This is week 1. We found out who our group members are and we introduced ourselves. We’re all mostly from Nebraska except for Ben Skow. He is from Illinois. We set up a group chat on GroupMe, talked about ourselves a little bit and set up our wordpress site as a team. Discussed some ideas on what we want our project to be. We then all worked on our personal blogs and began to get more comfortable with each other. I think the main challenge we are facing at the moment is what we want our main project idea to be. We are a little timid at the moment figuring out what we are all comfortable with and expressing what we show interest in. I think that will change as we get closer to each other and the ideas will start to flow. It’s the beginning of the semester, so im not too worried. I think in the future we will get ideas out faster and smoother and our work/progress will increase with the pure fact that we know how to be around each other. This week definitely went smooth and im excited to see where our team goes and what kind of ideas we come up with! On to week 2!
Week One Blog Post Katie Pearson
I think there are many different directions our group could go in for this project. I think it is important to find a bias of a group of people that we can get many different opinions on, and not just one person’s story. Maybe the stereotypes of athletes, cheerleaders, sorority/fraternity members, etc. would be interesting. I think a large group of people on campus would be ideal. I believe if we can find a campus organization or group, we will find success in the project. Having more than one person to discuss their story and how they have dealt with bias will make the project more interesting and I believe it will make the bias we are choosing to address more valid if several people we talk to have similar thoughts or experiences. This week my group set up our WordPress website. We discussed some potential ideas about what we could do our project over, and we created a GroupMe. We also discussed some of the portions of the project we would prefer to do. I know I am not highly skilled at photography and videography, so I said I would prefer to do the writing portion and the interactive/design portions of the final project. Right now our biggest challenge we are facing is choosing a topic.
Ben Skow- Week One
Today we met our teams, made our introductions, started to get to know each other, and made this blog. We asked Katie questions and now have a better understanding of the project. We also made a group me group chat so we can communicate more effectively outside of class. This week we will have to discuss our expectations for the project and create a group contract. One idea that has come up already is talking to people from different parts of the country and see what their expectations are of Nebraska, as people who have never been here. We also got our CATME scheduling tool to see when meetings will work best. Our best times are most weeknights and and weekends. We come into this class with a variety of skills so I am confident in our ability to do well on this project. We have established we are proficient in photo and video, as well as writing. Plans to create motion graphics have been mentioned. The next couple weeks will consist of a lot of brainstorming and planning out how we could accomplish our goals. I look forward to working with this team and am excited to see what we can accomplish while working on this project.
Collin Shefke Personal Blog
As a group, today we talked about our project and what we wanted to do as a group. We understood that the project was supposed to be about stereotypes. This is something we had originally struggled with because we had no idea where to start. There are so many stereotypes about every little thing that it was hard to narrow it done. We thought about looking into the political side of stereotypes and what it would look like to be conservative when you are liberal and vice versa. However, we decided to put that idea in our back pocket and not go down that road as a group yet. We also discussed the stereotypes of Nebraska and what people think. That also leads us to think about what it would be like going to Nebraska from another state. We later created a group chat on group me so that we could better communicate as a group and get to know each other more. I think we are all excited to get this project underway and we are excited to come up with more ideas to talk about as a group. Personally, I think this will be a fun project and I think we have a good group.
Team Avocado
Blog Posts
Introduce Yourself (Example Post)
This is an example post, originally published as part of Blogging University. Enroll in one of our ten programs, and start your blog right.
You’re going to publish a post today. Don’t worry about how your blog looks. Don’t worry if you haven’t given it a name yet, or you’re feeling overwhelmed. Just click the “New Post” button, and tell us why you’re here.
Why do this?
- Because it gives new readers context. What are you about? Why should they read your blog?
- Because it will help you focus you own ideas about your blog and what you’d like to do with it.
The post can be short or long, a personal intro to your life or a bloggy mission statement, a manifesto for the future or a simple outline of your the types of things you hope to publish.
To help you get started, here are a few questions:
- Why are you blogging publicly, rather than keeping a personal journal?
- What topics do you think you’ll write about?
- Who would you love to connect with via your blog?
- If you blog successfully throughout the next year, what would you hope to have accomplished?
You’re not locked into any of this; one of the wonderful things about blogs is how they constantly evolve as we learn, grow, and interact with one another — but it’s good to know where and why you started, and articulating your goals may just give you a few other post ideas.
Can’t think how to get started? Just write the first thing that pops into your head. Anne Lamott, author of a book on writing we love, says that you need to give yourself permission to write a “crappy first draft”. Anne makes a great point — just start writing, and worry about editing it later.
When you’re ready to publish, give your post three to five tags that describe your blog’s focus — writing, photography, fiction, parenting, food, cars, movies, sports, whatever. These tags will help others who care about your topics find you in the Reader. Make sure one of the tags is “zerotohero,” so other new bloggers can find you, too.