Blogs at International School of Beijing

Overview

Welcome to the ISB student blog site. This page gives details on setting up and maintaining your blog at ISB.

It’s important to remember that you are responsible for the content on your blog. Your blog is public so anyone on the planet can read it.

• Do not post personal contact information on your blog. For example, do not use your surname.
• Make sure that your posts represent you, your family and ISB in the best possible light.
• If you see any comments on your blog or content on another blog that is inappropriate, take a screenshot and contact a teacher or EdTech Facilitator.

The sections below outline how to get a blog, and how to maintain it. Read it carefully.

Getting a Blog

Blogs are provided as part of classes at ISB and are created for students for Grades 5 to 8. Teachers are responsible for explaining the role of blogging in their classes and how students are to use them responsibly.

Initial Blog Setup

In addition to being responsible for what’s on your blog you are also responsible for how it looks. Go to your blogs Dashboard and try the available themes and widgets. There are lots. Make sure you choose themes and widgets that look good, provide the functionality you need and help you get your ideas across to your readers. Some themes will suit some purposes better than others.

One of the first things you should do is set your site’s title. From your blog’s Dashboard go to Settings>General. From there change your blog’s title and remember to press save at the bottom of the page. Many teachers like the student’s first name to be in the title of the blog. It’s a good idea to put it in there. It really helps readers when they are reading a lot of blogs.

You should also set an avatar, which is a small logo to represent you. Do this from the top right corner, where your name is. Chose ‘Edit My Profile’.

You should also setup your display name, from Users, Click Edit, then Type a Nickname and choose it to ‘Display name publicly as’.

Comments/moderation

The first time a user posts a comment to your blog you will have to approve the comment before it is viewable to your readers. If you have approved a commenter once, the next time they comment on your blog their comment is immediately visible. If you always want to approve comments go to your blog’s Dashboard, choose Settings>Discussion and adjust the settings accordingly.

Blog Hard Drive Space

Each blog has 300 Mb of space. This is lots of room for text posts, but your blog will fill up quickly if you are posting photos, large audio files or video. To save space post videos to Dragons’ Tube and embed them in your blog. You don’t need to upload large photos when smaller ones will look just as good on a computer. The EdTech blog has several posts showing how to use media on your blog effectively. Check out this blog early to avoid frustration later on.

Subscribe by email allows you to subscribe your email address to receive an email notification whenever a post is made. This is per blog.

ISB may have subscribed you initially to receive notifications from your child’s homeroom teacher, grade level, or principals blogs.

If you want to change your email address, please follow these steps:

When you receive a notification in your email, click the link at the bottom, “To stop receiving these emails, click here. ” Once clicked, you will get a message stating that, “Your email subscription has been successfully cancelled.”

Then click the “Go to site”, button on the same page, find the Subscribe by email panel, enter your new email address and click “Subscribe”.

You will see a message, “Thank you, your email has been added to the mailing list” In your email, check for a message titled, “Please confirm subscription”. Click the “Confirm subscription” button.

You will receive the message, “Thank you, your subscription has been confirmed.” You have now successfully updated your email address.

If you want to subscribe to a blog’s notifications: Find the Subscribe by email panel, enter your email address and click “Subscribe”. You will see a message, “Thank you, your email has been added to the mailing list” In your email, check for a message titled, “Please confirm subscription”.

Click the “Confirm subscription” button. You will receive the message, “Thank you, your subscription has been confirmed.” You have now successfully subscribed your email address.

Should at any point you do not receive an email, be sure that you check in your Junk/Spam folders.

Please create a support request at the ICT Office’s Help desk, call 2025 or visit the Help desk.