What's a Blog?, and How Do I Create One?

Welcome to my introduction blog. This is where I'll tell you how to create your own blog. It's not too hard.

First, look in the upper-right hand corner of this page where it says "Sign In". Click on that (open it up in a new window or tab, so you don't lose this page you're reading right now, and can refer back to it).

This site - blogger.com - is run by Google, so if you already have a gmail account, you can just sign in with your username and password for that. If not, if you don't already have a gmail account, you'll have to come up with a user-name and password for your blog.

Next, just follow the instructions. Blogger.com is pretty user friendly in terms of setting up your blog and getting started.

When you name your blog, you could have it as "World Religion Blog", or "Jason File's Awesomely Profundacious Pontifications", or "My Thoughts"...whatever.

Then, come up with a unique blog address (if you just put your initials before the title, that will almost certainly be a unique url address). This is the address you'll give out to your classmates, so they can know where to go to read your thoughts.

Finally, pick a template (or "style") which you like. Then start blogging!

There's one thing I should add...this site isn't totally user-friendly if you want to edit your blogs. Say you write something, and when you read it you change your mind about what you wanted to say.

What you do is type in www.blogger.com into the address bar - this will take you out of your blog and back to the home page. From there, go to "Manage Posts" and follow the instructions (it's easy after that).

And that's it!

The last thing is for you to let your classmates know where to find your blog. You can do that through our Blackboard site (under "Blogs & Discussion") or here, by going to

http://schum10Sp09.wikispaces.com

See you in the blogosphere!