Setting up a Blogger Account

The first thing you need to do is get yourself a Google Gmail Account. This is a really handy on line email account that you can access anywhere in the world from any computer in the world. It has a ton of storage space and you can use it to chat to others who also have gmail accounts.

Some people like to have a separate Gmail addresses or use their School email account to separate your private log in from your school one. There are reasons for and against both ways of setting up a blog log in.

Gmail Account

The big thing to remember with this one is you HAVE TO WRITE DOWN YOUR USERNAME AND PASSWORD as you go because you may have to change it and you don't want to forget what you have decided on.

One you have a Google log in go to http://www.blogger.com/home

Then go to Blogger and make yourself a blog. It is quite straight forward but again write down your username and password.

Here is a download printout that are much more detailed that hopefully will spell it out more clearly if you are stuck...

DOWNLOAD THE PAPER VERSION OF THE INSTRUCTIONS HERE

It may be useful to print it off and have it sitting next to you as you begin.

Click the orange download button to download the instructions to your desktop.

If you like this clever way to embed a document in a blog John Sutton explains how to with a great video in this blog post.

Adding a new blog post with a photo

To add a new blog post. Go to your overview page and click on the pencil in the top left corner.

Write the title, click on the little photo icon, navigate to your photos to upload some and write some words in the big text box.

When you're done click PUBLISH.

Adding a hyperlink from text or a photo

To add a hyperlink from some text.

1. Go to the web page you want to link to and copy the URL web address.

2. Open up the blog post and type the text that you want to hyperlink.

3. Highlight that text.

4. Click on Link in the Menu Bar and copy in the link from the other web site.

5. Tick the OPEN THIS LINK IN A NEW WINDOW Box and OK.

Allanah's Blog

Publish publish the page and now the words become a hyperlink to a new website.

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You can also add a hyperlink to photos.

1. Upload the photo. Here is how you do that.

2. Copy the URL web address of where you want the hyperlink to go to.

3. Highlight the photo and click on LINK in the Menu Bar.

4. Add the link that you have copied that you want the photo to link to.

5. Tick the OPEN THIS LINK IN A NEW WINDOW Box and OK.

When you publish the post and click on the link it will take you to the new web page.

Fine tuning your blog

Go to your OVERVIEW and look for the SETTINGS

1. Then change the 'Who can comment?' to ANYONE.

2. Add Comment Moderation to Always - so the comments come to you for approval.

3. Add in the email that you want to moderated comments to go to. For a school I think it is wise for comment moderation to be turned on- moderation means that all comments get sent to the email address that you nominate and you get to decide whether you want to publish or delete the comment.

4. Turn Word Verification to OFF so that you don't have to type in the confusing verification letters. Put it back on if you find yourself getting spam comments.

5. You may also like to write a statement in the Comment Form Message to let your readers know what to expect when they leave a comment.

SAVE the settings.

Now go to the LANGUAGE AND FORMATTING and change the time zone to AUCKLAND.

And again save the settings.

And you're done apart from any other tinkerings that you might fancy.

Changing the Template and Layout

To change your overview page. Go to your Template.

Go CUSTOMISE and have a play around. It gives you a little preview. When you are happy click APPLY TO YOUR BLOG.

You can also adjust the BACKGROUND,  WIDTHS, LAYOUT and under ADVANCED you can make your blog really ugly by playing around with the colours.

When you're happy apply it. You can always come back and change it.

Adding a Static Page

You can add a static page to your blog with things like the week's homework or things that you want easy access to.

You can also make it a like to a website or extra links for learners.

It will stay in one place always be easily accessible.

To add a page go to your OVERVIEW.

Click on new page and decide where you want to go- along the top or on the side bar!

Decide if you want your page to a page with text or another web site.

Here is how it might look.

Posting to Your Blog with Email

Once you have set up your blog it is nice and easy to make a post just by sending an email. This feature wold be great if you have students overseas who want to share their travels on the blog- all the would need to be able to do is to send an email.

Also useful if you want people to be able to make posts but you don't want to the give them the password or let them change the sidebar or other setting.

To enable blogging via email go to SETTINGS, then look for MOBILE AND EMAIL.

Enter a secret word that you can remember. As an example the email address would be

allanahsblog.thinking.blogger.com

Click on the 'Publish Email Immediately' if you want to or you can make it go to draft but if it did that you might not notice it was there. 

If you send it straight to publish make sure you get an email letting you know it's there so you can check it.

To make your post simply send an email to the blog.

And very cleverly instead of just emailing text and photos you can email a short video as an attachment and that works as well.

Adding Gadgets on Your Side Bar

Adding gadgets to the side bar of your blog really adds functionality and interest to your blog.

To add a gadget go to the OVERVIEW. Then go to the LAYOUT.

Click on ADD A GADGET.

Scroll down the list and click the plus for the gadget you want.

