Instructor's Guide - Web version (TfLS)

1.    Welcome and Introductions - Greet students as they enter and have them sign up on the forms provided and make a name tag. Give each library a set of handouts. Your classroom assistant will help you. When all students are present, indicate to the classroom assistant to give the welcome message. The classroom assistant has several opening remarks and exercises. After the class has been turned over to you, you can have the library staff introduce themselves. This is optional and you may decide you don’t have time.
2.    Lecture with Powerpoint - Run through the PowerPoint “Managing Your Website  in Student Binder. Use the notes and slides and periodically check for understanding. This presentation covers a lot of new and unfamiliar concepts. There are two handouts referred to in the presentation. These are located after the Powerpoint presentation handout in the student’s binders.
3.    Tour the Demo site – Open a web browser to http://demo.anytown.lib.ia.us  and use the script “Tour of the PLOW Demo Web Site” Be sure to cover all areas of the site. This is the first view the students have of what their web sites may look like.
4.    Explore the site as an anonymous user -When all sites have been published successfully instruct students to explore the site. They are exploring as an anonymous user and so will not see everything.
5.    Log in as an author – Move on to the next handout, “How to Log in to an Author Account” p.22 in Student Binder, and have students do this.
6.    Explore the site as an author – Tell students to take another look at the web site and point out how they can now see much more content. Unpublished (Private) items appear in red. Let them explore for a few minutes.
7.    Find a page – This next task is to search and find specific items in Plone. The handout for this is, “How to Search for Items in Plone” in Student Binder. Go through the handout and talk about the various ways to search: the search box, the Advanced Search and browsing. The students will do a search exercise from the handout, “Search Exercises” in Student Binder. Students can do this on their own or with you. Students should record their answers to the questions on the worksheet.
8.    Introduce Content Types in Plone. Say that everything that is added to the site is a content type. Use the visual representations (if you still have them) the handout, “Content Types in Plone” and the PowerPoint presentation.
9.    Selecting Content Type - Say how do you know what content type you should use? Think about how the information should be displayed on the site. Introduce the exercise that helps them identify the correct content type.
10.    “Content Type Exercise” - You can have the students work on this individually, or work on it together as a class.
11.    Edit a page – This task has 7 handouts: “How to Edit a Page in Plone”, “How to Use the Kupu Editor,” “Edit a Page in Plone Exercise #1
12.     Publish and Retract a page – the last steps in Exercise #2 is to publish the page and then retract it. Point out that this is a very important step in the work flow.
13.    Work on several exercises.  -Tell the class that they will be adding fictitious content to their Web site. Some they will publish. Remind them to either delete the content or make it private if they don’t want it on their site. - The fictitious content relates to offering some computer classes in the library.
14.    Lead the class through these exercises:
15.    How to Add a Folder- Be sure to emphasize the metadata under the properties tab. This metadata appears on all content, so students need to be familiar with this.
16.    How to Add a Page
17.    How to Add a News Item - This includes adding picture to the item. All pictures are stored on the laptops c:\Desktop\PLOW\images
18.    How to Add an Event
19.    Add an Internal Link
20.    Add an External Link
21.    How to Add a Link - Be sure to cover “Editing a link”
22.    How to Add a Contact - The students do not have to fill in every piece of metadata for this exercise
23.    Making structural changes to the Web site - Do the exercise, “How to Move Content Items From One Folder to Another" - Discuss why they would ever need to do this.  Be sure to cover the Additional Information at the bottom of the page.
24.    Folder Views - Explain the differences between the different views of a folder. Use the explanations on “Change the folder view using display options” Have the students do the exercise that will show them what the different displays look like.
25.    Controlling When and How Items are Displayed - Use the next two exercises to show how items can be excluded from navigation, or hidden until the effective date and after the expiration date. Excluding Items from Navigation and Changing Effective and Expiration Dates of News Items.
26.    Images in Plone - This is what all the students have been waiting for! However, it’s a little complicated, so proceed carefully.  Some students may have already added images to their Web sites and done so incorrectly. You may have to help them un-do their work and re-do it the Plone way. Using the “Images in Plone” document, read through or present ALL of the information on the page. Check for understanding.
27.    Have students do the next two exercises, “How to Create a Picture Exhibit” on and “How to Add an Image to a Page”.
28.     Review How to Get Help with PLOW

If you finish all the exercises before the end of class, you may let the students continue to work on their sites in a kind of open “work day” format. Or, if their heads are full and they look exhausted, dismiss the class early! ☺