Cuatro causas por las que tu empresa no funciona bien en los medios sociales
Creative Commons License Photo Credit: infocux Technologies via Compfight

Admin:

Students – Check to see if you have a mentor assigned to you. Remember to check your comments and reply to any left by your mentor. Their first comment will probably be on your first post or your about me page that you created last week in the challenge.

Also check to see you are only mentioned once on the spreadsheet. Do this by using CTRL F and typing in your name. It will then allow you to scroll through to find out if you are mentioned more than once. Leave me a comment mentioning your name and URL and how many times you are on the list.

Classes – Please start making connections with other classes of a similar age or subject area in the higher grades. If you find a link on the spreadsheet that goes to a student blog rather than a class blog, please email me so I can take it off the list. Remember to leave a link on challenge posts once you have completed one of the activities for that post. I will visit to leave comment and also add you as a possible example for the next challenge in March.

Mentors – if you filled in the form AND left a short bio in the comment area of the registration post, then you should have been assigned a group of students. Please check the comment area of this post to find out which group of students you will be looking after.

COMMENT COMMENT COMMENT

Back in 2010 I asked Mrs Yollis and her students to create a post about commenting.

She included using HTML code when writing comments. This will interest our older bloggers.

So please visit her first before doing the activities below.

……………………………………………………………………………..

Are you still here?

Off you go, visit Mrs Yollis’ blog on commenting.

……………………………………………………………………………..

That was quick.

Are you sure you visited Mrs Yollis’ blog

to learn about HTML code in your comments?

……………………………………………………………………………..

OK, what did you learn while reading the blog and listening to Mrs Yollis and her students tell you about how to write great comments? If your school didn’t allow you to go to her post, I have included the video at the bottom of this post. I have also included a video for high school students about commenting. Teachers: a link to teaching quality commenting including more videos and information.

Let’s start talking online

It has been great to see a number of students and classes starting to visit other blogs and leave comments. Which of the following comments would you prefer to find on your blog?

how do you add a video

this is a great blog. i like Katy Perry too. plz visit my blog at ……………..

G’day John, I enjoyed reading your post about Talk like a Pirate Day. We also did that in our class. We dressed as pirates, spoke using pirate terms, but also found out there are still pirates roaming the seas even in modern times. Do you know how they are different to the old time pirates? Visit our class blog to read what we found out. …………….  Miss Wyatt

Activity 1: Write a post, create a video or create a poster about commenting.

Might be tips to get more visitors,  guidelines for acceptable comments on your blog, examples of good and bad comments – think outside the square. Remember you don’t have to approve all comments. It is your blog; send some to the trash and if it is a company trying to get you to visit their blog to buy something, then label it as spam.

Here are some links to commenting guidelines written by students and classes. Class in New Zealand, grade 11/12 class in USA, Huzzah class blog in Canada, Abbey has a blogging guideline page, Mrs Allen created a poster about commenting

 Activity 2: Write a really interesting post that you think will get lots of comments.

Often writing about one of your passions will get lots of comments, so will something controversial where your readers could agree or disagree with your opinion. Remember to end with a question so your readers can give an answer. If you are on Twitter use the hashtag #14stubc to mention your post. Otherwise leave a comment on this challenge post so I can add it to twitter.

Here are some posts written by students saying how to attract visitors to your blog – Alexandra, Jake, Ashleigh, Leif,

Activity 3: Have a family member write a post for you to add to your blog.

They could write it and email or post it to you. Does this post attract more visitors or family members leaving comments? One family member regularly blogs on Mrs Yollis’ blog – Where is nonno?

Activity 4: Write a post about the overseas blogs you have commented on.

We have over 30 countries represented in our class and student blogging participants. Visit some of them, read their posts and leave a quality comment. Why did you choose that blog and particular post?

Check out how Ms Bliss’ class wrote their post.

Here are the countries from classes and students participating in this challenge: USA, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Chile, China, Argentina, Venezuela, Bangladesh, Malaysia, Canada, UAE, Belarus, Russia, Scotland, UK, Switzerland, Ireland, Philippines, South Korea, Germany, Kyrgyzstan, Ecuador, Taiwan, Slovenia, Spain, Brunei, Indonesia, Cambodia, France, Colombia and Ghana. You will need to search the lists to find them – any that have red countries or pink teachers mean you might not be able to read posts or leave comments.

Activity 5: Adding great blogs to your blogroll

Now you have started visiting other blogs, there might be some you want to visit often. Instead of having to go to the student participation page each time, you can add them as links on the sidebar of your blog.

PS Students using Kidblog might have to write a post including the links as I don’t think you can have a blogroll on your own sidebar.

  1. To make it easy for visitors to find the blogs of your classmates and friends you need to add their link on your blogroll.
  2. If using Edublogs Pro or campus with My Class activated, in your dashboard> appearance> widgets> drag across Class blogs to your sidebar.
  3. If using Edublogs free version and you want to add classmates, overseas blogs or links to other websites you use often like mathletics, reading eggs etc then dashboard> appearance> widgets> links or blogroll
  4. If you want to group your links, then use link categories. These might be  ‘Overseas friends’ or for links about your hobbies you might need a category for ‘Cricket’ or ‘Tasmanian Devils’ or ‘Online Games’.
  5. To create these link categories, go to dashboard> links> Link Categories> put in the name of a category and save.
  6. Back to your dashboard> links> add new link.  Fill in the name of the person or website, then under web address put in the URL of their blog. Remember to include the http:// part. Choose which category you want the link to be under then click add link.

