Introduction

Hi it's Edumeg here,




At this stage of my blog I do not wish to introduce myself by name and I have chosen instead to use my blog name. I hope that as I gain knowledge and confidence in safe internet use by undertaking SSSC23things online training that eventually I will feel happier to share more detail about myself.




I work in social care, supporting people with learning disabilities. I am a registrant of the SSSC often browsing the website for new information and guidance. The organisation I work for is committed to providing high quality training to its staff and have encouraged all staff to access the learning and development opportunities provided on the SSSC website.



As I continue to progress in my career in social care I feel the need to develop my knowledge further. Although I manage to use IT to the best of my ability it is becoming apparent that the people I support's interest and expectations of us as support workers will demand a greater level of skills in internet use. As the demands to access social media sites, dating sites, job sites, online shopping and general browsing of the internet increases, so does the need for social care workers to provide support in this area. The obvious data protection and adult support and protection implications this will entail is a frightening reality. I recognise that if I do not continue to learn new skills in this area there is a potential that I will be unable to provide the necessary support to create the opportunities that people so rightly deserve.


8/1/18
Thing 1 : Blogging


I began by trying to use WordPress.com and didn't get very far, probably due to me being a beginner. For some reason it wouldn't allow me to set up a free blog and kept taking me to links to sign up to monthly payments for my blog. When this didn't work I realised that I already had a google account so it was much easier to use google blogger. Luckily I have a teenager in the house who pointed me in the right direction. Creating my blog with Google was fairly straight forward.

Step 1.
I clicked on the blogger icon and as I was already signed in it directed me to create my blog and asked me to give a blog name and design.
Thinking of a suitable name for my Blog, seems easy enough. Once I started to research a bit I found it was quite important to consider this very carefully. I discovered that your Blog name is your online identity. If I choose wrongly and wanted to change the name at a later date it would be time consuming, I would need to reset links and potentially loose links, update URL address and it could result in expense .  I opted for a short name so that it would be easily remembered and I wanted the blog to instantly give people an idea of what I was using my blog for. I eventually decided on Edumeg as in educating me. I did think about using a name to indicate that it was about learning IT skills but thought that I might like to use my blog for further training in the future and It would be best not to categories it.
Step 2. 
I then selected a design for my blog opting for a basic design but learnt I can go back at a later date and change my design choice as I get more adventurous.
Step 3.
I then e-mailed my blog details to SSSC. I used copy and paste to enter the URL address from the title bar at the top of the window then e-mailed the detail to SSSC. Unfortunately the e-mail bounced straight back to me saying there was an error. I then tried just e-mailing my blog address and I was able to successfully send my message. 


Following my E-mail I received a message alerting me that an unidentified device had tried to access my account. I went into my Google account to the security icon and to be on the safe side I decided to change my password. I realised that as my PC is quite an old one that it had randomly detected my location and it was in fact my own device but the wrong location. Panic over!

The SSSC23things has certainly got me thinking about how vulnerable we are when we use the internet.


Finally I was ready to make my blog public and clicked the publish icon in my blog page, Hoorah!