Task 1 Process Essay
I started this task by revisiting a Weebly page I had hosted for my classroom before my district moved to the Schoology platform in 2020. I started using Weebly during my student teaching in 2012 to post my lesson plans because it was free to host and did not require coding to make updates.
If I had not already had a Weebly page, I would have needed to register. After registering, I would have been asked to create a subdomain, or Universal Resource Locator (URL), so that users could search for my webpage once it was published. Because of the commonality of my last name, I had already chosen http://grahamclassroom.weebly.com/
Having a URL already established, I was able to move immediately into the creation of the website. At the top of the page, I decided to use “Ms. Graham’s Classroom” as the title of my webpage. I kept it simple so there can be name consistency across my classroom technology sites (Kahoot!, Schoology, Remind 101, etc.)
To begin designing my site for this course, in the taskbar at the top of the page, I added four “Standard” pages, editing the name of each page of instructional materials to Home, Print, Graphic, and Multimedia, and clicking “Publish” in between each change to save my progress.
Now that my page templates were in place, I moved to choosing a theme. In the “Themes” taskbar at the top of the page I chose “Portfolio: Modus Operandi – Cento” for its clean lines and easy readability.
For the “Home” page, I wanted to find a graphic for the header that suits a classroom theme. I went to the website https://unsplash.com/ to look for a royalty free image. When I searched “classroom,” I found the image Time to Hit the Books, which I think is suitable for all the subjects and grades I teach (Hudson, 2018). I downloaded this photo, then went back to the Weebly site. In the “Page” details, I clicked on the header, then “Edit Background,” and finally “Image.” In the “Image” popup, I clicked “Add Image” and “Upload Image,” then “Upload image from a computer.” Here I chose Hudson’s photograph from my downloads. Finally, I clicked on the image to drag it into a visually pleasing placement in the heading before clicking the green “Save” button in the upper right-hand corner. Immediately following, I changed the text in the header to “Welcome to Room 306” and “Agnes E. Beer Middle School” to establish that this page is a virtual platform for my classroom. From the “Build” taskbar at the top of the page, I added in a text box to the page where I wrote a short introduction of myself to future students. I then felt that I needed to add the photo of myself that I use on all of my technology platforms so that I am easily recognizable to students. To add and edit the photograph, I dragged the “Image” component from the “Build” taskbar. Clicking “Upload a photo from your computer,” I chose the photo I wanted to use from my downloads, and resized it so the text and image could appear on the page simultaneously. I then added a “Divider” from the “Build” components, as well as another text box with a footnote stating the purpose of the website. Under the footnote, I added a “Button” from the “Build” components to house a hyperlink. By clicking on the button placed at the bottom of the page, I was able to change the text on the button (“Task 1 Process Essay”), and linked it to the Google Doc that contains this essay. Feeling happy with my changes, I clicked “Publish” in the upper right-hand corner to save my changes.
For the headers on the Print, Graphic, and Multimedia pages, I followed the same process. For the Print Instructional Materials page, I chose a photograph of a hand holding a red pen and writing in a book (lilartsy, 2019), for the Graphic Instructional Materials page I chose a photograph of a Nikon camera with undeveloped film (Aier, 2021), and for the Multimedia Instructional Page page I chose the photograph If you feel the desire to write a book, what would it be about? (Carstens-Peters, 2017). Overall the process has been extremely easy to maneuver and I am happy with the progress I have made thus far.
References
If I had not already had a Weebly page, I would have needed to register. After registering, I would have been asked to create a subdomain, or Universal Resource Locator (URL), so that users could search for my webpage once it was published. Because of the commonality of my last name, I had already chosen http://grahamclassroom.weebly.com/
Having a URL already established, I was able to move immediately into the creation of the website. At the top of the page, I decided to use “Ms. Graham’s Classroom” as the title of my webpage. I kept it simple so there can be name consistency across my classroom technology sites (Kahoot!, Schoology, Remind 101, etc.)
To begin designing my site for this course, in the taskbar at the top of the page, I added four “Standard” pages, editing the name of each page of instructional materials to Home, Print, Graphic, and Multimedia, and clicking “Publish” in between each change to save my progress.
Now that my page templates were in place, I moved to choosing a theme. In the “Themes” taskbar at the top of the page I chose “Portfolio: Modus Operandi – Cento” for its clean lines and easy readability.
For the “Home” page, I wanted to find a graphic for the header that suits a classroom theme. I went to the website https://unsplash.com/ to look for a royalty free image. When I searched “classroom,” I found the image Time to Hit the Books, which I think is suitable for all the subjects and grades I teach (Hudson, 2018). I downloaded this photo, then went back to the Weebly site. In the “Page” details, I clicked on the header, then “Edit Background,” and finally “Image.” In the “Image” popup, I clicked “Add Image” and “Upload Image,” then “Upload image from a computer.” Here I chose Hudson’s photograph from my downloads. Finally, I clicked on the image to drag it into a visually pleasing placement in the heading before clicking the green “Save” button in the upper right-hand corner. Immediately following, I changed the text in the header to “Welcome to Room 306” and “Agnes E. Beer Middle School” to establish that this page is a virtual platform for my classroom. From the “Build” taskbar at the top of the page, I added in a text box to the page where I wrote a short introduction of myself to future students. I then felt that I needed to add the photo of myself that I use on all of my technology platforms so that I am easily recognizable to students. To add and edit the photograph, I dragged the “Image” component from the “Build” taskbar. Clicking “Upload a photo from your computer,” I chose the photo I wanted to use from my downloads, and resized it so the text and image could appear on the page simultaneously. I then added a “Divider” from the “Build” components, as well as another text box with a footnote stating the purpose of the website. Under the footnote, I added a “Button” from the “Build” components to house a hyperlink. By clicking on the button placed at the bottom of the page, I was able to change the text on the button (“Task 1 Process Essay”), and linked it to the Google Doc that contains this essay. Feeling happy with my changes, I clicked “Publish” in the upper right-hand corner to save my changes.
For the headers on the Print, Graphic, and Multimedia pages, I followed the same process. For the Print Instructional Materials page, I chose a photograph of a hand holding a red pen and writing in a book (lilartsy, 2019), for the Graphic Instructional Materials page I chose a photograph of a Nikon camera with undeveloped film (Aier, 2021), and for the Multimedia Instructional Page page I chose the photograph If you feel the desire to write a book, what would it be about? (Carstens-Peters, 2017). Overall the process has been extremely easy to maneuver and I am happy with the progress I have made thus far.
References
- Aier, T. (2021, November 1). [Nikon Camera with Photographs and Film]. Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/0T4eOvQ4_wI
- Carstens-Peters, G. (2017, February 5). If you feel the desire to write a book, what would it be about? [Photograph]. Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/npxXWgQ33ZQ
- Hudson, D. (2018, February 3). Time to Hit the Books [Photograph]. Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/asviIGR3CPE
- lilartsy. (2019, February 19). [Hand Holding a Red Pen While Writing in a Book]. Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/333oj7zFsdg