If you were to teach a class, what would you teach?
Today’s blog exercise is to teach a class online through your site.
This blog exercise does not have to be complicated. Do you have a favorite recipe? Share it with your readers with the techniques involved in preparing and serving. Do you have a favorite hobby? Share tips for that hobby or a technique involved in the process.
Are you an expert on a subject? Create a list of the things someone should know about that subject in a tutorial. Or reminisce in an educational format on what someone needs to know about this industry in order to succeed.
Whatever your subject matter on your site, there is an opportunity to teach, to become the instructor, the expert on the subject eager to share lessons with the readers.
You may write the educational exercise out, create a video or audio file, incorporate a slide show, gallery, or whatever tools you enjoy working with online.
Your blog exercise today is to become a teacher and teach your readers something.
Be creative. There are so many ways to teach today. Explore the possibilities on your site.
If you are familiar with Google+ Hangouts or other live chat programs, consider combing a social sharing event with your blog lesson or tutorial.
When you’ve published your tutorial, remember to include a hat tip link back to this post to create a trackback, or leave a properly formed link in the comments so participants can check out your blog exercise task. We’d love to learn from you.
You can find more Blog Exercises on Lorelle on WordPress. This is a year-long challenge to help you flex your blogging muscles.
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7 Comments
Many of the Posts on my site are “How to do This” instructions. So I hope that I can put links to two Posts, the first is the latest teaching Post and is how to make stopper knots (my site is about boating and boating safety). The second is an older one useful for left handed people that need to know how to tie a Bowline. For some reason the Bowline does not translate easily for left handed people.
Three Stopper Knots – Stopper knots are used on sailboats to keep the end of a line from running through a block and getting lost or dragging in the water. This is the latest of several How to do it Posts.
How to tie a Bowline with your left hand – The Bowline is the King or Queen of knots, and can used most any time a knot is needed on a boat, it’s use might be a bit inelegant at times for some applications, but it will get the job done. Used to put a loop in the end of a line that will stay the same size.
Thanks very much also for the article on links, just went through it and I have some changing to do on my site. I have used open in a new window some times, but have been erratic, so I have some cleaning up to do.
Thanks again for the series on how to have a better blog.
Thanks in advance also for any feedback.
These are great but the exercise called for you to do a “new” post. Give it a try now and see how you would teach a subject differently today.
As for feedback on these previously published posts, the knot one is well done. I’d break up the first paragraph into a couple paragraphs for easier reading but the rest is very well done.
The bowline article is also very well done. Excellent history and outline.
I note that you changed the About Page title to your username. I’d recommend you change it back to “About” as I wanted to know more about you, and was curious if you were talking about the Seattle Mountaineers or another group, and I couldn’t find where to learn more about who you are, where you sail, and so on. It wasn’t until I went through the links in your main navigation I saw that you had changed the Page title. Might want to change it back as “About” is a web standard now that people look for.
I also see that you have placed a contact form under the About Page as a subPage. Unfortunately, it is lost and hard to find if someone wishes to contact you. I recommend you do not make it a child Page of About but a parent Page and title it “Contact.” This again is in keeping with web standards and makes life easier for people to contact you. Remember to turn off comments on your About and Contact Pages as that is not a place for comments. On the Contact Page, it’s redundant.
The rest is brilliant. Well done. And say hi to my old buddies at the Mountaineers. I worked with them for many years a long time ago.
Thanks.
Thanks much for the feedback & kind remarks on what I have already done.
About is back to About, Contact is now up on the main top menu, I updated the About page a bit & comments are now off (they were off on the Contact page already) I cleaned up the Sidebar a bit since the About & Contact are now easier to find. Three stopper knots has two paragraphs to start and I fine tuned (I think) the opening paragraphs.
Yes I will do another How To and see if I can improve the presentation over the past and then post it back here.
