OK, if you're still reading, then we're still here. Groovy!
Now what I'd like you to do is this: come up with another category, or another use for Portaportal. It can be anything you like, as long as it is school appropriate. Just do the following first:
A) Email me your idea -- mrlarue2013@gmail.com
B) Let me approve it first in a response
C) Take your time thinking about this one... I'd rather you come up with something truly unique rather than rush ahead and "throw something together" just to rush through it
cheers,
Mr. L
PS Once you have my approval, full speed ahead!
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Thurs Aug 30: The Most Important Person in the World part three
Now that you have a link to your folder on Box.com, the next step is to add some images to that Box.com folder, which can then be accessed from your PortaPortal. Here is what you need to do:
A) Download at least nine images of your "important person"
B) Upload them to your folder at Box.com
C) provide a comment underneath each image, explaining what your person is doing in that picture
cheers,
Mr. L
A) Download at least nine images of your "important person"
B) Upload them to your folder at Box.com
C) provide a comment underneath each image, explaining what your person is doing in that picture
cheers,
Mr. L
Thurs Aug 30: The Most Important Person in the World part two
This next part will be a little trickier: here is what you must do:
A) Keep your PortaPortal account open!
B) In another window or tab, go to Box.com, and get into your account there
C) Stay OUTSIDE of the blue folder you share with me
D) create a new folder by clicking on the big button at the top right corner that says NEW, then click on the word "Folder" that appears underneath.
E) Name this folder after the name of the "most important person" you chose to represent in your portal account
F)This folder will be yellow. Click on the "share" button next to it
G) When you do, you will see an address for that folder, a WEBSITE address
H) Copy that address, then add it to the portaportal category you have created. Title it Box-folder, plus the name of the person you are gathering information about
cheers,
Mr. L
A) Keep your PortaPortal account open!
B) In another window or tab, go to Box.com, and get into your account there
C) Stay OUTSIDE of the blue folder you share with me
D) create a new folder by clicking on the big button at the top right corner that says NEW, then click on the word "Folder" that appears underneath.
E) Name this folder after the name of the "most important person" you chose to represent in your portal account
F)This folder will be yellow. Click on the "share" button next to it
G) When you do, you will see an address for that folder, a WEBSITE address
H) Copy that address, then add it to the portaportal category you have created. Title it Box-folder, plus the name of the person you are gathering information about
cheers,
Mr. L
Thurs Aug 30: The Most Important Person in the World part one
Greetings, Earthlings!.... Let's do something important
A) Pick out some public figure. Could be someone still alive, could be someone from the past. Could be an actual person, could be a fictional character from a movie or a book. Just make sure it is not anyone that would be considered inappropriate for school. So yes, serial killers don't make the list, just as an example.
B) Do a Google search on this person. Find eleven good websites about this person. Here's how I define a "good website"
- Its NOT just a link to a picture of this person. (WE'll get to that, I promise)
- Its a website in English (your brilliant instructor reads many computer languages, but only one human language)
- Its a website that you can actually read and understand. Don't pick something that makes you sound like you ate the dictionary for lunch
- THE MATERIAL MUST BE 100% SCHOOL APPROPRIATE
- It cannot just be different parts of the SAME website
C) Set up a category on your account at PortaPortal. Name the category after the person you chose, then add all eleven of the websites, COMPLETE WITH A DESCRIPTION, to this category
Pretty simple, eh?
Mr. L
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Tues August 28: fun with portaportal, part six, "life inside"
For the last part of today's activities, you must imagine that you
A) have a house -- a NICE house -- all to yourself. (Hooray!) But its totally EMPTY, except for one computer and an Internet connection
B) you are not allowed to leave this house. EVER. But you have all the money you will ever need
You are therefore 100% dependent on the Internet to get all the things you need to survive and to have fun. Here's what you have to do:
1) goto PortaPortal and create a new category named "My Place"
2) You will need to add all the websites you need to be able to get all the stuff you need to survive. This includes.
