Kennedy Blogs

For the final required post of the year, I’d like you to reflect on how this blogging experiment has worked out for you. Most of you were new to this at the beginning of the year, and now I’d like you to look back over what you’ve done, and tell me how you think it went.

The post should be about average length (for AP: 400 wds; for Perspectives: 250). It’s fine if you approach this question in your own way, but if you’re stuck, suggestions after the jump.

Had you ever done anything like this before?
What were some of your first thoughts when I said we were going to start blogs?
Which posts were you happiest with? (Providing links would be awesome.)
What was the hardest thing about this assignment?
Is this something you think you might keep doing?
What do you think of blogging, now that you’ve done it for a school year?

Kennedy Blog Posts, Facebook Update Edition

Mr. Ayers — Tue, 05 May 2009 16:51:21 +0000

Poopypance is reflecting on marriage.

Fred likes this.

Aaaaaaaaah Satan is concerned that I’m dead.

Rog has joined the group I bet I can find a million people who think swine flu is a hoax.

Irunifly is frustrated.

Nicholas has added the Castle Crashers application.

Freshboi27 is now a fan of The Jerk.

Blogging 101: Quoting

Mr. Ayers — Tue, 05 May 2009 12:56:01 +0000

This post is more about using conventions than providing tech help. Specifically, how do bloggers convey that they are quoting from somebody else’s blog?

First of all, some of you have noticed that on some of the blogs I’ve recommended, like Andrew Sullivan’s, many of his posts consist of a long quote, with a little intro and then maybe some response afterward. I recommend this as a strategy for coming up with topics: see what other people are saying, and respond to it. But you can’t just respond out of context; you have to let your reader know what you’re responding to. So here’s a very short example:

……………………

Christopher Hitchens has a fascinating column on Slate.com this week, where he talks about British interrogation of German prisoners while the Nazis were bombing London. I had no idea they exercised such restraint. Quoting from a book about the subject, Hitchens describes one incident where a German prisoner was being held, and a guard got too physical:

An external interrogator unused to the rules of Ham Common was exasperated by this initial stubbornness and “followed TATE to his cell at the close of that first interrogation and, in flagrant violation of the Commandant’s rigid rule that no physical violence should ever be used at Ham, struck the agent on the head. The incident led, on immediate representations by the Commandant, to the instant recall of [the offending officer] from the camp.” One blow to the head at a time when undefended British cities were being blitzed every night, and the brute was out of there for good.

Hitchens goes on to explain that their reasons for being so strict about it was that they believed roughing up prisoners might get you information, but it was mostly bad information that you couldn’t trust.

………………………

Notice two things: first of all, I provide a link, so that an interested reader can go read the whole thing. Then I provide a block quote, which is indented. On Blogger, you have the option of highlighting text in your post and clicking the button with the quotation marks. The indentation signals to the reader who is saying what.

Also, doing this may have another benefit, by getting you to pay more attention to what others are saying, and making it easier to think of things to blog about.

Blogging 101: Hit Counters

Mr. Ayers — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:56:44 +0000

If you’re interested in seeing how many people have visited your blog on any given day, you can add a “hit counter” to your sidebar. This allows you (and visitors) to see how many people have visited (or “hit”) your blog. The really simple ones show you a number for the current day, and how many have visited overall.

Now, this has its advantages and drawbacks. You might find it motivating to know that people are visiting; you might discover that it’s more people than you expected, which might make you more likely to blog with purpose. Conversely, you might discover that not very many people have discovered your blog yet. If you’re likely to find the information discouraging or distracting, you might not want one. My own experiences with hit counters, and instructions on how to install one, after the jump.

(Ahem… The “jump” is that link below. I don’t know why it’s called that.)

I think I installed a hit counter in my blog maybe a month after I’d started blogging. I found it both inspiring and discouraging, depending on the day. I usually only got a few hits at first, but over time I got more and more. Now I’m using a different service, WordPress, which tells me more information about how many people are visiting each day, and what they’re looking at. That info has changed what I do on the blog, to a degree, allowing me to write about the things that people seem most interested in. On another day, I’ll talk about how you can drive traffic on your blog, to get more people to find it.

In the meantime, here’s the instructions for a hit counter:

Log on to your blog and go to “Layout.”
Select “Add a Gadget” on the right- or left-hand sidebar, or at the bottom.
In a new tab (Ctrl+T), go to Google and type in “HTML hit counter code.” Don’t click on any that say “download”; you don’t want to download something, you just want to find someplace where you can copy the code. The code will look something like what I’ve added below (use this code if you don’t want to go searching):
Copy the HTML code, and paste it into the HTML Gadget on your blog.
Make sure you save the gadget, then click on “View Blog.” The counter should be there.

http://www.quick-counter.net/” title=”HTML hit counter – Quick-counter.net”>http://www.quick-counter.net/aip.php?tp=di&tz=Europe%2FLondon” alt=”HTML hit counter – Quick-counter.net” border=”0″ />

This Week on Kennedy Blogs

Mr. Ayers — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 14:36:19 +0000

I’m going to try to start highlighting some of the particularly good posts out there lately. For this first one, I might go back a week or two to do it. Here are some good posts you might’ve missed.

StuTheDew defended his decision to play at the Straight Edge.

Fred thoughtfully considered faith and religion on Easter.

Wernerette debated teen drinking policies in the United States and Germany.

Mixmaster Mack praised Kings of Leon but buried their new album.

Josh shook his head about making government policy with religion instead of science.

Sundance considered the appeal of sniffing chocolate instead of eating it.

Nick announced his new Hide the Elephant podcast on iTunes (!).

If you see posts out there that people should be reading, let me know about them.

Because I’m Curious…

Mr. Ayers — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 15:58:35 +0000

View This Poll