Working with Pages in your Student Blog!

Literacy – 6th grade

In this activity you will:

•Be introduced to the differences between posts and pages.

•Learn how to write an About Page.

•Write your About Page or create a Page on your blog

•Visit the Discussion Question for activity three to share what you believe makes a good About page.

Step 1: Introduction to Pages

•Blogs are composed of two main areas where you publish your content: Posts and Pages.

•New bloggers frequently struggle with the difference between the two, and hopefully the following will help clear it up.

•Pages on blogs are normally used for information that you want to share with your readers but don’t expect to update frequently. Not all blogging software includes the ability to add pages.

Step 2: How to write an About Page

•An About page is where readers find out more about you and your blog. Readers often use it to decide whether to bother subscribing to a blog.

•When you set up a new Edublogs blog it automatically comes set up with an ‘About page’. Readers access this page by clicking on About in the page links at the top of your theme or in the link in your sidebar.

•The idea is you change the default text on this About page by inserting your own information.

What to Write on Your About Page

•Your about page is all about letting people know who are you, what’s your interests and what you write about.•Start with telling people more about yourself as people are more likely to engage with your blog if they can relate to you as an individual. Then tell them about your blog and the reasons why you blog.•Not too long and not too short – include photos that help readers relate to you as a person.•Here’s my ‘About page’ on my personal blog.•What’s included on an About Page does vary depending on the type of blog and its intended audience. Here’s tips for writing About pages for Student and Class blogs.

Writing Your About Page

Editing your default About page is as simple as:

1.  Click on Pages > Edit in your advanced Admin interface

2.  Hover over the page name About to bring up the action link menus and click on Edit

3.  Now it is just a case of replacing the default text on your About page with your own images, text etc.

4.  When finished all you need to do is click Update Page

Step 3: Write your About Page•Now it is time for you to write your About page. However, if you don’t feel comfortable about writing personal stuff about yourself yet — then we recommend you focus on writing another type of page.•One idea would be to create a new Page with a list of helpful resources you would like to share with others.•Once you have written your About page or Resource page come back to this post and leave a link to the page you have created so that others can check it out!

Step 4: Discussion QuestionVisit the DQ for activity #3 and share what you believe makes a quality About Page.

Step 5: Extension activity – Optional•Visit at least five blogs belonging to fellow challenge participants from this list and do the following:•Pay close attention to the layout and how they use pages and posts•Find the “About” page if one is present and read about the blogger•Comment on the About page (or a post you like) if comments are open and introduce yourself to the blogger with a link to your blog