- food and such -- some can come from fast food places, but not all of it
- furniture -- there is none in your house yet
- clothing -- of course
- stuff to play with, including electronics and such
- other stuff to play with that doesn't plug in
- any reading material you're into
- pets and all the stuff they need
- etc etc etc you get the idea
You will need a minimum of at least 13 websites for this one...after all, you can never leave this house ever again
Cheers,
Mr. L
PS If we have time, there is a part two for this
Tues August 28: fun with portaportal, part five
So now you have an online bookmarking account at portaportal. You have made it visible to me, and added three categories. You have added websites to two of the categories --> "important" and "my stuff". Now it's time to add some websites to the last category you made -- "travel"
The first step is to figure out which place you either want to travel to, or someplace you've already been that you liked so much that would recommend to the rest of us as a great place to go. It can be another city, another state, another country, even another planet. (Nope, I'm not kidding.)
The second step will be to add not less than seven websites to this category.
Three of the websites must be about the place itself; include an "official" website if it has one... for example, I am sure that the city of London has an official website
Two of the websites must be about things you can do when you are there. There might be some "overlap" from the three websites above, but don't worry about that. Just fit 'em in where you can
Finally, two of the websites must be specifically about HOW you get there. They could be airline or cruise lines websites (or NASA if you're planning on going into outer space...or maybe the Russian space agency, since the cheap chiseling politicians in this country won't fund NASA enough to put people in space, even as they shower Wall Street with money)
Make sure that the websites are something that you actually can make sense out of...if you don't understand what they are saying, then don't use that website. And as ever, ALL your websites must be SCHOOL APPROPRIATE
cheers,
Mr. L
The first step is to figure out which place you either want to travel to, or someplace you've already been that you liked so much that would recommend to the rest of us as a great place to go. It can be another city, another state, another country, even another planet. (Nope, I'm not kidding.)
The second step will be to add not less than seven websites to this category.
Three of the websites must be about the place itself; include an "official" website if it has one... for example, I am sure that the city of London has an official website
Two of the websites must be about things you can do when you are there. There might be some "overlap" from the three websites above, but don't worry about that. Just fit 'em in where you can
Finally, two of the websites must be specifically about HOW you get there. They could be airline or cruise lines websites (or NASA if you're planning on going into outer space...or maybe the Russian space agency, since the cheap chiseling politicians in this country won't fund NASA enough to put people in space, even as they shower Wall Street with money)
Make sure that the websites are something that you actually can make sense out of...if you don't understand what they are saying, then don't use that website. And as ever, ALL your websites must be SCHOOL APPROPRIATE
cheers,
Mr. L
Monday, August 27, 2012
Mon August 26: fun with portaportal, part four
Hey there, hi there, ho there,
OK, so now you have an account at "PortaPortal", a place where your website favorites will always be safe and accessible, 24/7. You have added some categories where you place websites, and you put one website link into the "important" category. BUT, we hadn't gotten around to putting any websites into the category called "my stuff". Now that's going to change.
What you will need to do is this:
A) do a Google search about some school appropriate topic that you are really, really interested in. It can be anything: astronomy, skateboarding, the chemical composition of eye liner, green Chinese pottery, whatever works for you.
B) Find ten really good websites about that particular topic. Good meaning a website you could actually understand and make use of, and is good for the thing that interests you.
C) Add these websites ONE AT A TIME to the category called "my stuff". Make sure that you include both a title and a description...don't assume that I will know or understand what this website is about. Ya gotta explain it to me
MAKE SURE ALL WEBSITES CHOSEN ARE SCHOOL APPROPRIATE.
and make sure that the links actually work!
Cheers,
Mr. L
OK, so now you have an account at "PortaPortal", a place where your website favorites will always be safe and accessible, 24/7. You have added some categories where you place websites, and you put one website link into the "important" category. BUT, we hadn't gotten around to putting any websites into the category called "my stuff". Now that's going to change.
What you will need to do is this:
A) do a Google search about some school appropriate topic that you are really, really interested in. It can be anything: astronomy, skateboarding, the chemical composition of eye liner, green Chinese pottery, whatever works for you.
