This week we taught a class at the Center for Active Seniors (CASI) in Davenport, Iowa. 

For years we’ve taught a seminar called “Every RVer Needs a Blog!” Our personal travel blog is very important to us and we love showing other people how to do the same.  Now that we’ve kept a Blog for 11 years, and have turned the first couple years into coffee table books, we are re-committed to teaching this wonderfully easy way to have your own website. Yet, our audience for “Every RVer Needs a Blog” has been dwindling.  And, of course, since our audience this week would not even be RVers, we came up with a different title and description:

Making your own free website and online photo album using Blogger and Picasa

Imagine starting a family website when a grandchild is born, adding stories and pictures throughout the years and having a beautiful coffee table book to give to that grandchild when they graduate High School.  Or … when you take that trip of a lifetime, you could have an easy-to-maintain website for the stories and photos of that trip, then print a coffee table book to remember the trip for years to come.  Or … if you have a hobby, club, or small business to share with the world, a website is the way to do it!  Or … all of the above.

This seminar will introduce you to Google’s free website and photo tools, Blogger.com and Picasa photo software.  Learn how to start a Blog/Website and add stories and photos with Geeks on Tour’s easy to understand, step-by-step instructions.

This is the first time we’ve combined pieces of 2 classes, because the photos go into a Google+ Web Album using Picasa, and then the Blog is made with Blogger.com.  Since I started my computer training center in Fort Lauderdale in 1983, I’ve always taught how to use specific software.  Classes had titles like Beginning WordPerfect, or Intermediate PageMaker.  Now we teach “Managing Digital Photos with Picasa” or “Making Custom Maps with Google Maps.”  This time the class was vertically integrated to teach an end result – a coffee table book that you wrote!   I was a little worried that it would be too much material for a 1.5 hour class, and too confusing since we covered multiple software and websites: Picasa, Blogger.com, Plus.Google.com, and Blog2Print.com. 

I think it went well.  Jim, as usual, was the wizard behind all the audio-visual equipment.  We really like teaching classes where there is a creation being made.  We start from scratch, and at the end of the class, we have a website to show for it.  We still were able to fit the class notes on a 2 page handout. 

The facility where we taught the class is nothing short of amazing.  Every city should be so lucky as to have a Senior Center like CASI: Center for Active Seniors, Inc.  The seniors around here are never lacking for something to do. We hope to find more facilities like ths around the country and add our technology training to their mix.