Blog Journal 8: Building a Website

I enjoyed making up my fake teacher and building a website. However, I engaged in a very unexpected activity in building the website; something I never thought I would have to do. I ended up having to code for my website! Now how could this happen, because at no point do the instructions point towards coding! Well, it is the result of my paranoia mostly. Allow me to explain, there were two categories for "High Pass" that created this situation. The first; every external link must open in a new page. This was easy enough, despite Weebly's design limitations. A link has to be inserted into a textbox, and once it is inserted a box can be checked off that makes the link open in a new page. This was simple, so how did I run into an issue? The second category; include a Creative Commons license. Also easy, Weebly provides an option for HTML file insertion! I clicked on the box, copied the HTML, and embedded it onto the website. So where did the issue start? Well my friends, the Creative Commons licnese HTML is also a link, and this link took me to an external website that would not open in a new tab. There is no box that can be clicked to fix this; all that I can edit is the HTML code. Catastrophy, how can I possibly fix this? My paranoia tells me that if the CCL opens in the same page I do not get a High Pass. I REALLY want that high pass. I can edit the code, thats it, so the solution is obvious; figure out how to code. I spent 20 minutes on this, I could not do it. At this point I thanked my lucky stars that I have a roommate who is a Computer Science major. I texted him, and he helped this History major code an HTML file to open a link in a new tab. Did I need to do this? Probably not. Did I enjoy doing this? No. I did it though! Something I never thought I would do. I have now developed a very specific skill through the website assignment: I can change where a link opens in an HTML file! So that is very exciting.

Here is the website: https://stylesdaviseme2040.weebly.com/

I have not learned any new skills with Diigo besides knowing how to use Diigo. Highlighting, commenting, annotating, source finding, information locating, source breakdown; these are all skills that are necessary for the History major. I have been practicing the skills that Diigo develops for the entirety of my three year college career. My familiarity with these practices means that I have not learned any new skills through Diigo. I do think it can be useful in highlighting information for others in group efforts. It makes it very easy to share ideas about specific pieces of information in the development of larger projects amongst individuals.

As we develop the ways we educate with technology it is important to keep track of the new techonological developments that can improve our own teaching styles! We can stay aware of changes through the use of websites like this. Once a week, we can check this website, or simply look up the ways in which education is evolving, and apply what we like to our own educating practices. There are always ways to improve, especially with technology improving as rapidly as it is. We are the educators, the people applying the technology; no one else can do it but us, so it is important that we stay on top of technological developments.

This website can be used to stay in touch with educational tech trends: https://www.edsurge.com/news/topics/technology-trends