Web Design for Student Bloggers
I am meeting with Andrea Hernandez and our 5th graders to give our students an introduction (an awareness) about the design of a blog. The 5th graders are one of our pilot grades of implementing student portfolios. We will be starting the lesson out by looking at different sites that these 10/11 year olds frequent. What do they like about them, what don’t they like?
Here are some of the sites the students look at on a regular basis.
- Shelfari.com
- Webkinz/Club Penguin
- Cool Math
- Animal Jam
- Miniclip
- BrainPop
- YouTube
- Scratch
They like:
- Image related to content
- Search function
- Thumbnail images
- Ratings
- Logo
They don’t like:
- Advertisement (distracting)
Keep your audience in mind...
Will will also look at different sites designed for different audiences:
- News Sites- CNN, BBC, Frankfurter Allgemeine, Jacksonville Times Union,
- School Sites- MJGDS, Charlotte Country Day School, Gesher Jewish Day School
- Student sites- Check out many examples of student blogs participating in the Student Blogging Challenge.
Check out some of these web pages. What do you think of their design?
- Yale University School of Arts
Yale University
- Political Campaign
Political
- Indiana University: Evolution and Nature of Science Institute
Indiana University
- Car Leasing
Car Leasing
I will be using and clarifying (if needed) “web (blog) design” vocabulary.
-
Blog Design
- URL
- Domain
- Themes- WordPress Theme Gallery
- Widgets
- Embed Code
- Sidebar
- Header
- Links
- Categories
- CSS
- Pages
- Posts
- Advertisements
- HTML- Funky Chickens, Lissa Explains, Mrs. Yollis’s post
- Colors- use Color Scheme Designer, Hex Color Picker
- Fonts- typography- DaFonts, Samples of Web Typography,
Students will then browse the WordPress Theme Gallery to find a theme with a design of their liking. Since we are using WordPress 3.0 multi user site, students are not able to download and install their own themes, but will have to email us the link to the theme and the SuperAdmins will have to install and activate the theme network wide.
Once the theme of their liking is activated we will meet again to talk about how to customize their blog further with custom headers and other widgets.
Blinging Your Blog
Image licensed under Creative Commons by Swamibu Blinging your Blog:
- ClustrMap- Add a map of visitors
- Flag Counter- Add the flags of countries your visitors are from
- Revolver Maps- Add a rotating globe of your visitors
- Shelfari- Add a bookshelf
- Voki- Create an animated speaking avatar
- Virtual Pet
More Resources:
- Jeff Utecht wrote a blog post about Discussing Web Design in 5th Grade.
[...] Silvia Tolisano, Web Design for Student Bloggers “I am meeting with Andrea Hernandez and our 5th graders to give our students an introduction [...]
This is kind of off-topic but since you mention that the kids use Shelfari, I am curious to know how you structure that activity. My husband is also a teacher and wants to use it with his 4th-5th-6th graders but he ran across a racy user photo and shut down the idea. How do you cope with the open nature of the site? Ever run across problems? Thanks and I think your blogging work is so inspiring. The kids are learning such an important skill!!
@Kelli
Personally, I have not run across problems when using Shelfari. Unfortunately when we use any online site we expose ourselves (and our students) to other users’ input. We have two choices: 1. Don’t use online sites or 2. learn to ignore, tolerate, discuss and learn to see them as teachable moments.
That is not to diminish the position a teacher can put himself/herself into when an “unfortunate” incident happens. Make sure that you talk to your administration to assure their support if it comes to a complaint. It is also important to have ongoing parent education to talk about how using these kinds of tools/sites outweigh the “potential” they can have for learning.