B) Find ten really good websites about that particular topic. Good meaning a website you could actually understand and make use of, and is good for the thing that interests you.
C) Add these websites ONE AT A TIME to the category called "my stuff". Make sure that you include both a title and a description...don't assume that I will know or understand what this website is about. Ya gotta explain it to me
MAKE SURE ALL WEBSITES CHOSEN ARE SCHOOL APPROPRIATE.
and make sure that the links actually work!
Cheers,
Mr. L
Mon August 26: fun with portaportal, part three
OK children, for our next magic trick, we will be creating a category, and then putting in a link. Here is what you do:
A) There will probably be a big message in the middle of the screen that says "You must create some categories to begin. If there is, click the button thats there with the message.
B) If not, go to the top of the screen, and click the button that has a "+" sign in the middle of it. It looks like this:
C) However you get there, when you arrive, you will have the chance to create some categories. Lets start with three: "Important", "My Stuff" and "Travel". Then, click the "Add Categories" button
D)When you get back to your main screen, it will look something like this:
E) You will want to click on the "+" sign next to the category named "important", as shown above.
F) When you get to the next screen, you will see a place to set up your first link. It has a place for the "title" and the "URL". Next to the word "title" type in the name of our blog
G) Next to the "URL", type in the website address for our class website, our blog ----> http://mrlcomputerapps.blogspot.com/
H) When you have done that, scroll down and click the "ADD LINKS" button.
That'll be all for now,
Mr. L
A) There will probably be a big message in the middle of the screen that says "You must create some categories to begin. If there is, click the button thats there with the message.
B) If not, go to the top of the screen, and click the button that has a "+" sign in the middle of it. It looks like this:
C) However you get there, when you arrive, you will have the chance to create some categories. Lets start with three: "Important", "My Stuff" and "Travel". Then, click the "Add Categories" button
D)When you get back to your main screen, it will look something like this:
E) You will want to click on the "+" sign next to the category named "important", as shown above.
F) When you get to the next screen, you will see a place to set up your first link. It has a place for the "title" and the "URL". Next to the word "title" type in the name of our blog
G) Next to the "URL", type in the website address for our class website, our blog ----> http://mrlcomputerapps.blogspot.com/
H) When you have done that, scroll down and click the "ADD LINKS" button.
That'll be all for now,
Mr. L
Mon August 26: fun with portaportal, part two
Part two of working with portaportal involves two steps. The first is to make sure that I, your humble genius instructor, have the ability to see your portal. Remember if I can't see it, the grade is ZERO. Here's how you do that:
1) At the top of the screen, you will see a whole collection of buttons. You will click the "Preferences" button, which looks like this:
2) On the next screen, please scroll down to the middle of the page. There you will see something which says "GUEST PAGE BEHAVIOR". Just below that, it says "guest access". When you first get there, it says "do not allow guest access". Change it so it says "allow guest access", like this:
3) After you've done that, scroll all the way down and click the "Change User Preferences" button at the bottom of the screen
Cheers,
Mr. L
1) At the top of the screen, you will see a whole collection of buttons. You will click the "Preferences" button, which looks like this:
2) On the next screen, please scroll down to the middle of the page. There you will see something which says "GUEST PAGE BEHAVIOR". Just below that, it says "guest access". When you first get there, it says "do not allow guest access". Change it so it says "allow guest access", like this:
3) After you've done that, scroll all the way down and click the "Change User Preferences" button at the bottom of the screen
Cheers,
Mr. L
Mon August 26: fun with portaportal, part one
Greetings, and welcome back!
A) we will be using a huge number of websites during the rest of the year. There will be many classes where I instruct you to go find websites that support some work you are doing
B) Since you aren't using your own personal computer, you can't just set up a "favorites" list that can only be found on one computer
To work around this, I have discovered a website called PortaPortal, which allows you to save favorite websites to one single place online.
