Monday, September 22, 2008

How to join Blogger and a closed blog

Here are some instructions for joining Blogger - developed for the students who are soon starting the 'Reflection on Practice' course that I am running in a closed blog.

1. Respond to invitation to join the closed blog
The invitation to join the blog will come to you via email. Click on the link that invites you to "view this blog"

2. Sign in if you have a Google account
If you have a Google account, sign in with your user name and password. If you do not have a Google account, create an account. You do not have to create a blog unless you especially want to.

3. Create your Google account

4. Once you have created your Google account
You are now able to view the blog once you accept the invitation.

5. View the blog



6. The next time you go to look at the blog
You will need to sign in so don't forget your user name and password.



Please drop a comment below if you are still having problems logging in to the M503.7 blog.

6 comments:

Blogger In Middle-earth said...

Tēnā koe Sarah!

I've tried this recently - before I read your post (thanks). I have not had a great deal of success. In fact, the whole excercise was a bit of a time waster.

The problem seems to be that Blogger gets confused and does not recognise valid (Google) accounts which is peculiar, since Blogger is controlled by Google.

I'd have to think long and hard at my strategies before I attempted to involve a group of people in a private blog (ever) again.

BTW, I'm logged in under my Google account when I submit this comment :-0

Ka kite

Sarah Stewart said...

Ummmmm, gosh, I hope this works then. I didn't think one needed a Google account to be able to sign into Blogger until one of my students pointed it out.

David McQuillan said...

Hi Sarah,

I'm missing the point here. I can see how there could be a point of individual students having a closed blog if they're engaging in personal reflection, but a class blog????

Sarah Stewart said...

David: I understand your confusion.

What I have done is take the course out of BlackBoard and put it into a blog. Because the policy at the moment is to keep our courses closed, I have 'closed' the blog, which means only the students and I (and anyone I have personally invited) have access to the blog.

You may ask when I have bothered to do that - why not stay in BlackBoard? The reason is to slowly introduce midwives to other technology outside BlackBoard. Once they become familiar with Blogger, maybe they will then go on to develop their own blog etc. The other reason I have chosen this format is because I think conversation flows so much easier than in the BlackBoard discussion forum.

What I really would have liked to have done is require the students to reflect in their own blogs, but the course is too short for that, I think, ie 7 weeks. And I do not want to bog them down with too much technology.

Does that make sense?

David McQuillan said...

Thanks for that.
Sounds reasonable.

Sarah Stewart said...

Megan Gibbons has found a blog approach to be really useful for encouraging discussion in the nutrition paper she ran a few weeks ago. But her blog was open to all:

http://shannonstale.blogspot.com/

It will be interesting for me to see how things pan out in this 'closed' blog, and see what the students think.