A new session of each course opens each month, allowing you to enroll whenever your busy schedule permits!
How does it work? Once a session starts, two lessons will be released each week, for the six-week duration of your course. You will have access to all previously released lessons until the course ends.
Keep in mind that the interactive discussion area for each lesson automatically closes 2 weeks after each lesson is released, so you’re encouraged to complete each lesson within two weeks of its release.
The Final Exam will be released on the same day as the last lesson. Once the Final Exam has been released, you will have 2 weeks plus 10 days to complete the Final and finish any remaining lessons in your course. No further extensions can be provided beyond these 10 days.
Week One
Lesson 01 - Getting Started With WordPress
Wednesday
This first lesson explores the magic of WordPress! You'll discover how to use this WordPress to create an attractive, dynamic blog or website—without needing to learn any special code. You'll find out what the two "flavors" of WordPress are and why most experts recommend the WordPress.org version we will use in this course. Then you'll go online, sign up for a hosting account, and tour the WordPress Dashboard.
Lesson 02 - Creating a Blog
Friday
What can a blog do that a website can't? Blogging's become a popular way to establish an online presence. This lesson focuses on how adding a blog can make a traditional website more effective. Then you'll build a blog with WordPress—by creating, refining, and categorizing posts. You'll also find out how to encourage and control visitor feedback.
Week Two
Lesson 03 - Making a WordPress Website
Wednesday
Get the best of both worlds by combining a blog with a traditional website. In this lesson, you'll use WordPress to create and organize web pages. You will also learn how to convert your blog to a traditional website—or vice versa—with the click of a button.
Lesson 04 - Making Your Pages Look Great
Friday
This lesson is all about WordPress themes—the templates that give your website its look and feel. You'll discover how to choose a theme, install it, and tweak it.
Week Three
Lesson 05 - Working With Images and Multimedia
Wednesday
Photos, drawings, charts, videos, and audio clips can make your website more appealing and understandable. This lesson teaches you how to use WordPress to upload and insert images and multimedia files.
Lesson 06 - Plugins: The Modular Solution for Functional Websites
Friday
Plugins are little programs that add features to your WordPress website. In this lesson, you'll learn how to find and use them.
Week Four
Lesson 07 - Making a User-Friendly Website
Wednesday
If your online visitors have trouble understanding or navigating your website, they'll go somewhere else. This lesson helps you pinpoint and eliminate usability problems.
Lesson 08 - Polishing Your WordPress Website
Friday
In this lesson, you'll take a long, hard look at your class project and how to make it better. You'll create a front page featuring both static and dynamic content; add links to pages, documents, email, and other sites; and repair typos, grammatical errors, and other mistakes.
Week Five
Lesson 09 - Getting Search Engines to Love Your Website
Wednesday
What if you launched a website and nobody came? This lesson will show you how to keep that from happening. You'll find out what makes search engines tick and how to get them to visit your pages.
Lesson 10 - Making the Most of Statistics and Social Networking
Friday
Statistics are just a bunch of numbers if you don't know how to use them. This lesson focuses on how to analyze stats so you can improve your site. You'll also find out how to tie your WordPress pages into social sites like Facebook and Twitter.
Week Six
Lesson 11 - WordPress Security and Monetization
Wednesday
This lesson will teach you how to protect a WordPress site against hackers and reviews money-making strategies for blogs and websites.
Lesson 12 - Mastering Your Domains
Friday
In the final lesson, you will take a tour of the hosting control panel, discuss domain naming strategies, and review where to get help after the course ends.