CLICK HERE TO GET STARTED-->
http://www.portaportal.com/
HERE IS WHAT YOU DO WHEN YOU GET THERE1) when you get to the website, click on the big "SIGNUP" button off to the left
2) on the next page, you will see a place to type in your first and last name, your login name, your password and your email address. It might be helpful to you if you use the same login name and password for this as for your email, but that's just one man's opinion
3) On the next page, it says that you are already logged in AND that a confirmation email has been sent to your email account. BEFORE YOU DO ANYTHING, GO TO YOUR EMAIL FIRST, and find that email that portaportal has sent to you. It should say something like "portaportal membership"
4) When you read that email, you will find your username and password. Just below that, there is a link to click to confirm your account. CLICK THAT LINK!
5) Clicking that link brings you to a screen which says "thanks for confirming". Next to that, you will see a link that says "Return to Portal" Click that link.
When everybody is at this point, we can begin part two. If you get there early, please feel free to check out some of the features on your own while you are waiting
Cheers,
Mr. L
Thursday, August 23, 2012
Thursday August 23: What's in your wallet?, part three
OK, so if you're reading this, it means that you have
A) set up an account at Box.com
B) shared a folder with me
C) made a "wallet" folder inside that shared folder
D) uploaded 14 images of stuff you'd love to own to that wallet folder
Now for the next step, you will need to write a comment beneath each image. Please, don't write like you ate the dictionary for lunch, just tell me what each item is, and why you want one
Cheers,
Mr. L
A) set up an account at Box.com
B) shared a folder with me
C) made a "wallet" folder inside that shared folder
D) uploaded 14 images of stuff you'd love to own to that wallet folder
Now for the next step, you will need to write a comment beneath each image. Please, don't write like you ate the dictionary for lunch, just tell me what each item is, and why you want one
Cheers,
Mr. L
Thursday August 23: What's in your wallet?, part one
Yesterday, you were asked to send me an email as part of our classwork. Part of the reason for this was so that each of you could be invited to a separate folder online at a place called "Box.com".
This folder is a safe place to put your work that you do for this class. To get access to that folder, you have to respond to an invitation which I have emailed to you. Doing so allows you to set up an account of your own. In YOUR account, you will have a folder that you share with me. You will also be able to create many other folders that have nothing to do with me; perhaps you may use these folders for other classes, or for interests outside of school.
OK, so let's get going. The first step is to respond to the emailed invitation I sent you. If you didn't get it, you need to look in your email, and if you still can't find it, let me know and I will re-send that invite.
The second step is to get into your account, and then get inside the blue folder you will find there. That's the folder you share with me.
The third step is, once you are inside that folder, use the big UPLOAD button at the top right corner of the screen to upload something to that folder. For this first time around, it can be anything "School Appropriate" that you can find on your computer.
So let's get going and do just that.
cheers,
Mr. L
This folder is a safe place to put your work that you do for this class. To get access to that folder, you have to respond to an invitation which I have emailed to you. Doing so allows you to set up an account of your own. In YOUR account, you will have a folder that you share with me. You will also be able to create many other folders that have nothing to do with me; perhaps you may use these folders for other classes, or for interests outside of school.
OK, so let's get going. The first step is to respond to the emailed invitation I sent you. If you didn't get it, you need to look in your email, and if you still can't find it, let me know and I will re-send that invite.
The second step is to get into your account, and then get inside the blue folder you will find there. That's the folder you share with me.
The third step is, once you are inside that folder, use the big UPLOAD button at the top right corner of the screen to upload something to that folder. For this first time around, it can be anything "School Appropriate" that you can find on your computer.
So let's get going and do just that.
cheers,
Mr. L
Tuesday, August 21, 2012
Wednesday August 22: welcome to Mr. LaRue's Computer Apps class
Greetings, one and all!
If you are reading this, you no doubt are in my Computer Apps class at PSA (Palmetto Scholars Academy). This blog will contain news of interest to everyone taking this class, including a running account of daily class activities, upcoming tests, project parameters, assigned homework (with due dates) and so on. I will do my level best to update it after the conclusion of each class day.
Today's secret message : "A captain's goal is simple: find a crew, find a job... keep flying." -- Malcolm Reynolds
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