Smile

name icon text text full text
smile 🙂 :) :-) :smile:
biggrin 😀 :D :-D :grin:
sad 🙁 :( :-( :sad:
surprised 😮 :o :-o :eek:
eek 😯 8O 8-O :shock:
confused 😕 :? :-? :???:
cool 8) 8) 😎 :cool:
mad 😡 :x :-x :mad:
razz 😛 :P :-P :razz:
neutral 😐 :| :-| :neutral:
wink 😉 ;) ;-) :wink:
lol 😆 :lol:
redface 😳 :oops:
cry 😥 :cry:
evil 👿 :evil:
twisted 😈 :twisted:
rolleyes 🙄 :roll:
exclaim :!:
question :?:
idea 💡 :idea:
arrow :arrow:
mrgreen :mrgreen: :mrgreen:

 

Adding A Clustermap Widget

Update April 2015: shortly after we published this, clustermaps had some problems, you need to set up a new account to get your maps going again. The process has not changed.

Here is a short screencast on how to add a clustermap widget to your blogs sidebar. This will let you see how many visitors you have had and where they come from.

You can embed the video from this page on another Glow Blog using this code:
[video width="640" height="400" mp4="https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/glowblogs/public/bloggingbootcamp/uploads/sites/2623/2015/03/bootcamp-widget-clustermap.mp4" poster="https://blogs.glowscotland.org.uk/glowblogs/public/bloggingbootcamp/uploads/sites/2623/2015/03/bootcamp-widget-clustermap.mp4.png"][/video]

 

How to add a cluster-map:

  1. Copy the URL to your blog
  2. Go to http://www.clustermaps.com
  3. Paste the URL into the url field and fill in your email address
  4. Submit the form
  5. Check your email and activate your account
  6. Check your mail for a second message and copy the new password.
  7. Log on to clustermaps
  8. Select the [B] Minimalist style of code
  9. Copy the code.
  10. Return to your blog. Add a text widget to your sidebar, paste in the code and save.

Bootcamp Catch Up

late

The bootcamp is well underway, if you have signed up and not started you can still catch up. Even if you have not signed up you can join in.

All you need to do:

  1. Make a blog
  2. Create a new post on that blog and categorize it bootcamp
  3. E-mail John with the address of your post: gw09johnstonjohn4@glowmail.org.uk

Lots of help and detail on the week one post.

Bootcamp Week 3

Technical

Widgets

Widgets are used to add features and functionality to the sidebar (usually) of your blog. Widget placement is dependent on themes.

Widgets on Glow Blog Help blog
Download: Widgets docx or Widgets PDF

Images

Adding an image wp4 | Glow Blog Help
Adding an image to a post MS docx
Adding an image to a post PDF

You might want to find out about Galleries too: Adding an image gallery on the Glow Blog Help

Discussion

Talk about why you should or could use images. How do they help communicate? What advantages to they bring? Discuss using images safely & legally, see the Finding Images post here for more information and some sources of images.

Blogging Challenge

A picture of learning This weeks Blogging Challenge

As part of #DigiLeanScot Week:

Blog photos of ‘a picture of learning’

What Does Learning look like in your class?

Remember to categorize your posts bootcamp!

Finding Images


Lost Boots by Phil.Renaud Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License

This came up during the week 2 GlowMeet.
Looking for images for your blog leads you into a potential minefield of copyright.
There are many images on the internet that you can use but that come with certain conditions. These conditions may include things like you can use but not edit, or that you must attribute.

Attribution is quite tricky, it means that you must give credit to the photographer and also respect the rest of their conditions. In the example about, I’ve not edited the picture (NoDerivs), I am not making money on this blog(NonCommercial) and I am attributing and linking back to the owner.

This is pretty difficult for adults and more so for younger pupils.

You have three choices:
Use only your own images. This gives lots of opportunities for creative photography.
Use images that do not need attribution, public domain ones.
Use creative commons and similarly licensed phptoas and learn to attribut.

Here are a few of the many sites that will help you find images you can use.

Morguefile.com free stock photos No attribution needed.
Pics4Learning | Free photos for education Pics4Learning is a safe, free image library for education. Teachers and students can use the copyright-friendly photos & images for classrooms, multimedia projects, websites, videos, portfolios, or any projects in an educational setting. Instructions given on each image page on how to attribute.
Flickr: The Commons and just using the flickr search tools and filtering for creative commons images. There are lots of tools that help you search flickr: my own is A flickr CC search toy
which allows you to download an image ‘stamped’ with attribution (see the example below). This avoids the need to manually attribute but in no use for headers where you crop the image.
Free Images: Where To Find Royalty Free Stock Photos For Your Blog – Mini-Guide, Part 1 A lot of different sources listed together.
Pexels · Free high quality stock photos Many dfo not need attribution CC0
Open Collections | OpenGLAM All collections provide digital scans or photos that can be freely used without any restrictions. We first list the datasets that are completely in the Public Domain: below that we list the sets that are licensed under an open Creative Commons license (CC-BY/CC-BY-SA). The sets within each list have been ordered alphabetically.

IMG_6882a

Bootcamp Week 2

bullet_infoThis week we want to think about how we are ‘looking’. Both in theme of the blog’s appearance and in the impression we make to visitors.

Technical

Custom Header Image | Glow Blog Help
Downloads: Adding a Header MS docx |  Adding a Header PDF

 

 

After week one you might like to find out a bit more about categories and tags.

Talk

Have a discussion (with your class if you are working with a class) about the impression we make to visitors to our site. What do we want to look like? Is our content appropriate? Will it give a good impression of our class and school. Do we publish information that will put us at risk?

You could blog your about your discussion and remember categorise it bootcamp.