Some of my Posts take quite a bit of time, taking the pictures and doing the triple checking. I also go back and fine tune what I have written over time when I find a rough spot. Some of the Posts took over 100 man hours to do, and I spent 6 hours yesterday getting a few pictures to update one of the 100 man hour Posts and PowerPoint that is embedded in the Post. I consider 20 hours to be a short time to write a new Post. I type a bit slow and such.
Thanks again for the help & your site
Well done. It makes me proud to know that someone listens to me once in a while. 😀 Doesn’t it feel better. Cleaner?
Hey, I understand well how long it takes to publish posts. My longest one took me six months. I kept going back and rehashing it, over and over again, until I realized that it was the fear of the reaction to the post that kept me from publishing. I hit publish and the knot went out of my stomach. Then the reactions came and the knot went back in, but in time, I learned to just let it all go and not work so hard. People really appreciate the simple things.
Take the time you need to do your best work. Only you can judge yourself for that. We don’t have to know what color your underwear are to appreciate the fact that you are wearing some. 😀
Looking good!
Yes my site is cleaner, one of these circular things, you pointed out some things and in addressing them it made me look at some other parts.
yes much cleaner and easier to navigate. Thanks again
@Janet – you are welcome, the Post is descended from a handout I made to hand out in boating class to help my left handed students.
@Lorelle – bit off topic here – but – as you might have noticed some of my site traces it’s roots back to when I knew less than nothing about WordPress anything other than it was a free blog on my web site so I clicked on the free part 🙂 – did not even know what a “blog” was (yes a bit sheltered at times)
So some of my Pages have Permalinks as “test-page-one” etc. does that do any damage other than just looks sort of sloppy? Should that be changed? (no the old Page would not be deleted just hidden – I fought too many 404 errors when I moved (several hundred 404’s) to delete anything now!
The About Page – a friend is thinking about setting up a Professional site on WordPress.com – they want to use a static landing page with their name etc on it – but that then leaves me confused about what to call it? Home? Home/About – or have two items in the Menu that end up at the same place?
Yes I sort of plod along on most of the Posts, think about what I want to do, take a few pictures, think about what I want to cover, notes at times, then write it and let it sit for a while, read and change, at some point it gets “close enough” and it is published, followed a few minutes later with a “I can’t believe I missed that” reaction.
Thanks again for your help and your blog here, always makes me think a bit with each Post you do.
LOL! The domino effect in action! I love it.
About deleting and rearranging posts, tracking down page not found errors is important, and part of the process. Luckily, you don’t have thousands of articles to dig through to correct the problems.
Cleaning up your site means making sacrifices, killing your darlings as the saying goes. Get rid of the junk. You don’t have to delete it if you aren’t ready. You may put it in Drafts until you are ready to say goodbye or repurpose the content. As for the links, it’s just part of site maintenance to clean those up. Not fun, but it’s the job.
The benefit is that your site’s navigation and structure are easier for the reader. When you started, it was all about you. Now you understand it is all about the reader. Make their life easier by making yours a little more difficult and the benefits will pay off greatly.
A landing page is any web page on a site that involves a call to action, such as a contact form, download point, or point of sale. It may be any web page on your site. You would have links and graphics around the site to direct people to that point, and you would use the landing page link in your marketing strategies to direct people right to the action.
I think you are talking about a Static Front Page, not a landing page, though it could be. The web standard is to call the static front page of the site “Home” and the blog “Blog.” About is the bio. While it could serve as the static front page, I’d name it “Home.”
Too many people think they have to introduce themselves to everyone who visits their site, as if every visit is the first time. If the site serves as a resume or portfolio, a virtual business card on the web, then that’s appropriate thinking. If they want to bring people back for more consistently, building a community like you have, then introducing yourself every time you meet old friends is kinda silly.
I wish more people would blog the way you do, thinking the topic through thoroughly and preparing the content, editing, and fine tuning before hitting publish. The web would be a better place if they did.
Thanks!
The world is more beautiful when people like you concerns about the needs of left-handed people (e.g. me). Wonderful! Our perception is different. I think I tie shoelaces differently too.
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