What a Power Session - it’s done!
I have just powered on this afternoon and the new look technoLOTE site is up! I wasn’t planning on having things done so quickly, but was so keen to finish, that I just kept going. Feels good to be done!
Please have a good look at technoLOTE and let me know what you think of it. Have a look around and let me know if it’s too hard to find things. I’d also love some feedback on the About page - which I rewrote as part of the 31 Day Challenge. There is also a page on how to subscribe that I love for someone to read and tell me if it’s all clear enough for someone who has never subscribed to a blog before.
Phew, I think it might be bedtime…
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Hey Good Lookin’ - advice on finding the right theme for my blog
Right, that’s it. It’s gotta go. A makeover is needed. I’d been thinking this almost every time I looked at my other blog, technoLOTE, for a few months. I thought it was a bit dull, and I was no longer liking the colour scheme. I was very unsure about the posts background being green, and the grey sidebar was giving me troubles whenever I tried to edit the code.
Time for something new for 2008! I asked Sue Waters to have a good look at my blog and tell me what she thought. After a few emails back and forth her main points of advice were:
- keep it simple and make sure that new readers can see exactly what you want them to see quickly and easily
- it is important to have a ‘Home’ page that directs readers to the front page of your blog, especially for people who are new to your site
- put your RSS and subscription information at the top of the sidebar where it is easy for readers to see
- make sure there is a Search function and place it at the top of the sidebar too
- remove all widgets that aren’t really necessary. It is very easy to collect too many widgets and they can clutter your sidebar and be a distraction.
- don’t have too many pages listed on the top menu
- a white background makes for clearer reading for most people
- read her post on tips for effective blogging
So started my quest for a new look. I was obsessed. I spent hours trawling through the Wordpress Themes Directory. I downloaded at least 40 different themes and got Nick (my husband and personal IT assistant) to upload them for me to whatever content directory they needed to go in. Then I played. I found a few I thought were ok, then asked the techoLOTE readers whether they preferred the original or testsite1. Generally, technoLOTE readers were split as to which one they thought was better - positives and negatives for each were mentioned. I really found there was a fairly even split between readers who liked the original vs the test site. Some general comments were:
- the green background on the original wasn’t great (although some thought it was better than white - what to do?!)
- the header on the original took up valuable ‘real estate’ - I had never heard this term used in conjunction with blogs before, but several people mentioned it.
- the white on the new site was easier to read - although some thought it was too glaringly white
- even thought the text on the new site was easier to read on the white, the site looked cluttered.
Ok, with this feedback in mind, I kept looking. This damn theme searching was getting in the way of everything else. I didn’t feel as though I could really go forward until I had it sorted. The more I looked at themes and other people’s sites the more I felt the need to change mine.
I drove my poor husband nuts by saying ‘What do you think of this?’ and turning my laptop around to show him. This was taking up so much of my attention that he thought I loved my laptop more than him. Oh, darling, it’s just a phase I’m going through! I got advice from some Twitter contacts, which I wrote about a couple of posts ago.
I then started emailing one of my very best friends, Michelle, who works in IT at LinkMe to get her advice. She came back with the goods, just like Sue did. Michelle made a lot of sense and her main points were:
- sidebar headings must be as clear as possible
- really think about what you want to have on your blog and how you want to organise it, then find a theme that suits that. Think about what pages you need - keep the topics broad - and what exactly will go on them.
- adding drop down menus to page titles if possible is not a bad idea
- reduce amounts of unused space
- Michelle has this to say about headings and text styling:
- Michelle -Not sure in the blog posts why there are all different sized headings. Perhaps this is because it’s a demo and not finished(?). Me - that was me experimenting. so, not a good idea then? Michelle - Different sized headings are used to indicate hierarchy. If you mixed them, you start losing the hierarchy. Plus, it can look messy. I would def advise to keep the headings at the same level and the body at a different level. Any emphasis can be done using bold. Where there is a call to action (therefore, you want people to act on something, use italic text). Try not to mix bold and italics because you want people to subconciously know what you mean just by the style of your text.
