Hello there, thank you for watching todays screencast from TeacherCast University. This is the third video in our online learning series called “Kidblog: An Introduction to Blogging with your students” About This Lesson In todays look at Kidblog.org we will examine the dashboard area and show you how to set up your class blog. We will discuss some great new features to Kidblog and show you how to customize your Kidblog account to fit your individual class needs. Here I have my class blog. You can see that Kidblog features a very simple and easy navigational structure. On the top we have our header featuring our class name and class avatar. You can view your class posts and comments by clicking on these tabs. To the right are three buttons where you can choose how you wish to view your student posts an to the right of that is a button where you can choose to hide or show your blogs customizable sidebar widgets. Once you have logged into your Kidblog account, access the dashboard by clicking on either the big K on the top left or clicking on the word SETTINGS in your blog header. The Dashboard In the Dashboard area, you will see your class information. This information on top shows your class avatar, your blog title and tagline. Below this you you can view the number of posts and comments your blog has as well as links to access your settings, privacy controls and the ability to add or modify users. We will first look at the settings panel Changing Your Avatar In the settings panel Kidblog provides assess to the inner workings of your blog. You can customize these features however is best for your class. Here we will discuss the features that will allow you to create a visually dynamic learning experience for your students. The left of the screen presents you with the ability to change your class avatar. To do so, click on the Choose Avatar button. This will bring up your Media Library. You may choose a new avatar from a variety of methods. You may select an Avatar from images that have already been placed in your Kidblog media library or choose from a selection of preset icon images provided by Kidblog. If you have an image you would like to add from your hard drive, you can select My Computer and either drag the image files into the screen, or click Choose File to select the appropriate image. If you are interested in using an image already on the web, you can find that image and copy it’s URL and past it in the LINK (URL) section. A popular feature for helping students choose photos is by using the camera built into their computers. This is probably the most enjoyable method for your students. The can be as creative as can be. Lastly, Kidblog provides the opportunity to connect your account to your Google Drive. This feature is one of the many options if you choose to upgrade your account. The box next to the Class Avatar is your User Accounts. When you sign up for Kidblog you are given a class size of 40 students. If you wish to sign up for the amazing Teacher Premium account, you can unlock the great Unlimited Students feature for larger class sizes. On the right are your class settings. Here you can modify your class name, class description, and add a location for your blog. Changing Your Theme After modifying the features in your General Settings tab, click on the Theme/Sidebar button to choose a visual cover for your blog. Kidblog provides students more than 20 visually pleasing themes. Students can have fun changing these themes at any time without effecting their content. You can see here that the Retro theme is activated. To change themes, simply click on another theme and hit the Activate button. To see your corrections, simply refresh your blog in a second tab. To the right of the themes are the controls for your blogs sidebar widgets. There are several great features to the new Kidblog sidebar area. Because this feature is so dynamic and robust, we will be discussing these options in a separate video in this course. Next to the Theme/Sidebar button on the top is your Users Menu Adding and Modifying Users The users menu allows you to create, edit, and remove the students in your class. This menu is the heart of the Kidblog dashboard because it is the one menu you will be coming back to when your students need to have their passwords reset or if you need to add or delete students quickly throughout the year. The Users menu will be discussed in great detail in a future video in our online course. Customizing Privacy Next to the Users tab is the Privacy menu. In this section, you have the ability to customize your Kidblog account for your students. One of the new features in Kidblog is the ability for students to choose their audience. Students can now select who gets to see their posts and comments. Once you have your privacy settings selected, scroll to the bottom and click on the Save button. To the right of the privacy menu is the Categories tab. Adding Blogging Categories In the Manage Categories section, you will have the ability to set up the various categories which your students will be blogging from. These categories can be for example: Homework, Classwork, Tests or perhaps Chapter 1, 2,3. To create a new category, select the New Category button and type in the name of a new category and hit the Create Category button. To the right of the Categories tab is the new Conections tab. Connecting to Other Classes Perhaps you and another classroom are both using Kidblog and you wish to share posts. While logged into your Kidblog account, you can visit another users blog and click on the Follow button. This is a great new feature that will help you teach your students about digital citizenship and digital content sharing. After hitting the follow button, you can choose which of your classes is attempting to follow that blog. You can then leave a message for the owner of that blog to say hello. The Class Connections tab works very similar to Facebook and Twitter in the respect that you can have the option of following another blog, but that blog’s class does not have to necessarily have to follow your class’s information. There are many new options available in the Dashboard section of Kidblog. These options can be edited and modified at any point throughout the year. About our Online Course The complete video series to this online course can be found on our website TeacherCast.net/LearnKidblog. I hope you take a moment to browse this and all of our online tutorials over at TeacherCastUniversity.com and TeacherCast.net I hope you liked this video and found it helpful. If you did, click on the LIKE button below and leave us a comment. 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