Wednesday 18 June 2008

9TA Thursday 18th June - RSS Magic

Aims:
To learn what an RSS feed is
To use an RSS feeder
To make a personalised google homepage

Starter:
Find out what an RSS feed is. What does an RSS feed do? What is the symbol for RSS? Write the answers up on your blog *in your own words* (if it doesn't fit on your main blog make a new schoolwork one it's very quick)

Activities:
1. Your homework last week was to find 5 different links to blogs, news and pictures. You will need these links handy and might have to open them all up.
2. Create yourself an account on google reader (click the link). Use the same username as for your blog and you will be able to log on without having to sign up again. Google reader is a feed reader. Start off by adding some feeds.
a) Type in the address of your blog and add it.
b) Add the address of the pages from your homework (2 blogs, 1 news site, 1 flickr photo page, 1 other)
c) Find a couple more pages to add on - interesting examples are - this day in history, joke of the day, quote of the day, sports news etc...
3. Write a short blog post explaining google reader - what is it? Is it useful? Can you see yourself using it? Who would use it?

Mini Extension Task: In google reader you can share items - what does this do?

4. Time to try igoogle - www.google.com/ig I google is a personalised internet homepage. You can add Widgets as well as RSS feeds to your page. You can drag and drop boxes to get them exactly where you want. You can also add tabs to personalise your page. Be sensible with what you add - if you want to play at home that's okay but at school do not add anything that you shouldn't be doing in lessons!

5. Blog about Igoogle - is it any good? Would you make it your personal homepage?

Extension Work: Comment-time: Visit some of the class blogs and leave some comments and constructive feedback to classmates.

Nb: Have I linked to your page on the bar on the right? If not leave me a comment with the address of your page.

Homework: There has been some controversy over google's use of information. Some people are worried about privacy and more. Research and write a post on your blog about The Google Controversy, why are some people worried about google and in particular privacy.
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