematical Induction (playing with LaTeX) (1242 views)
• February 28, 2014: What’s the difference between e-Learning, online learning, Blended Learning,…? (1011 views)
• February 24, 2013: Great Grey Owl snow-plunges and catches mouse! (570 views)

Because three of these were written in the last 14 months (interesting, eh?), those are also the top three posts of 2014.

Other Neat-o Stats

I wrote the most posts in April (31), mostly because of NaPoWriMo.

I had the most views during November (1476).

Views-per-visitor is fairly consistent, usually around 1.4 posts per day (including the homepage).

Canadian and US visitors accounted for the vast majority of the views, with nearly equal numbers of each. This is an increase in the proportion of US visitors. The next three countries are the UK, India, and Australia.

Apparently Akismet has protected my site from 18,147 spam comments already. Neat-o. This means about 1.9% of comments are legitimate, and 1.3% of comments are legitimate and not written by me.

Search Engine Terms Used

When people use search engines and find my blog, the terms used are sometimes logged. The most frequently-occurring term is brandon grasley (surprise!). Many times it’s spelled incorrectly (grasely is common), and happily there are few capitals used (Grasley is the same as grasley according to Google, after all). Some of the more interesting searches that landed people here were:

• how to build an igloo out of legos
• importance of laptop to rural school pupils when teaching
• “i didn’t publish it because i thought
• technial skill the least inportant, why
• tired of being the go-to-guy
• how long can a 500 g brick of cheese last
• email id of people who create a cover for novel
• can i read kindle comics on chunky

and my personal favourite:

• a lot of brandons who are on facebook or twitter

Neat-o, eh?

Any cool stats from your blog?