Challenge 2 – Freedom to choose

Welcome to our second group of activities in the blogging challenge. Again three areas to improve in your blog, then some choices for posts for this week.

Improve your blog

Avatars

I notice many of our newer bloggers don’t have avatars yet. Visit this post where I explain how to create and upload your avatars. Click on one of the avatars to take you to the actual site. Maybe as a class you could then create a slideshow of the avatars you created. Or maybe you could create an avatar for each member of your family and put those in a slideshow. Which slideshow? Check out the Web tools to use on the right sidebar of this blog.

Here are some other links for creating and uploading avatars –  Blogger or blogspot, Kidblog,

Blogroll

What is a blogroll, you ask? Now that you have started visiting other student blogs, you might start finding some blogs that you really like.  You might visit these every day, but how do you remember their URL?  This is where a blogroll comes in handy. If you look  on the right  sidebar of this blog, you will notice I have three subheadings such as:

• Get Help
• Web tools to use
• Animals blogging

These are my blogroll.  I can choose to have them in total (headings will then be in alphabetical order – see Miss T below), or just one category at a time.

Check out the blogroll categories from these students and classes: Kids in the Mid (left sidebar), Miss T (left), Mr Miller (right),  Teegan (left, some are actually images as links too), Bree (far right)

To create the link category headings, go to your dashboard>  links > link category You might include  classmates, overseas friends, class blogs, get help and websites.

To make sure these appear on your sidebar, go to dashboard> appearance> widgets and drag the links or blogroll across to the sidebar area.

Add some links to your blogroll

To add some links such as the challenge blog and your friends’  blogs, go to your dashboard> links> add new.  Remember to say what category you put the link under and also use http:// in front of the URL. Be internet savvy and only use first names of students.

You might include at least 10 classmates, some overseas friends you have visited,  Student Challenge Blog,  The Edublogger, Help from Edublogs or kidblogs or weebly etc, your class/school blog and/or intranet and  websites you often visit.

Here is a post by Sue Waters about creating a blogroll. Follow the instructions for Step 2 in her post.

If using Blogger, go here to find instructions. Remember to include Bling for your Blog on your blogroll.

Hyperlinking

You will notice in today’s challenge, I have included a lot of hyperlinks to other places to visit. If you do this in posts, you are showing your readers that you have researched the topic – you are not just writing about what your friends have told you or things you think you know. You can hyperlink in posts, pages and comments – handy if commenting on kidblog and you want to leave your blog URL.

Edublogs – linking in post/page

Blogger – linking from text or photo

Kidblog – video on how to add links

Weebly – video on how to add links

linking in comment – this is the same for all blog platforms

Ideas for posts

OK so you have done the three activities above to improve your blog.

Blogs are all about your passions. So every second week, the challenge is going to be your chance to excel

write about your passions

Maybe it is LEGO, Moshi Monsters, MMORPG games, book reviews, minecraft, embroidery, travelling, crafts, art, architecture, poetry, farming, astronomy ……  The list is boundless.

You might want to start writing a series of posts about your passion. Remember your readers may know absolutely nothing about what you love, so start by explaining things well. Send them to other websites to get more information (called hyperlinking, which is one of the improve your blog activities  for this week)

But a blog post or page is written in your words, so don’t copy and paste from other websites – always use your own words first and then send your visitors to other places on the internet to find out more.

Write a post, create a movie, find websites, create a slideshow, create a comic – there are infinite ways to present your passion.

If you know of a great tool to use, leave a comment below with a link to the tool URL in your comment.

Don’t know what to write about:

Visit these websites – look around them and write a post about some part that intrigued you.

• Mrs Norton suggests looking at South Australian Child and Youth Health Network
• Jess suggests looking at CyberQuoll – starts with a lot of noise
• Check out the Digizen game
• PBS have a webonauts game – need flash and starts with noise so headphones might be good
• Learn about dental hygiene with these games
• What can you learn on the nourish interactive site?
• An ABC story about virtual exercise – what do you think?

Still got time left this week

Then start leaving more comments on other participants’ blogs.  Find at least 5 other students with similar hobbies to you. Visit their blog and leave a comment.

Have you remembered to check your own spam comments, in case some are legitimate?

Image: Photo taken by Miss W on her way to Bicheno.