Blog

This weeks blog challenge is to blog a bio poem as an introduction to yourself or your class. (feel free to do this in another way if you can think of something more fun).

You could do this as a whole class or individually.

Here is a help sheet from readwritthink:

Bio Poem Help Sheet

Here is an example from 2007 on the class blog I was running:

brandan-ibopoem

 

Comments

comment_addComments allow other people to comment on your posts.
You can:

  1. Turn comments off
  2. Let anyone comments
  3. Moderate comments

We recommend that you do not let anyone comment without moderation.

You can control which comments go for moderation. When you set up your blog it is set so that Comment author must have a previously approved comment. I usually add Comment must be manually approved so that I can approve all comments. Comment settings are in Settings-> Discussion in the dashboard.

Pupils cannot see or approve unmoderated comments.

Comments Help PDF Version
Comments Help MS docx Version

Making Comments

Making comments on other blogs is a good way of making connections with other people and classes.

When you are making a comment on a glow blog and you are logged into that Glow Blogs LA your name will already be filled in in the comment box.

You might like to logout so that you can fill in the URL back to your blog. This allows the owner of the blog you are commenting on to find your blog.

 

Bootcamp Week 1

bullet_infoWeek 1 kicks off on Monday 16th of February 2015

Last Chance for  the Bootcamp week 1 Blogging Bootcamp Glow Meet 2mp Thursday 19 February.

 

The Main tasks for Week 1:

  1. Create a Blog, make it Public
  2. Make a First Post
  3. Categorise that post bootcamp.
  4. email me a link to the post: gw09johnstonjohn4@glowmail.org.uk

This week we will have a GlowMeets on Monday 2pm, repeated on Tuesday 2pm and Thursday 2pm as some schools are on Holiday.

Blogging Bootcamp Glow Meet

The meeting room will be open for 10-15 minutes prior to  the meet. It should last 15-30 minutes.

I will also have the room open at 12-12:15 on Monday if you would like to make a test. Email me if another time would suit for a quick test and I’ll open the room them too.

Don’t worry if you can’t make any of the meets, the information here will be enough to get you going.

You can download the instructions an information as a word document or PDF:

Creating a Blog

 

Making your First Post

Other Activities for Week 1

Have a class discussion about what a blog is, what you think you are going to use your blog for. Blog about this, remember to tag it bootcamp.

Links

Blogging Bootcamp: Get Set

email_infoHopefully we are all ready to start the bootcamp next week.

We are aware that some Local Authorities will be on holiday for some of the week.
The planned activities are not compulsory but it is important to at least set up the blog and make a post. If you can’t do that in the first week you can catch up or join in later.

We will have a GlowMeet to kick off the bootcamp on Monday 16th February at 2pm
This will be repeated on Tuesday and Thursday at 2pm (if there are a few folk needing a different time we could change the Thursday to the morning.) Do not worry if you cannot make the meet, all the information will be posted here on the blog and I will respond to help requests via email.

the meet will be at:
https://meet.Glowscotland.org.uk/bootcamp

This will only be open at the specific times.

If you want to test Glow Meet in your establishment drop me an email with a few possible times and we can try it out. The room will be open for testing Monday 16th 12:00 midday till 12:15 pm

Safety Considerations

You will be posting material to the internet, it will be viewable by anyone with an internet connection. make sure you are aware of school policy around this.
We will be discussing Internet safety as part of the bootcamp, but teachers should be aware of the issues and their responsibilities.

Tasks for Week 1

Detailed instructions will be posted on the blog by Monday.

  • Set up a blog
  • Introduce yourself to rest of course: Make a blog post.
  • Categorize this post as bootcamp.

Send me a link to that post. This will allow me to get the url for you blog and check the category you are using. You only need to do this the first time. After that we will pull in links to blog post with the bootcamp tag automatically to the bootcamp blog.

Class/ Group Discussion
Why Blog? Talk about why you are blogging, what reasons you could have for posting information or starting conversations on the internet.
You might like to write a post about your discussions, categorize that as bootcamp too.
You may wish to note anything interesting or tricky in the setting up and post that to your blog too.

Watch the blog for updates. Drop me a mail if you have any questions

Blogging Bootcamp: 10 days to go

email_info

Still time to signup

You should have by now received a welcome email, it has also been posted to the blog.

We have 90 signups to the bootcamp! A couple of those are for non-participating interested folk, but we might get over 100 before the 16th.

I’ve also posted a very rough outline of the course.

That will probably change both over the next couple of days and throughout the course.

Before you start:
If you are using Glow:

  1. Check you can log on
  2. Check any pupils who will be posting to the blog can log on.
  3. Gather a list of the username of all the pupils who will be posting to the blog.

You Glow admin (ASM) should be able to download a class lists with users names in csv format. you should be able to copy the username column out from excel. Alternatively, create the list manually (perhaps getting pupils to add them to a list on a computer). Send me an email if you are having trouble with this.

If you are using another system make sure you and your pupils can log in.

The Bootcamp will launch with a GlowMeet on Monday 16th of February. Screencasts and supporting material will be posted to the blog. If you cannot make the 16th and would like me to repeat the Meet on Tuesday 17th, please let me know. If there are a few folk/classes that would suit we are happy to do that.

If Glow meet does not work for you do not worry, the supporting material will go over the same ground.
You can ask questions any time via e-mail or by leaving a comment on the blog.

cheers

John
gw09johnstonjohn4@glowmail.org.uk

Report a Glow concern
Cookie policy  Privacy policy

Glow Blogs uses cookies to enhance your experience on our service. By using this service or closing this message you consent to our use of those cookies. Please read our Cookie Policy.