The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
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GOOGLE, BLOGGER BASICS
Using Google Blogger you can create a free blog, a webbased journal where you and collaborators can share their thoughts, opinions, stories, projects updates, editorials and more. Through this tutorial you will learn to: ● Access Blogger ● Create a Blog ● Add Blog posts ● Add collaborators ● Modify the Blog template or layout ● Adjust comment settings ● Share your Blog RSS Feed with a Canvas course
Creating a Blog Step 1: Where do I login? Login into your Maricopa Gmail Account with your MEID and Password using your browser through MyMCC https://orion.mesacc.edu/portal/ (select Employee Gmail) or https://accounts.maricopa.edu.
Step 2: Accessing Blogger From the black Google Menu select More > Blogger.
Step 3: Confirm Your Profile & Start a New Blog Confirm the display name you prefer for your account and select New Blog.
Step 4: Complete the Initial SetUp Provide a title, address and initial theme for your blog. Select Create Blog. Note: You can adjust these items later. H. Agria 6/29/2012 1
The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
[email protected]
Creating a New Blog Post Step 1: From the Blogger Dashboard find your blog and select the Create New Post icon.
Step 2: From the Create New Post Page enter your post a title and enter the post itself. The Compose window provides a Rich Content Editor where you enter text or HTML. The text editing features are similar to word processing programs.
Inserting Images: To insert an image into your post select the Image Icon from the Compose window Rich Content Editor. You have the option to choose a file from your computer or other sources. Once you have found your image click on the Add selected button at the bottom of the image dialog box. Note: You may upload multiple files at once. Use JPG, GIF, or PNG files. Use the image guides to move and resize the image in your post.
H. Agria 6/29/2012 2
The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
[email protected]
Optional Post Settings: Review the post settings (menu to the right of post) to Label (operate like tags or search terms) to your post, schedule your post to publish on a certain date/time, extra a permalink for that post (individual URL address), add a location to your post, and/or adjust post commenting and other features.
Step 3: Preview your post to make sure it looks good. When you are done, Save or Publish your post.
Editing a Post Step 1: From the Blogger Dashboard find your blog and select the Go to Posts List icon.
Step 2: Scroll over the name of the post and select Edit from the post options.
Step 3: Edit your post and select Update.
Setting Permissions (Adding Collaborators, Readers; Privacy) Step 1: From the Blogger Dashboard find your blog and select the Go to Posts List icon. From the navigation select Settings.
Step 2: Under Permissions select Add Authors and enter the email addresses of contributors you would like to post to this blog and select Invite authors. Note: Authors can only add posts, they have no admin rights.
H. Agria 6/29/2012 3
The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
[email protected]
Student Gmail Accounts For security and ease of use it is recommended to invite students to contribute to the class blog as authors using their Maricopa Email Account. Once a student accepts the invitation they can navigation to the blog from the black Google Menu > More > Blogger > select the blog name.
Step 3: Under Blog Readers select Edit and choose your blog reader setting. You can have your blog reading available for Anybody, Only blog authors, or only readers that you invite. When you have made your selections choose Save changes.
Other Privacy Settings By default all Blogs are visible to search engines and listed. To make your blog private, from the Blogger Dashboard find your blog and select the Settings from the navigation. Under the Basic options edit your blog’s privacy option to Not listed on Blogger and Not visible to search engines and select Save changes.
Adjusting Templates & Layout Step 1: From the Blogger Dashboard select your blog and from the navigation select Template. Review the different blog templates.
Step 2: Under the template thumbnail choose Apply To Blog or Customize to adjust each piece of the template to fit your preferences.
Step 3: To adjust layout, from the Blogger Dashboard select Layout from the navigation. From this page you can move, edit and add elements to your blog such as gadgets.
Commenting By default only registered users can comment on your blog. You can adjust the commenting settings, including adding moderation to make it easier to oversee the interaction on your blog.
H. Agria 6/29/2012 4
The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
[email protected]
Step 1: From the Blogger Dashboard select your blog and from the navigation select Settings > Posts and comments.
Step 2: Under the Comments sections review the options. By default comments are restricted to Registered Users (a standard authentication process for blogging platforms). This is not recommended for class blogs. Choose instead to open comments to User with Google Accounts or Only members of this blog.
Comment Moderation If you do not want comments to immediately post to your blog, adjust the moderation settings to Always under the Comments section of the Settings. Note: Moderation will require that you, as the administrator, review and release comments. This can be very time consuming and generally is not necessary for restricted blogs. Alternative to moderation: Establish etiquette for commenting on your blog to avoid issues.
Feeding Your Blog to Canvas Announcements Canvas allows instructors to share blog feeds so that students can easily see the latest posts and information from the blog in the class Announcements area.
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The Center for Teaching and Learning 480.461.7331 http://ctl.mesacc.edu
[email protected]
Step 1: Open your Canvas Course and navigate to the Announcements page from the Course Navigation.
Step 2: Click the Add External Feed link (rightside of page) to add a feed from another website or blog to the Announcement stream.
Step 3: Enter the RSS Feed into the dialog box. All new entries from that feed will be added to Announcements for your course. Note: Old posts will not be added to the announcements stream.
Your Blog RSS Feed Your Blog RSS feed is the URL address plus a feed directive. Add /feeds/posts/default?alt=rss to the end of your Blogger URL.
Step 4: Select the Content to post (Full article, Truncated, Link only) OR check the option to Only add posts with a specific phrase in the title by specifying a phrases or keywords in the title of posts.
Step 5: Select Add Feed. Note: It can take from 13 hours for new posts to update the Canvas Announcements area.
Additional Resources Canvas Guides: http://guides.instructure.com/m/4152 Blogger Help: http://support.google.com/blogger/?hl=en&p=help_home H. Agria 6/29/2012 6