Day: July 11, 2017

Digital Lit Posts

Digital Activism

rachellashmett

If you spend a day on the internet you are more than likely going to see some activism. There are so many different networks that allow activism, but is activism online a bad thing? There is negatives and positives of every situation so I will be discussing both.

 

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Image Credit: Whitman Service Learning

Negatives

The main negative I see with activating online is anything can be activated. Since there are so many different types of people there is going to be support coming from multiple sources. Even the worst possible campaign will get support.

Another negative is the protection you have against people opposing you. I think this is a negative because you need to be able to see both sides of the story in order to be successful. When you are online, it is so easy to delete a comment or block someone because they disagreed with you.

Positives

The first positive about activating online is you can have so many different supporters. In The New Face of Teen Activism, Melissa (an online activist) says “A lot of physical protests and movements are very localized, but online there are no limits to who can engage with you.” This is so true. When you are discussing an idea physically, you can only talk to so many people. On the internet, you can live in New York and talk to someone in China! The support is endless!

Another positive is the use of promotions. With so many different social medias, you can expand your message across so many different platforms. With this you get supporters and you can create a type of petition or fundraiser. These two things can be exposed to multiple people and get much more support than doing it physically.

The last positive is the impact activism can have on neutral readers. Activist can make such a big impact and talk about very touchy subjects. When reviewing the Shorty Awards, I found The Help Hotline. This was made by teenagers in order to help people with depression, suicidal thoughts, and much more. These teenagers made such an impact on others that they were nominated for the Shorty Awards, pretty impressive.

Overall, I believe if you want to be an online activist you need to be aware of the positives and negatives. I personally thing online activism is a great thing, mainly because of the amount of supporters you can get for a great cause.

Until next time,

-Rachel

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Independent Learning Project

DIY Blogging

rachellashmett
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Image Credit: Billy Curtis

For a long time, I have been very interested in DIY projects. I think it is so cool what we can make and are able to recycle. Last week, I posted a DIY project I did with my father and I loved talking about it. I got so much positive feedback from social media, it was awesome! This made me decide to search how to do DIY posts correctly and I found a lot of tips and tricks.

One major thing I found out was that DIY blogs usually only write about DIY projects. Also, only a certain type of DIY. Like one blog I found was dedicated to wood work projects while another was completely about yarn projects. This is a cool thing about DIY is there is so many different kinds that they can be appealing to anyone.

Different kinds of DIY projects include:

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Image Credit: grassrootsgroundswell

Kitchen

Bathroom

TV/ Electronic

Wood Work

Classroom

Outdoor

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Image Credit: b inxee

Stain Removal/ Cleaning

Garden/ Landscaping

Welding/ Metal Work

And these are just a few!

Since I am interested in multiple DIY projects, I don’t want to limit my blog to one type. I want to do things that I find interesting and will be useful to me. This can make my blog successful because it is able to reach out to more people. One way of being able to reach people is through social media.

Although my posts get shared through Twitter and Facebook, Pinterest is a very famous site for looking at DIY. This is because the pins are based off pictures and you are able to see the DIY without having to click on it. This way, you can try the DIY without having to read the post. However, some people do click through to the post and read the steps to creating this DIY.

Now, what about the post? How can you make the post interesting to read? Some of the tips I found was making a step list. If you make a step list than it is easy for the reader to follow when creating their own project. The reader can easily copy and paste a list so they are able to print it off.

When making a list or the steps, you want to make sure you go through everything you did but not make every step super long. I found that the recommended length for each step is 2 sentences at most. “Well, what if I have to explain more?” If you need to explain more, you can write a very detailed guide at the beginning or end of your post. This way they have help if they need it.

Hopefully this post was helpful to future DIY writers!

Until next time,

-Rachel