Click here for blogspot, click here for weebly, teachers click here for kidblog

Activity 6:  Learn some HTML code to include a link in a comment or to improve the look of a comment.

Mrs Yollis explains this in her post link above. Might be a way to include a link to your blog whenever you leave a comment. On my challenge blog, I have a post called do not publish and this is where I keep HTML code to help with my blog URL at the end of a comment. You might want to leave a comment on this post and tell me what you have found interesting about commenting. Use some HTML code in your comment.

Activity 7: What makes a great conversation in the comment area?

Check out these students – Max and Abbey, Jack and Abbey, Colton and Lily – take note their conversation continues further down the page, Merry Beau and Mackenzie – lots of conversations

These are threaded comments where the reader clicks on reply underneath the first comment – this is then indented slightly and the next reply is indented further.  Some themes are good for 5 threads while other themes you might end up with only one word on each line on the 5th thread. To change the number of threads go to dashboard> settings> discussion and change to whatever number you want from 1-10

Do you have to answer every comment? That is up to you. Some comments allow for a great conversation while others might just need a “Thank you for leaving a comment on my blog.”

How do you know if someone has answered your comment on their blog? When you leave a comment on a blog, there might be a tick box about notify me by email. Click on that box and you will be notified every time someone leaves a comment on that post. You can easily unsubscribe later if you want to stop having the emails, by checking the bottom where there should be an unsubscribe link.

Activity 8: Add a widget to find out where your readers are coming from.

There are many different widgets you can use – clustrmapsflag counterfeedjit  Have you seen any others while visiting blogs of other students? Maybe you could write a post about why you chose the  reader widget you have put on your blog. Remember you might get lots of readers, but not everyone is comfortable leaving a comment.

 Activity 9. Questions in a post

Write a post asking questions about one country mentioned in activity 4. Have at least 6 questions in your post. If your questions are interesting you might get lots of comments. Remember to tweet about it or leave a comment on this post, so I can tweet.  #14stubc

Activity re 13

Research how to write 13 (thirteen) in 13 different languages. Maybe make a poster or slide show.

Still got more time? Comment, comment, comment

68 thoughts on “Week 2: Start talking

  1. Dear Miss W,
    I have completed challenge 2. I had heaps of fun doing it. I commented on about 5 to 6 people.
    From, Isabella

  2. Hi Miss W, I have completed chalenge 2.
    I have had fun in the blogging challlenge.
    here is my blog address blpshyd,gobal2.vic.edu.au

  3. Hi Miss W I have completed challenge 2.
    I have had fun doing it.
    here is my blog address blpsjordy.global2.vic.edu
    bye

  4. TJ | October 17, 2014 at 13:00
    Your comment is awaiting moderation.

    Hello. It’s TJ again. And I would like to tell you that in week 2 I completed making comments on other bloggers blogs. I also added the counter country widget. I think that it’s cool that I can see how many people have visited my blog from each country. You can see how many people have visited my blog at ramlog.aisgz.org/11petersent😀

  5. Hello Ms. W, for week 2 I did comments which I really liked to do and I also added the country counter widget. Please visit my blog: ramlog.aisgz.org/11savagea

  6. Hello,
    On the seconded week I when to lots of new peplos blogs and commented on theirs too! I also put in a county counter on my blog too!

  7. Hello! The country counter widget I find very useful because you can see people that commented on your blog from different countries.

  8. I got the flag thing and i have 8 comments… It help me who is from and where…. It was useful. Thank you! ramlog.aisgz.org/11vallesh

  9. Hi! I’m Jiyoon. I did the commenting
    and there were lots of great things!
    I had a good time seeing others
    blog and it was good!

  10. Hi, my name is Anthony. I already did the comments and the country counter flag this week. Feel free to visit my blog at ramlog.aisgz.org/11wena

  11. Hi Ms. W, this week we had a new widget the flag counter it is really useful cause you can which people visit your blog in different country’s.

  12. This week I went on the blogging challenge site and posted comments on lots of students blogs. I found all of them very interesting and different. This week I also finished putting my counter widget. Please check out my blog at: ramlog.aisgz.org/11narayananp.

  13. Hi Ms.W I just finished putting the country counter widget and wrote lots and lots of comments on other peoples blog. Please check out my blog at ramlog.aisgz.org/11guow just to tell you my country counter widget is at the bottom of my blog.

