This is the post for the August 29, 2014 class meeting.

Today we’ll begin work on Project 1, which means we’ll be talking about effective websites and setting some goals for the project.

Schedule Information

I have added a list of important dates for the course and the university to the site, under the Syllabus menu at the top. I will set up a Google Calendar with the dates and readings next week.

I have set office hours for 11:05 to noon Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (so right after class). I can also meet you by appointment, and you can always email me.Discussing What Makes a Website Good

1. To get started, let’s talk about what makes a website “good” in the Forums. Here’s the discussion question that I posted there:
   

   Let’s talk about what makes a website “good” to establish some guidelines for the web portals that you will make for Project 1. 

   For homework, I asked you to find general advice on what makes a webpage work in one of the Lynda.com tutorials linked in the 8/27 blog post. Add a new topic to this forum that tells us the advice you found and whether you agreed with it. Be sure that you use a clear subject line so that we can tell what you are writing about before we click on your topic.

   After you post your advice, read some of the other advice people post and respond. You can add Thumbs Up for advice that you agree with. Add a written comment to at least one other person’s post.

2. After everyone posts and comments, we’ll talk about the characteristics briefly and I’ll talk about the Digital Text Show & Tell forum.
3. Finally we will briefly go over the assignment for the first project, Building a Web Portal. I will add assessment information to the assignment next week.

Homework

We will work on setting up the WordPress sites in class next week, so you can begin thinking about a name and the kind of design you would like for your site, but you don’t have to write anything down yet.

Second, begin taking photos you can use to illustrate your blog. You will probably want at least one photo for your About page, either of yourself or something you care about. Depending upon the Theme you decide upon, you will probably be able to add a photo to the header on your website as well. Take some photos that will work with the name and design you are thinking of this weekend and upload them to some place like Flickr, Instagram, or Google Plus Photos so you can get to them in the classroom next week.