Sunday, June 10, 2007

1. Create Your Own Blog

Create the Empty Blog

Create a blog on Blogger.com, a free service from Google. You can upload a photo of yourself or a caricature to further personalize your blog (here's the small photo I use). Here are the simple steps:
  1. Go to Blogger.com
  2. -- If you already have a Google account, log in to it using your username and password.
    -- If not, select a username and a password to create your Google account. You have to use your real name in the process, but your username may be anything (without spaces). Your password should be more than 6 characters, and ideally would include a mix of lower case, upper case and numbers. (But you DO have to remember it!).
  3. Pick a name for your blog. It can be anything from "Martha's Blog" to "Internet Learning in Room 302."
  4. Pick a one-word "short name" for your blog that will be part of its web address. Since this must be unique, pick a name that others probably haven't already chosen. It could be "marthablog" or "rm302" or anything. You and others will access your blog using this name in an address like: "http://marthablog.blogspot.com."
  5. Choose a template from the examples to choose the appearance of your blog; you can always change your mind later.
Congratulations! You've created your blog! Next step is to add your first post (message):

Add Your First Post:
What do you think of blogging? Any ideas where you might you this in school?
  1. Click on "Post," "Create," "New Post" or whatever will take you to an editing window where you can write your first message. It's called a post for the same reason our mail goes through the post office.
  2. Each posting requires a short, explanatory Title, just like the subject in an e-mail message. Your message will be shared via its title, so it should be self-explanatory. Enter your title in the Title box.
  3. Each posting requires a message body, again like an e-mail message. The editing window provides formatting tools like simple word processor that you can use to add to the expressiveness of your text. Book titles, for example, may be italicized.
  4. Each posting should also include tags or labels. These are descriptive terms, separated by commas, that you or others may use to search for relevant postings. Be sure to use our workshop tag for every post your create in the workshop. That's how we'll share with each other. Write two or three tags in the Labels for this post section.
  5. Optional: A small photo from your computer or from the web may be added to any post (use the Add Image tool in the button bar). Hovering the mouse over a tool will display the tool's function.
  6. When you are finished, click on Publish Post (or on Save As Draft if you don't want to post it yet).
Congratulations! You've completed your first post and finished the activity! Later we'll share and comment on each others' posts.

1 comment:

CNicholas said...

This resource was very easy to follow and I was successful in creating my own blog and entering two postings. I am unsure of the difference between a tag and label. Is there a difference?