Blogs & Blog Readers
This was my first experience with feed readers so I spent a little time looking at them after reading the article linked to this assignment. The article by zapier has short summaries and mention the best features of the top ten blog readers. Reading through each summary gives the reader an idea of how advanced or simple the source is laid out and the criteria used to make the recommendations. In the end, I chose to go with Feedly. It is user-friendly, super easy to figure out without understanding how blog readers work, and I especially liked the simpleness of the setup. Going into the settings I found that there are some accessibility features such as dark theme, open dyslexic font, text size, and density. The explore feature accepts common terms to search for topics or specific blogs. Following a blog requires labeling it to be stored in your feed on the left side menu.When searching for blogs I found familiar sites that I commonly use and also sites that are new to me. For the purpose of this assignment, I am choosing to highlight blogs that I had not previously followed.
- John Spencer http://www.spencerauthor.com/ Speaker, author, former middle school teacher, and current college professor with creative ideas and sharing his passion with others through his website and blogs.
- Lisa Nielsen https://theinnovativeeducator.blogspot.com/ Changing schools with her innovative ideas of making it relevant and applicable for real-world success. Author, blogger, and speaker integrating technology into schools. I am interested in her thoughts of technology and the role of educators in making it relevant to students.
- Meredith Farkas https://meredith.wolfwater.com/wordpress/ Her blog titled "Information Wants to be Free" has topics dedicated to the impact of social media on research, mobile technologies and online pedagogy caught my attention. I followed this one because her most recent blog post was a review of her best 2019 books and podcasts (which I've been trying to listen to lately).
- The Perpetual Page Turner https://www.perpetualpageturner.com/ Jamie has been blogging since 2010 and completes book reviews for both adults and kids. She does have a link to book deals through Amazon so she does get some payment for her reviews and advertisements. Font is a little small and navigation was somewhat difficult but I like her reviews and information.
- DCG Middle School Library http://dcgmiddleschoollibrary.blogspot.com/ A middle school library in Iowa with 45 followers. I chose to follow this blog so I can see the positive aspects of having a school library blog and if this is something I would choose to do and maintain. Tons of pictures and articles and the layout is easy to follow. You can definitely tell she spends time on the maintenance of running this blog.
- Library Media Tech Talk http://librarymediatechtalk.blogspot.com/ Stony Evans is a middle school librarian in Arkansas. His blogs are mostly the history of what is happening in his library. He is a good writer and has great ideas. I followed him because he co-authored "Hacking School Libraries" and I have really tried to implement some of those ideas into my library.
I also found a couple of personal blogs to follow about food. Because everything with me revolves around food?! Ditch the Carbs and Low Carb Yum are two of my current favorites...because HOLIDAYS!!
Overall, great assignment to introduce Blog Readers and discover the features that make them so much more useful than bookmarking every site I want to visit.
Also...
Your article is great and I love your blog page! It is so well done!
ReplyDeleteI chose DCG Middle School Library as well! I really like what they were showing. I think I connected to their webpage for my link, but it is super cool to see there is a feed for the blog specifically.
ReplyDeleteI tried Feedly as well but jumped to Bloglovin. I'm not a blog reader but I like that I could actually access all of them in one space. As for your 5 blogs I hadn't heard of any of your choices and I look forward to reading more about them and in them.
ReplyDeleteHi Kara! Thanks for some follow ideas. I found the Perpetual Page Turner as well and got a little lost in some of her posts; I got caught up into a trail of all the books that were turning into movies this year. She has some good stuff, but I could see myself spending too much time there--yikes! (By the way, did you know the movie The Turning...which looks totally creepy..is a remake of The Turning of the Screw by Henry James?! I had not put that together, but it makes it way more interesting.)
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing The Perpetual Page Turner blog! I like how she shares all types of books and doesn't just focus on one age group. I found children's books as well as young adult books. Alot of other blogs have also favor Feedly. I'm going to have to check it out. Because, like you said, no one likes to bookmark every blog they follow. Having them all in one space is good!!
ReplyDeleteThe Innovative Educator has some really good reads. Thanks for putting her on my radar. I added her to my feed reader selections and I look forward to seeing what she has to offer. I have searched pretty far back in her archives and I found a good amount of things to try in my library. It's good to see someone offering ideas and resources that are still relevant and useful.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your blog recommendations. I chose Bloglovin as well. I found it to be so easy to use.
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