Why to Try Blogging and How to Start

I am teaching my Christian Educational Ministries "Program and Curriculum Development" students how to blog tomorrow.  (I talked more about the books for this course here). 

They have already had to make comments on two different blogs because that is a good way to familiarize yourself with blogs.  (For inspiration, see my list of the Best 70 Church Leadership Blogs). 

Tomorrow we are meeting in a computer lab and they will all be setting up a blog on WordPress.  I have told them that they can set up a fake ministry blog or a personal blog. 

Here are three reasons I am teaching them to blog. 

1. Churches and ministries need websites and the blog is the easiest way to get a basic website going.  Even for one event they may want to be able to do this.   

2. I want these students to get over their fear of doing web design.  You don’t know if you are good at it and like it until you try. 

3. Even if they don’t do it the future, they need to be able to work well with designers and they will do that better if they have done it a bit themselves. 

Here are the basic instructions for them.

If you are new to blogging, this sequence of tasks may be a good quick way to try your hand at it.    

The screen photos are on the attached Microsoft Word handout here if you are interested.  Download WordPress_Blogging.doc 

My sample blog which I practiced with tonight is: http://ced352.wordpress.com/

1. Go to http://wordpress.com/
2. Click: Start a blog in seconds »
3. You need to figure out a Username and Email Address and click the legal box and then click gimme a blog. 
4. Then you need to come up with the url for your blog and the name of the blog and whether you want it to appear publicly or not.  The url will not be able to be changed but the blog name can be changed later.
5. Check your email for the confirmation email. 
6. Write a post.  Then click Publish.
7. Upload a post with a photo.   
8. Update your profile.  Change your password to something you will remember. 
9. Presentation.  Pick a new theme.
10. Presentation.  Do a Custom Image Header by uploading a photo.  You can only do this for some themes. 
11. Go to Manage . . . Pages . . . Edit your About page. 
12. Under Manage . . . Pages . . . Create a New Page

It literally took my students less than 10 minutes to get blogging.

Lots of people in the blogosphere are recommending the new book The Blogging Church by Brian Bailey (who has a blog here) and Terry Storch.  That is the best place to begin probably.