  14. Hello,
    All of Mrs. Theriault`s students at All Things Quebec participated in Challenge 2 by leaving (and continuing to leave) copious comments! Most of the students also published a “shout-out“ post celebrating the work of another blogger.
    Here are a few examples:
    http://roxyonline.edublogs.org/

    http://beatriceonline.edublogs.org/2014/09/23/woof-woof/

    http://florenceonline.edublogs.org/2014/10/02/all-about-dogs-i-would-like-to-have-edublogs-challenge-2/

    Mrs. Theriault
    http://allthingsquebec.wordpress.com/

  15. I’ve been finding these challenges to be very enjoyable! Also I’ve completed all the activities. My blog URL is ap34520.edublogs.org

  16. Dear Mrs.W sorry for calling you Mrs.Waters. I have finished the blog week 3. I really enjoyed it thank you for all you have done.

  17. Hi Mrs.Waters, I’m Marcy. I’ve joined the international blogging challenge and I’m excited for this topic we’re doing this week. After doing the other challenges (which I enjoyed writing about), I’m interested to to learn what the future topisc are this week. Maybe you can check out my blog, here’s my url: http://marcy1am.edublogs.org/

    Sincerely, Marcy

    1. G’day Marcy,
      If you have any good ideas for themes each week, leave me a comment here. One student last year mentioned leaders so I organized a group of activities around that theme and acknowledge her as the person with the idea.

      Having run 13 challenges now, some of the ideas can be a bit tired and also some students have taken part in most of the challenges so I need new ideas for them.

  18. dear mrs.waters my name is isaac. I live in Oregon. I really liked the challenge this week. At first i couldn’t think what my interesting post i should do but then i was watching a movie with my mom called dolphin tale and it inspired me so i would really love it if you read the story about dolphin tale on my blog. If you wan’t to go to my blog this is my url: http://isaac7pm.edublogs.org/

    sincerely Isaac

  19. I finished the blogging challenge for this week it was really fun.I can’t wait for the next challenge. How long have you been doing the blogging challenge?

    1. G’day David,
      Thanks for leaving a comment on the challenge blog. Sorry I can’t visit your blog but I don’t know your blog URL.

      The first student blogging challenge was run in September 2008 with my class, Mrs Smith from Vancouver Island, Inpi from Portugal and Mr Bogush from Connecticut, USA.

      I run the challenge twice a year for ten weeks starting September and then again in March.

  20. Dear Mrs. Waters,
    I really enjoyed the challenge for this week! I have finished both of my posts and they are pending for approval. 🙂 Please come visit my blog to see how it is turning out, at – http://jazzy2am.edublogs.org. I am looking forward to next weeks blogging challenge! 🙂

    Thank you for your time,
    Jazzy

  21. Hello Mrs. Waters, so I did the blogging challenge this week and again am waiting for it to be published!! 🙂 And when it is I hope you have a chance to read both my commenting post and poem post hear is my link http://paige2am.edublogs.org/ . Anyway I’m enjoying this a lot so far but how do we make posters for our blogs and if you have a link you can give me about it that would be awesome if not that’s okay.

    Thank you,
    Paige 🙂

    1. G’day Kate,
      I love the way you are being so creative in your posts and also including the app or tool you have used to create the post.

  22. Hi, I’m currently doing your blogging challenge and it really helped me with understanding blogging. I just finished writing about my hobbies and I hope I can get some people from other countries to comment on my blog. Maybe you could look at my blog too. Anyway thanks for helping me understand how to blog.

  23. Dear Mrs.Waters,
    My name is Colby, I live in Oregon and I am very excited to be blogging. Sorry for blogging at like midnight for you.
    your friend,
    Colby

  24. Mrs.Waters I did your blogging challenge and It really made me think about commenting on others blogs. I hope I get some comments on my blog for the creative writing activity. I love having a blog it is very fun. I hope you can check out my blog soon and thank you for making this blogging challenge.

  25. Hello,
    These are all great ideas. My students will be registering their blogs in the Challenge over the next 48 hrs and we will begin as quickly as possible.
    I would like to know whether we can pick and choose from these challenges or whether my students would be expected to do them all.
    Thank you,
    Evelyn Yvonne Theriault
    All Things quebec

    1. G’day Evelyn,
      When taking part in the challenge, it is up to you how many of the activities you expect the students to finish. Some might only do one, others might do three or four. Last year I had one student in China who completed all of them. You can also adapt the activities to suit what you are doing in class at the moment. Because your students will be registering after the challenge started, they might not end up with a mentor though.

      1. Thank you for the quick response, Miss W.
        Although my students would welcome a mentor, our main goal in signing up is to take part in the challenges and to meet other student bloggers.
        Thanks again,
        Mrs. Theriault
        All Things Quebec

  26. Dear Ms. Wyatt,

    Thank you for including me in your new student challenge about commenting! Although I love all aspects of blogging, the comment section is my favorite place. Wonderful relationships can develop through commenting and lots of extended learning, too!

    Including family members in the blogging community is something I always try to do. Last year, we welcomed Bubbe, a 92 year old great-grandmother to our blog. Even though her great-grandson is no longer in my class, Bubbe still participates in our blog through the comment section. Here is a link to her comments this year.

    http://yollis365project.blogspot.com/2014/08/221-meet-92-year-old-bubbe.html

    Happy Blogging!

    ~Mrs. Y♥llis

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