Course Overview
Our Middle School Web Design Course empowers students to create dynamic, media rich, responsive websites which share ideas and showcase learning. Students begin creating websites in Google Sites, a powerful but approachable WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) website creation platform included in the Google Apps for Education suite of tools. Students learn to create a variety of different images incorporating graphics, photos and text, using Canva.com. Students are introduced to a variety of best practices for web design, and challenged to both enhance and demonstrate their web design skills in a variety of individual as well as team projects. Students also learn to create interactive and dynamic websites using Adobe Express. Student projects and learning are showcased on a digital portfolio, and students both give and receive feedback during the semester with classmates. In web design, students develop skills to create interactive, web-based content and experiences, which can serve them well in future studies as well as life.
Canvas Course Links
Current and past versions / iterations of this course are publicly available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Only license. Please use / copy / remix any of this course content for your own courses!
Fall 2024 (current term, incomplete content - lessons still being added)
Spring 2024 (completed term and content)
Sample Course Portfolio
Students in my fall 2023 middle school Web Design course are creating digital portfolios with Google Sites to practice as well as showcase their web design skills and learning. The example "Web Design Portfolio Site" I'm building with them this semester is available / publicly accessible.
Google Sites
The majority of web development students will learn this semester will utilize the WYSIWYG environments of Google Sites, Canva and Adobe Express.
Past Web Design Teaching and Work
CodeHS
In Spring 2024, students completed programming modules in the CodeHS curriculum, providing a foundation in HTML and scripting.
WordPress
I have extensive experiences working with WordPress to design, create and share websites, and have shared a variety of WordPress focused presentations in the past. My middle school students (currently, in 2024-25) do not use WordPress in our class.
Other Stuff
Much of my past work in web design is highlighted in my academic vitae and on my presentations / handouts page.
More information about me is also available on my online bio.
