Adding slideshows

Animoto is a natty little tool which allows you to create your own slideshows to music for placement in a blog. You can also add text.

See: http://animoto.com

Templates

If you want to see some alternative blog templates, google 'blog templates free'. Some examples include:

http://btemplates.com/
http://www.bloggertemplatesfree.com/

Edublogs

Edublogs is a hub for educational blogs. Hosted by Wordpress, you can create your own blog for free within an existing educational community.

Blog (Weblog) - EDUCAUSE Learning Library Initiative

An extensive listing of resources and articles related to the use of weblogs in higher education
http://www.educause.edu/Browse/645?PARENT_ID=645

Content Delivery in the Blogosphere

An article by Richard Ferdig and Kaye Trammell (2004) from the University of Florida about the use of weblogs in educational contexts.
http://www.thejournal.com/articles/16626_6

Educational Blogging

An EDUCAUSE article by Stephen Downes (2004) about the educational potential of weblogs:

http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERM0450.pdf

What makes a weblog a weblog?

This is a view on what constitutes a blog which also provides a guide to blog-related terminology:

http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/whatmakesaweblogaweblog.html

A Training Video on how to use Blogger

http://trainingvideos.hscs.wmin.ac.uk/blogger/index.html

Blogs as a resource bank and training tool

Here is a sample EFL teacher's blog to demonstrate how blogs can be used for training and resource compilation. It explores the possibilities for YouTube and other video sharing sites in the classroom. Every week a new lesson plan is uploaded.


http://www.teflclips.com

Blogging articles/blogs

16 Must Read Articles for Bloggers and
15 Must Read Articles for Blog Writers
and
Rough Guide to Blogging

How to set up a Blogger blog

See link here http://academic.ursinus.edu/it/docs/blogger.pdf

Microblogging

See Wikipedia's definition of microblogging

See also: Microblogging with Plurk

Plurk is one microblogging site
Twitter is another

StatCounter

If you want to add a stat counter to your site to see how many people visit your blog and where they come from, you can get a free version from StatCounter.

It gives you clear instructions about how to add the code to a blogger.com blog amongst others.

Captioning Pictures

This is quite a fun tool. You can caption pictures, save them and then post to your blog.

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/captioner.php

Adding Sound Files

Here's a link with some advice on how to add sound files (music) to your blog.

http://tips-for-new-bloggers.blogspot.com/2007/02/add-music-to-blogspot-blog.html

More Blogging Links

A comparative review of blogging software:

http://writing.berkeley.edu/tesl-ej/ej35/m1.html



A blog discussing blogs and also other IT used in EFL classrooms:

http://blog-efl.blogspot.com

Creating a Google account

In order to use Blogger you need a Google account. To open this, go to:

https://www.google.com/accounts/Login

Book on blogging

Blood, R (2002) The Weblog Handbook: Practical Advice on Creating and Maintaining Your Blog

Adding sidebar links

If you want to add a link from the blog (it will appear in the sidebar), rather than a posting, then you need to go to 'template'. At the bottom of the page, click on 'add page element' and then select 'add link'. Simply type in the URL into the required box, give it a name and then save to the blog. 'Add page element' can also be used to upload a picture, and various other options, to the sidebar. In the 'template' area you can also drag and move page elements around...useful if you want to alter your blog's appearance.

Who reads and contributes to the blog?

You need to decide who you want to read and contribute to the blog. This can be established by altering the settings on your blog.

To do this in Blogger, go to the 'settings' tab on your blog management page.

The link below tells you how you can have your blog listed on the web and how you can restrict and moderate comments:

Is a blog open to anyone?

I recommend going through each of the tabs e.g. basics, comments, e-mail, permissions etc and selecting the settings you prefer as soon as you establish a new blog.

If you want to restrict who can read and write on the blog, you need to go to the 'permissions' section. From here you can invite others to join the blog community.