The blog initially launched on this platform in March 2020, at the beginning of the Covid work-and-learn-from-home period, when the now retired director, Dan Soneson, was looking for a vehicle to share short and important technical information with language and culture instructors. The very first post was titled Starting your Zoom Meeting, addressing the most basic and immediate need of an instructor suddenly thrust into remote teaching. Over time, the range of topics deepened to include a variety of technical tools and pedagogical topics. The series on Jamboard proved particularly popular, with the Locate and Organize your Jamboards post being viewed over 1100 times. The primary goal of the blog was to share tips and tricks, but it was also a method of keeping the language and culture community connected during a very challenging time.
During the fully remote period, we aimed to publish multiple posts each week, which was a major undertaking. Many posts were written by Dan, and others were authored by a small but dedicated team of LC staff, and the occasional guest writer. On May 10, 2021, Dan published his final post on the blog; and later that summer, we all began the difficult return to campus.
In November 2022, interim director Beth Kautz with site designer Anna Hubbard relaunched the blog as a Drupal Lite site. The regrouped team posted less frequently than they did on the classic Tip of the Day blog, but the posts were often longer and geared towards a HyFlex, rather than fully remote, educational environment. After a year, along with staff transitions, maintaining a blog became challenging with the launch of the center’s social media nexus and course promotion initiatives. Of course, technology has evolved considerably since 2020, with Zoom updating its settings constantly, Jamboard being decommissioned, among many other changes.
Therefore, in January 2025, the Language Center will sunset both the Blogger and Drupal Lite forms of the blog. We have access to some readership data, and realize that the blogs are still being viewed. We encourage everyone who has content on the blogs that they find useful to copy it for themselves for use offline, or email elsie@umn.edu to request that we find a way to integrate currently relevant content into our main website.
