As a central tool of this class, you will create your own blog to use this semester for all of your written assignments, and to keep track of your thoughts about any of the issues we cover. You can also maintain this blog after this class is over for personal or professional purposes.
In the context of this course, your blog has two purposes:
1) Your blog will provide a space for you to keep all of your assignments over the course of our semester together. You will not hand in written assignments to me each week; rather you will post them on your blog. In this sense, your blog is merely your assignment notebook that you will use as you read and prepare for class each week. You will also be posting any additional thoughts you have: responses to class discussion, after thoughts, things you forgot to say in class, relevant experiences you have, etc.
But importantly, your blog is a public space, and as you post (and comment on others'), you will gain a much richer understanding of everything we read and discuss in class. I want you to think of it as interactive and intertextual in that way. In this sense, your blog is much more than just a Microsoft Word document that happens to be online. It is a hypertextual space that allows you to link to images, webpages, video and other online tools and toys.
2) Creating your own blog will also introduce you to the blogisphere if you don't know this place already. Why blog? I am trying to encourage you to practice the digital literacies we are learning about. Further, I think you will enjoy it, and I hope that you will discover creative educational uses for this online medium. You will see how easy it is to use blogger.com, and perhaps it will inspire you to bring blogs into your classroom or youth space someday.
To start your own blog, you need to go to: www.blogger.com
Click the button that says NEW BLOG (you will see this even if you have blogged before) and follow the instructions to get started.
As you fill in the info, you will be asked to give your blog a TITLE. This title will appear at the top of your blog. (Mine is called "XXXXX")
Then, you need to choose an address: http://_______.blogspot.com. This will be the web address associated with your site. You can call it anything you like. Be clever or simple (or both) -- it is up to you. Do note that many addresses have already been used by other bloggers, so you may have to get creative. Write it down so you don't forget it! (You can also find it later on in your Dashboard where all of your future blogs will be listed.)
You will also need to choose a design template for your blog. For the purposes of this class, you must choose SIMPLE OR PICTURE WINDOW for ease and readability. Once you have the account set up, you can start posting.
A “post” is an entry on your blog. (For clarification, you have one blog, but many posts). Give the post a title and then compose as you would any journal entry. When you are finished, hit the button at the bottom that says Publish. It will not appear on your blog until you publish it. You can always go back and edit old posts and create new ones.
Your First Post:
Your first post should be a short introduction to you using PICTURES. (Need help? Click here.) Post 2-5 pictures of yourself that tell us about who are you, what you did over the break, what do you do when you are not in class, where you work, what kind of hobbies you are into, etc. (If you don't have access to personal pictures today, then find images online that speak to who you are.) Add some captions to each one.
POST A COMMENT WITH YOUR ADDRESS:
When you are done creating your blog and posting your first entry, please come back to this blog and post a comment at the end of the first post (scroll down) that includes your name and your blog address so that I can post it in the blog list to the right.
Some Tips and Helpful Hints:
- Once you are in your blog, look at the top right corner of the screen. If you click on the word DESIGN, you will be able to make design changes, create new posts, edit old posts, etc. (You can only do this if you are logged in to your blog.)
- Once you are in the DESIGN screen, you can do all kinds of things to make your blog a bit more interesting. Change your fonts and colors, edit a post, change your settings. See the tabs at the top of the screen for all kinds of options.
- Poke around online and make a list of websites related to education, media literacy, social justice or anything else relevant and post them on your blog. You can add all kinds of things by ADDING A GADGET from your LAYOUT screen.
- Just do the best you can with this. If you get stuck, don't fret... I am happy to help you anytime as you work on getting this started. And remember: you can't break it. It is just a blog. Everything can be changed if need be!
JS(:
