WeeklyTasks6


 


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Blogging for Beginners 2007

WEEK 6 Tasks - Feb 19th to 26th

 

Rounding Off

 

 

Objectives for Week 6: To evaluate the session and your own learning experience. To draw a plan for the integration of blogs in your teaching and learning.

 

 

Task 1 - Looking ahead - The Challenges of blog integration into our teaching:

 

(It is recommended that you read this post (Time to blog autonomously!) to our group blog before trying the tasks below) 

 

a. Plan your blogging project for 2007. The following questions may help you consider all relevant factors:

 

PLANNING YOUR BLOG

 

  • BLOG NAME
  • BLOG HOST (click here ??? for a list of possible blog hosts) - remember each one offers different features which may suit your needs better.
  • BLOG SAFETY: will you demand word verification? will comments be moderated?
  • OWNER - who will start the blog? You? somebody else?
  • ADMINISTRATOR(S) - Is this an individual project? Or will this be a team blog, with several teachers collaborating?
  • WHEN WILL THE BLOG BE KEPT ACTIVE? (starting date?; end?)
  • TOPIC - what will your blog be about?
  • WHO WILL POST? - Just you? Or you and a friend? One of your classes? Perhaps everyone in your school?
  • WHERE WILL AUTHORS POST FROM? School lab? Public PCs? Home  computers? You may need to consider programmes such as wbloggar, especially if they're working on dial-up connections...
  • HOW OFTEN WILL AUTHORS POST? - Once a week? Twice in a month? Once a term? If this is a class blog, you may need to consider how much class time you'll need to devote to it.
  • WHY WILL AUTHORS POST? Will blogging be a class requirement? Does this blog aim at encouraging free expression? Deciding upon this is bound to affect your answers to the next question.
  • EVALUATION - if this is a class blog, will bloggers be evaluated for their posts? If so, what will the criteria be? If the authors will be your learners, how will you deal with language mistakes?
 
  • TARGET AUDIENCE - who will the posters be writing for? You for your students? Or you for colleagues in your country? Or your students for another class? Thinking of what kind of connection your readers may have should be important when determining what kind of content you'll include (remember the more you embed, the harder it is for people on a slow connection to get access to your blog).
  • ADVERTISING - how will you make sure people get to know you have a blog waiting to be read? A poster in the school board? Will you post an announcement to Dekita? All depends on who you expect to read you....
  • WIDGETS -  what widgets will you embed to customize your template? (remember it's not "just bells and whistles"!)

 

 b. Post your project plan to our group. It is important that you do this as early as possible during the week of Feb 19, so that then everyone can carry out the next two tasks before the end of the workshop!

 

c. Reply to two projects posted by other participants. In your feedback, say what you particularly like about their projects, and ask them questions about aspects of their projects you find unclear...

 

d. Make any adjustments to your blogging project that you consider necessary.

 

e. Once satisfied with your plan, post it as a comment to the blog entry for this week.

 

g. Is your project a class blog? When ready, announce your blog in Dekita (OPTIONAL)

 

 

Task 2 - The future of blogging

 

a. Read "A Gartner Prediction Gone Horriby Wrong" (Agarwal 2006) and then react to this blog entry, either by posting a comment there, or linking to this blog post from your own blog! Post a message to the group to let us know where to find your views on this!

"The technology analysts at Gartner have predicted that there will be around 100 million bloggers (do not read this as blogs) in the first half of 2007 but that will be the saturation point, the blogosphere will cease to grow from that day onwards."

 

b. Want to go further? Watch The Future of Media (Sloan) (OPTIONAL)

In the year 2014 the New York times has gone offline...The Fourth Estate's fortunes have waned What happened to the news?.... and what is EPIC

 

On the same page, you'll find a link to the a new version of the movie, set in the year 2015.

 

How do such predictions make you feel, now that you're ready to become a "loud voice" in the blogosphere?

 

 

 

Task 3 - Evaluation time!

 

Please answer our survey to help us get to know your views on the workshop. (The survey will be closed on Feb 26, 12 AM GMT. Make sure to try it before then!)

 

Click here to see results (as from Feb 26, 2007)

 

JUST FOR FUN: one way to measure your "success" as a blogger so far could be to try a search on Technoratti with your name, or your blog name... Has anyone been blogging about your blog? Not yet? Try again in a couple of months!

 

 

 

Task 4 - Time to celebrate!

 

Sunday, February 25
18:00 GMT
Alado Graduation party Host:The Blogging Team

Make sure you've added all of the Blogging Team to your Yahoo! messenger (Yahoo IDs: gladysbaya, carlaarena, mcbellusci and erikacruvinel) to your contacts so that we can see when you get online and help you get into the Alado Room if necessary!To make it easier for us to find you, add your name to the database started for this meeting. If you have access to speakers and a microphone, check they're working in advance!

 

Click here to check your work for Week 6