You can repeat the process and get lots of gadgets.

Here is a list of gadgets that I have found useful.

• Pages- add static page to your blog- one that doesn't scroll away over time.

• Search box- search your blog 

• Html- very useful for adding things like YouTube videos and services from other web sites.

• Text- it's good to write a little about your class so visitors know what year level you teach, who you are and why you are blogging.

• Picture- a good place to put a class photo

• Slideshow- add a slideshow of photos from the blog.

• Poll- ask your readers to vote on topics of interest.

• Link List- this is how I add links to Reading, Maths etc website to add usefulness and functionality to your blog.

• Labels- group your blog posts into categories or add children's names so they can easily find their blog posts.

• Logo- you will need this to quickly go the the log in page if you have removed the navigation bar at the top of your blog.

• Follow by email- interested people can add their email address and get an email update every time the blog gets updated. Here is a post that shows you how to do this.

Adding a Animoto Slideshow

Animoto Slideshows  add a variety of cool transitions and music very simply to your blog.

To make a slideshow you first have to do register.

First off all select your theme.

For the free version you can upload no more than 15 photos as the slideshow lasts 30 seconds. I suggest you put your photos into one folder and go CLICK + SHIFT on the first photo in the list and then click on the last photo and all of them will be selected.

You can fiddle with the music and photo order but for a quick production just click preview and produce your movie.

That will whirr away for a bit as Animoto renders the video.

When the rendering is done you will get an email telling you or you can just grab the embedding code and put it straight on your blog. Look for the SHARE tab.

Highlight and copy the code.

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Now go to your blog post. Click on the HTML tab and paste the code where you want it to be. Click back on the COMPOSE tab to see how it will look. Publish when you're happy.

I often put the html embed code at the bottom of my writing in a blog post so I know that I don't break the previous code.

Make a video of your own at Animoto.

Editing HTML

I don't know a lot about HTML but it's the code that underwrites what goes on the internet.

What I quite often do is make the Blogger video larger so that it is easier to see without having to go full screen. To do that I upload the video and then click on the html tab of the new post. You will see some html code as below. I then change the height and width to suit.

I sometimes do the same with YouTube videos
If I am gathering an embed code for a web site that I don't want children to be able to click on I can sometimes remove the words that would link to the site by taking out the Title so that the > and < touch.

Sometimes you may want to share a link in your comments. I use Blog Assist to do it for me but you can do it for yourself but putting a bit of html code around the URL address like this adding the black bits around the web address and the text.

I can't put the actual html code here so you can copy it because it actually tries to link it so you will have to copy off the picture below.

The word Nets in the example above will be all that the the people you left comments for will see but it will be hyperlinked to the URL you want to share.

Adding a Label

Adding a label to the side bar of your blog lets you group your blog posts into categories or names of children who have written or featured in a blog post.

To add a label go to the OVERVIEW. Then go to the LAYOUT.

Click on ADD A GADGET.

Scroll down the list and click the plus for Label.

Decide how you want your labels to look.

Then save your gadget. You can move where your gadgets are placed by dragging the rectangle where you want it to be and then save your arrangement.

To add a label you write your post and add the label that you want your viewers to see. like this...

Your labels will then look something like this...

Adding an email link in the side bar

My email address for this blog is

bling4yrblog@gmail.com

To make an email link of your own type this into a html gadget in your side bar but put your own email address instead of mine. You have to type it exactly for it to work. If you can't see it clearly click on the photo to bring it up to a bigger size.

For the blog post on how to add an html gadget click here.

To be able to just copy the link click here.

When it is inserted a single click will open your email and put the email address in the right spot and you will be able to email. Clever eh?

Adding a Site Visit Counter & Clustermap

A site counter is a great way of recording how many visits you have to your blog and where they are when they watch. A great motivator for blogging often.

A good odometer type hit counter is http://www.tinycounter.com/create.php

There are different forms but of map counter and some that I like are Clustrmaps and WhoAmungUs.

To get the web-counter go to the above website.

ClustrMaps

Follow the instructions and enter the html into an html gadget on your sidebar.

Whos Amung Us

You may also like http://whos.amung.us/maps/customize/. Their maps are live maps so little stars light up as people visit from different locations. Kids love it when they see lights in other countries.

Adding audio with AudioPal

I like AudioPal a lot because there is no need for username and passwords for the service to work. You can record 60 seconds at a time. Plenty of time for classroom use.

You can either speak directly into the AudioPal via your laptop's inbuilt microphone or upload an mp3 file you have recorded earlier.

It prompts you to allow Flash recorder- this just reminds you that it is accessing your computer.

When you're done with recording you can play it back to see if you like it or re-record.

Enter your email address to GET IT. AudioPal will send you an email with a link to the embed code.

Copy the embed code and enter it in the html tab on your blog post or html gadget on your side bar!

It will look and sound like this on your blog.