Teachers

Hi there!

Here is a step-by-step guide for how I set up this simple classroom blog. It's very easy :)

Feel free to share ideas for how this blog could be improved upon, or maybe share further ideas for how teachers can make the most of a blog. If you set up your own site let me know your address so our blogs can be friends! :D

Setting up a basic classroom blog

Create the blog

* You will a need a gmail account for the teacher and one or more accounts for your students. With more accounts you can better trace the content of what is being posted and manage student leavers with greater ease.

*Log in using the teachers gmail details to www.blogger.com

* Click on new blog and choose a title and an address and click ok. The blog has been created!

Design

*From the my blogs page click on the blog name and you will get to the overview page. At the bottom of the overview page click on template to chose your style and customise it. When you are ready, click back to blogger.

Student Permissions

* On the overview page click on settings. Go to permissions and click add authors and add your student gmail account(s) to the list.

*Here you can choose whether you want your blog to be for your class only, or for the general public.

* Log out of your teachers account and log into gmail using your students account details. There should be an email invitation to contribute to the blog. Follow the link on this email to confirm the invitation. Log out of the student profile and log back in using the teachers account details.

Adding Pages

* From the overview page click on pages. Here you can choose to create a page as a tab (as illustrated on this blog) or alternatively you can create a page to assess as a link. You cannot have more that one post on a page.

Link to Facebook

*If you would like students to be able to share this blog on social networking sites then you can upgrade to Google+ with you teachers gmail account. This is a free service.

Student Safety

*See the Student Welcome page on this blog for some safety tips.

*I recommend changing the password to the students account when a student leaves your class. Encourage students to guard the login password.

I hope this was helpful. Thank you for reading and enjoy blogging!

Sarah

Eurocentres Cambridge