5 WordPress with Linsey Steege — 03.13.2015

In the Active Teaching Lab on March 13, 2015, Linsey Steege shared how she has been using WordPress in her undergraduate and graduate courses. She discussed how she shapes her assignments and how her students have reacted to submitting them on WordPress.

Key Takeaways

• WordPress is pretty easy once the students are in, and once one member of a group is in, they can re-invite others. But expect a little bit of chaos the first week.
• Students took seriously the responsibility of creating posts that the public can see. They learned to write less formally (for the web), but more carefully (for public consumption). Some used their real names; though none were required to.
• Structure group assignments so they have to work together and iterate on a post, so they don’t divide and conquer (each take one post). They learn more when forced to read/comment on each others’ posts.
• WordPress is not a UW-Madison supported tool, though many departments use it. It can also be set as the D2L home page (instructions here)

If you’re interested in learning more to get up and running with WordPress, watch the videos below and try using the WordPress activity worksheet we used in this session!

The Active Teaching Lab, a Faculty Engagement program, provides a safe space for structured explorations of cool teaching tools and techniques that your colleagues are using to engage students and teach more effectively. During the academic year, labs are held weekly and will be listed on the Active Teaching Lab page.

Lindsey’s WordPress Story