WordPress is a very valuable tool for a number of reasons. It is used by individuals and organizations for blogging, but also to create fully-functioning websites – due to the powerful range of 3rd party plugins.
Usage
WordPress has many uses that most of us are exceedingly familiar with. It can be a blog, business website, art portfolio, e-commerce store and so much more. Uses are Creating:
• School Website – Numerous schools host their entire school website on WordPress.
• Class Website – Here the teacher provides links to resources, assignments and information to help students with their school classes.
• Class Blog -Class blogs are used in a wide range of different ways. Some teachers use their class blogs to to post daily tasks, information on what was covered in class and when assignments are due. Teachers do this to keep students and parents up-to-date, provide information for students who are absent and provide resources students can use for revision.
• Class Blog with Student Blogs – Lots of teachers use class blogs for global collaboration, authentic learning, reflective blogging, collaboration and discussion. When used for these purposes it’s common for their students’ to have their own individual student blogs.
• Group Collaboration and Projects – Group collaboration and project blogs can be as simple as students, or teachers, collaborating on a group blog, and might involved collaborators from the same school or different schools, to large global projects.
• ePortfolios – An increasing numbers of educators use blogs for their own digital portfolio or for their student’s digital portfolios. The student blogs are used to showcase their work and share their learning, throughout their school life while the educator’s personal eportfolios may be used to document their skills against professional standards.
Review
WordPress is a free open source platform, this means that their codes are open to everybody to use and modify. Any programmers / coders can use WordPress to create their own themes or plugins for others to download for free, or to be purchased for a fee. People often make the mistake of classifying WordPress as just a blogging platform. Although that used to be true in the past, WordPress has evolved throughout the years into a versatile educational tool.
Tool Evaluation
