Blogging+101

**Introduction[[image:blog_logo.jpg width="260" height="169" caption="credit: blog.ning.com"]]**
(Adapted from K12Learning20) A blog is a website with **posts** (e.g. articles, news items, commentaries, journal entries, stories, reviews, summaries, etc...), organized chronologically by categories (or tags); readers can leave comments responding to the posts. //Bloggers// can include links, images and other "widgets". //Readers// can subscribe to the blog using RSS readers. (Like your Google Reader). A blog may have one or many authors, and can be about any topic, from personal to political.

YOUR blog will be a place to track your reactions to our class novel, __To Kill a Mockingbird__. You will post regularly while we read the novel, comment on the story, link to outside resources (like the [|Student Survival Guide]), receive comments, and comment on your classmates' blogs. You will receive a grade for your blog and use the entries for other projects.

**Today, the primary goal is to get you "up and blogging."**
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**Do Now 1!** Set up your blog.

-Go to [|Blogger] (Google's blog service) and use your class g-mail address to set up your blog .

-Use your school g-mail account to sign up for your blog; remember all terms of agreement (keep it appropriate and school related) apply

-THINK CAREFULLY about your **blog title** and **URL**. They do NOT have to be the same--the best titles/URLs will be simple, appropriate, and have some connection to language arts, our yearlong themes of justice/laws, and/or the novel, __To Kill a Mockingbird__,.

**Do Now 2!** Once you have signed up for your blog, let me (and us) know the URL of your blog. Use this form to submit the URL.
 * Be sure to cut and paste your URL correctly!***

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**Do Now 3!** Write your first post! -Title your post "Post 1" and write about your initial impressions of __To Kill a Mockingbird.__ Possible questions to answer (or choose your own!) Write a paragraph or so. Practice linking to an outside source to add "depth" to your post.
 * What do you think of Scout?
 * Is there a Boo Radley character in your neighborhood?
 * What's a favorite vocabuary word or allusion you have learned?

Finds some blogs of interest in Blogging 101 a
 * Part II**