 |
Blogging for Beginners 2007
WEEK 1 Tasks - Jan 15th to 21st
Getting Started
|
| Objectives for Week 1: To get familiar with the moderators and other participants and the online environments to be used. |
| Click here for tutorials for the tasks below. |
Task 1 - Getting to Know Your Partners:
a. Post a message to the group introducing yourself. Make sure to include the following information:
* Your full name, and how you'd like the group to address you.
* Your city and country of origin / residence.
* What do you do? If you are a teacher: what do you teach exactly? what ages and levels do you work with? If you're not a teacher: what led you to join this workshop?
* Is this your first time at an EVO workshop? Are you joining other EVO workshops too?
* Some personal information that'll help everyone see you there's a real human being behind your emails... Do you have an interesting hobby? a special skill? A terrible secret? ;-) Share your uniqueness!
SURVIVING THE FIRST DAYSMore than 250 messages were posted to our group on its first day. This can be for less experienced members, or those with hectic work calendars at this time of the year!!!
JUST REMEMBER:
As a first step, make sure you've set your mailing preferences to "Daily digest". It may take Yahoo a while to process that, but when it does, you will be getting only one email for every 25 messages posted to the group. Then you'll find it really easy to scan the subject lines (which are all grouped at the top) and click only on the ones you really want to read (they're hyperlinked to the texts in the same message you get).
If you find digests still too time-consuming, you can change your emailing preferences to "Special Notices", in which case you'll be getting only messages we moderators post as special (the weekly tasks posted today, for instance). Or you may choose "No mail", and simply ignore the interaction at the group completely!
Try
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/groups/mypreferences/ for detailed guidelines on how to do this (you can change your mailing preferences as many times as you like).
Meanwhile, you can read everybody's intros at http://bloggingforbeginners.pbwiki.com/Participants
, and at the weekend a summary of discussions "you shouldn't miss" will be published at the wiki too.
As you probably know, weekly tasks are also available at
http://bloggingforbeginners.pbwiki.com/WeeklyTasks, so you needn't worry
about missing anything even if you don't read a single message!
If you choose to receive group messages (individually or digests) with your email, creating a filter that automatically puts them into a folder is a clever way to separate them from all your other emails. You can then look into that folder whenever you want to, and ignore it for the rest of the day. Try this link:
http://learningwithcomputers.pbwiki.com/Textmails#HowcanyouautomaticallyorganizemessagesfromourgroupifyoureusingOutlookExpress
for a tutorial to do that.
You can also help others follow by:
* making subject lines as specific as possible
* deleting all irrelevant text from original messages when replying
And remember just lurking is perfect!
Things will quieten down soon, just help us make it as easy as possible for everyone...
The Blogging Team
b. Reply to at least two introductions posted to the group (you could either highlight things in common between you and other partners, or ask questions of them).
c. Learn who make up The Blogging Team. Do you have any questions for us? Post them to the group too!
d. Add your photo and message to our Frappr map. Let's show how international our community is!
e. Access our Yahoogroup Database and enter your data. (you need to click on "add your record") to help us organize information.
f. Update your Yahoo profile, so that everybody will find it easy to know who you are.
g. OPTIONAL TASKS:
1. If there are any dates you'd like to share with us(your birthday, perhaps?), add them to the group calendar !
2. Add your photo to our album for participants at our YG.
3. Set your mailing preferences for our group. We strongly suggest "Daily digest" (this means you'll be getting just one message in your inbox for every 25 messages posted to the group).
Task 2 - Discussing Blogs
a. How much do you already know about blogging? Answer our introductory survey to help us find it out!
b. Read What Exactly is a Blog Anyway? (Carvin A., 2006) and then...
| If you don’t know what a blog is, you’re not alone; according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, nearly two-thirds of Internet users don’t have a good idea of the meaning of “blog.” |
| This article takes a look at blogging, which is becoming increasingly popular as a language learning tool. It gives an overview of blogging websites, suggests why you might want to use them, and gives some practical advice on setting up blogs for use with your own classes. |
c. Visit our group blog and compare it with our wiki. Also, have a look at this website: http://www.tesol.org.
Can you now tell the difference between a blog, a wiki and a website in your own words? Share your questions and ideas by posting a message to the group.
d. Looking Ahead:
Have you ever blogged?
Have you ever blogged with your classes?
How might a blog contribute to your professional development?
What you might do with a blog in your classes?
These questions are really meant for personal reflection, though you may want to share your answers with the group. We encourage you to take your thoughts down using a notepad, a word processor, or simply paper and pen!
Task 3 - Time for synchronous interaction!
| Monday and Tuesday, January 15 and 16 | 22:00 GMT | Skype | Office Hours for doubts, questions, and support for participants | Skype ID: carlaarena |
Join us at Yahoo! messenger on Wednesday, January 17 - 22 to 23 GMT or Saturday, January 20 - 10 to 11 GMT for a short chat on your expectations for this workshop and your experience so far. We'll also explore how this tool can help us in the following weeks.
Make sure you've added Gladys (Yahoo ID: gladysbaya) to your contacts so that she can see when you get online and invite you to join the conference!To make it easier for us to find you, add your name to the database started for this session. If you have access to speakers and a microphone, check they're working in advance, so that we can try voice chat for a while too!
Comments (0)
You don't have permission to comment on this page.