So, thankfully I have many wise people around me who are so willing to help! I found a possible theme for technoLOTE last night. After playing around with it this morning (and getting a bit of feedback from Sue and Michelle) and I am pretty happy with it. I finally feel as thought I am getting somewhere and that I can start putting my energy and attention into improving the content technoLOTE now. I’m still playing around with some little bits and pieces on this new theme (which takes all of the above points into consideration, even though it may not be perfect) and will let you know when I officially ‘launch’ it which will hopefully be in the next couple of days. Just depends on how much time my dear, dear neglected husband has to help me.
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If I was an iPod I’d be…
My first iPod was a first generation Nano. I got to know how to use it, what it could do. I actually didn’t really think I wanted one, but my boyfriend (husband now) thought he’d like to buy me a new ‘toy’ so I got a nano for Christmas. I had no idea what it could actually do before I started playing with it, and I loved it. Loved it loved it loved it. I was downloading podcasts and uploading CDs in no time.
Over time though, I learnt more about my little nano and I wanted to do more with it. I found then that there were some restrictions. The small screen was well, too small. There was not enough memory for everything I wanted to put on it. It wasn’t video capable. I wanted to do things with it and add things to it that it wasn’t able to do.
My first venture into the edublogosphere was technoLOTE. At first I was nervous, and unsure about how it all worked and what I was doing. I thought of some pretty good ideas and wrote about them. I stopped for a while and then went back to it with some new ideas. I was enjoying it and going ok. Then my understandings of blogging grew and I found there were some restrictions with my first blog. I find that I want to write about things other than technology and lots more about my reflections as a teacher. I don’t think technoLOTE is really the place for this as it really is intended to have a language teaching and technology focus which is not what I always want to write about. I was watching many conversations happening over blog posts and wanting to write something similar but felt a bit restricted by the concept and focus of technoLOTE. I just love reading little anecdotes and stories on other people’s blogs about something funny that happened that day or something that engraged or engaged them as teachers, regardless of what subject they taught. The audience I envision for technoLOTE will consist mainly of teachers who know very little about Web 2.0 (well, until they meet me that is!). Initally, they will not be looking for or will be confused by material on the blog that isn’t directly about language teaching.
A few months ago I ventured further into the iPod world and now have an 80GB iPod Video which does everything I want it to do and more than I’m sure I haven’t discovered yet.I can play movies and videos and watch vodcasts. I can store the entire contents of my laptop on it and carry it around with me. I can use it to show photos and videos in class and I’ve recently bought a voice recorder for it which I have got many plans for. (More on them later).
I am now venturing further into the edublogging world and have started this new blog.I have new understandings about what I want from the edublogging world and I am now putting the tools into place to deepen those understandings.
I want this blog to be a conversation about learning and teaching. I want to enhance this blog, and others I have, with some regular podcasts (and to enhance the podcasts with the blogs). I want to have a place in the edublogosphere where I am Jess McCulloch, educator/teacher (as opposed to Jess McCulloch language teacher). technoLOTE is for my language teaching self and technoChinese is for my Chinese language teaching self. Ah, the delight of multiple personalities!
I think also that initially, before I learned about what blogging is really for, I saw myself setting up a website for teachers and so I thought I had to have most of the answers, an idea which can be restrictive and make writing forced sometimes. I love writing (I was the kid who had several diaries and was absolutely rapt when she got a blank notebook and pencils for a Christmas or birthday present) and it was a bit frustrating to feel restricted. It took me a while to understand what things I really wanted to write about and where the best places were to do that.
I still use my first gen nano - I run with it. It’s still helping me achieve some of my goals. I will still use technoLOTE as it will help me be a better language teacher and will hopefully provide some good resources to other language teachers. But my development as an educator/teacher of children - which is what I am first and foremost - will be recorded here.
So, if I was an iPod, at this stage I would be an 80GB Video, with designs on an iPod Touch or, eventually an iPhone. If you were an iPod, which one would you be?
P.S The pic of the ipod with voice recorder attached is mine, but the nano isn’t. I got that image from flickrcc.
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