Blogging 101: A Starter Course

Welcome to the Blog! We will be using this throughout the year as a class forum. A few simple rules for posting and commenting apply...such as:

Posts

• Must have a catchy, relevant title. (This post’s title is Blogging 101: A Starter Course)
• Must be 75+ words in length.
• Must be free of any spelling errors. (Word choice errors are not spelling errors. For example; there/their/they’re, choose/chose, loose/lose, to/too/two, etc…)
• Must end with an interesting exit strategy. (A question or challenge to the reader)

Comments

• Must be 50+ words in length.
• Must follow the same spelling guidelines as posts.
• Must address something specific the writer has said and *must add something new to the post (see below)
• Must also end with an intriguing question for the writer.

Two additional rules:

• You must be the 1st or 2nd person to comment on a writer’s post. If there are already two comments, choose another student’s post.
• Writers should (not must) respond briefly to all comments.

THE GOLDEN BLOGGING RULE: No Negative Comments. Ever. Politely disagreeing and giving an example of why you might disagree is certainly ok. Respond to posts the way you would want others to respond to your posts.

Lastly, I suggest you use Google Docs to write your posts and comments. Why? Two reasons: One, it has a word count feature under the Tools menu. And two, the spell checking feature is going to be far better than the one in Blogger (though it does not distinguish between “i” and “I”...but of course I do and you should know this anyway!). You can then copy and paste your work into the blog.

Sound reasonable?

Blog on!

* Comments -- challenge an idea, add further textual evidence with citation, reference an outside source or website, etc.