Bryophytes and Lichens of the PNW - WordPress for group projects

Getting Started

• Getting Started with WordPress - What is WordPress and how is it being used at Evergreen?

Create a New WordPress Site

blogs.evergreen.edu is Evergreen's WordPress server. You can create your own site, all you need is an Evergreen email address and login.

• Create a group blog and add additional users.
• Create your first site if you are new to blogs.evergreen.edu.
• Learn how to create additional sites if you already have a site at blogs.evergreen.edu.

Driving in WordPress

• Dashboard Overview

Settings

From your dashboard we need to change some settings in your site

• General - change your tagline; change your time zone to "Los Angeles"
• Reading - change your site's visibility settings to "Only registered users..." (defaults to Evergreen users only)
• Permalinks - set this to Post Name

Writing and Managing your content

• Get Published - Pages and Posts
• Categories and Tags

Content to include in your sites

Required elements for your group's WordPress:

Pages/Categories

• Introduction/About
• Research Project Topics:
  • Evergreen Parking Lot Bioblitz
  • Opal Creek Wilderness Annotated Checklist Project
  • Experiments in prairie lichen restoration
  • Fire effects on prairie bryophyte and lichens Communities

Required Posts

• (Weeks 3-8) Individual weekly blog posts
• (Week 9) Group post summarizing the preliminary results from your research project

Post Guidelines

• Each group member is responsible for writing one blog entry about your research topic in an informal, popular science-writing style.
• Body of your article should be no longer than 1000 words, or about two pages, single-spaced.
• Include at least 1 photo.
• Each post should include at least 5 references.
• Should include tables, graphs, figures created by your group members relating to your group research topic.
• Feel free to include video or links to other content on the internet. The more interactive a blog post is, the better.
• Other information relevant to your group project.

Images, video and linked files

• Insert an image
• Video - embed video from Vimeo or YouTube
• Link to a file
• Image Galleries
• Audio

Sidebars

Many themes support sidebar content. Often times if you don't anything to your sidebar a default set of "widgets" will appear. You can change this by adding your own widgets.

• Widgets - add additional features to your sidebar
• Add external links to your sidebar

Front Page and Navigation

• Change what your front page displays if you'd prefer a static pages instead of your latest posts (optional).
• Custom Menus - allow you to modify the navigation for your site
  • not all themes support custom menus

Designing Your Site

Working with themes

Themes allow you to change the design of your blog at anytime. Changing your theme will not affect the primary content of your site.

• Choose a theme
• Customize your header image - some themes allow for you to add your own header image Appearance > Header Image (may only appear if your chosen theme supports custom header images)
• Make additional changes to your theme (advanced)

Adding functionality to your site with plugins

• Plugin Overview - use plugins to connect your site with a variety of web content including Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, etc. Want to connect to a popular service that you don't see listed in the available plugins? Let Academic Computing know and we can look into adding it.
  • Tip: Plugins can make your site run slower. Only activate those plugins you are planning on using and deactivate any plugins you're not using.

Wrap Up

• What happens to my site when I graduate?

Additional WordPress Resources

• Built-in Help
  • After you've logged in, the Help tab is visible via the Dashboard, in the upper right, under "Howdy"
  • Help is context aware so it will show you information based on where you are in the WordPress Dashboard
  • Built-in help videos (part of built-in help)
• WordPress Tutorials
• Lynda.com Video Tutorials

Need More Help?

• WordPress Tutorial - for a step-by-step tutorial to get you started
• FAQs - common questions about using WordPress at Evergreen
• All WordPress articles

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Still have questions or problems with WordPress, send Academic Computing a message or call the Computer Center at 360-867-6227.