How To

How to register

If you have a Blogs@Baruch account, you’ll be added to the course site as an “author” (which gives you access to the dashboard to publish posts). If you have problems logging in, please contact me ([email protected]). Check the instructions below on how to post on the site. We’ll also discuss this in class.

How to access the dashboard

  1. Go to https://blogs.baruch.cuny.edu/greatworks17 (or log on to your Blogs@Baruch profile and find the site under “my sites”)
  2. Log in with your username and password
  3. Once you’re logged in, hover over Great Works I Spring 2017 in the top left corner, and select dashboard from the drop-down menu
  4. You now see the dashboard on the left of your page. You can navigate between the actual site (front-end) and the dashboard (back-end) by hovering over Great Works I Spring 2017 and selecting either dashboard or visit site
  5. Remember you can only access the dashboard when you’re logged in

How to update your profile

To update your profile, go to profile in the top right corner. You can upload a photo, add more info about yourself and change your password here.

How to publish on the blog

  1. To write and publish a blog post, go to posts in the dashboard, then select add new 
  2. This is where you can type or paste your blog post
  3. You can save your draft by clicking save draft on the righthand side. Don’t forget to do this often so you don’t lose your work!
  4. Here you can also preview your post. You will want to check what it looks like before you actually publish it.
  5. You can add photos and other media to your post by clicking the add media button
  6. You can insert hyperlinks by selecting the text you want to link to another site, clicking on the hyperlink icon in the toolbar (when you hover over it, it says “insert/edit link”) and copying the URL to the source. We’ll go over this on the first day of class.
  7. When you’re ready, click publish. 
  8. Visit the site to see if the posts looks right. If not, you can go back and edit it.

There’s no need to access the other menu items (media, comments, tools, and settings)

How to read and annotate

I have enabled the annotation tool hypothes.is on two parts of our course site: the “readings” and “blog” pages. When you’re on these pages, a screen will pop up on the righthand side. This is where our footnotes to the text will show up. You can open and close this screen by clicking on the arrow in the top right corner. Note: you can use this annotation tool without logging in to the site!

  1. The first time you want to annotate (ie. highlight or comment on the text on the page) you have to create an account with hypothes.is
  2. This is very easy: there’s a link in the pop-up screen to the hypothes.is website where you will have to enter your email address and follow the instructions
  3. Once you have your account, go back to our Blogs@Baruch site and log in
  4. You can now start annotating the text and read others’ annotations
  5. Simply select the word(s)/sentence(s) you want to highlight or annotate and click on the highlight or annotate button that pops up above the selected text
  6. You can also comment on each other’s annotations and share them online
  7. By default the annotations are set to “public,” which means that anyone can read them. On the first day of class we’ll discuss if we want to create a private group for our course. Instructions on how to do that will follow.
  8. You can see all your and your peers’ public annotations by clicking on their name. This takes you to the hypothes.is website where you’ll see a thread of all their public annotations.

How to use Google Docs

We will write some of the longer assignments in Google Docs. You need a Gmail account to be able to log in.

Go to docs.google.com or navigate to your Google Drive when you’re already logged in (to Gmail for example).

You can create a new document or share with others (you will need their email address) using the “share” button in the top right corner.

When you share a document, you can select “can edit”, “can comment,” and “can view.” Determine what you want the person you’re sharing with to be able to do and select accordingly.

Depending on your privileges, you can edit a text, add comments in the margins, or suggest changes. It’s a great way to collaborate on and peer review writing!