 So, what we're going to do is I'm going to be asking our panel some questions about their world and how they use WordPress, but I'm going to go ahead and have the panel introduce themselves, say a little bit about who they are and why they're here. Hi, my name is Sunny Tucker. I'm 16 and I blog. Hi, my name is Alicia. I'm 13 years old and I blog with WordPress. I love WordPress and I love connecting with people and sharing my story. Hi, my name is Alyssa Fernandez. I'm 12 years old and I'm here because we were actually, well, because of this kids panel and our mom is speaking here and so are we. Yay! Hi, my name is Anna Tuttle. I'm 15 and a couple of years ago I did a presentation, but this year I'm just coming to enjoy and I blog with WordPress, obviously. Okay, so the question is basically do we publish any content online and what do we publish? So I should I answer first? So me personally, my blog is mainly just about things that happen to me in my life and how I'm reacting to them with funny photos and stuff. So I mainly just publish stuff online to make people laugh and I also now I'm focusing more on like social media aspect, so yeah, and yes, I publish online. So I do publish online. I have a blog called Holy Art and I publish things to help kids become better people and deal with the changing world around them. Yes, I publish online. I am with my sister at holyart.com and basically what I really love doing is sharing my message because I was bullied in elementary school and I like helping kids embrace themselves, love themselves and have self-esteem and confidence. So I publish online. I actually started my blog to keep up with my extended family who live very far away. And also as an outlet to get out feelings and thoughts that I had that I didn't really feel like telling anybody else currently. So yeah, I definitely publish online. Awesome. So the next question is going to be what methods do you use to push your publications? Do you tweet, you know, you guys have talked about your blogs, but what do you use to get your blogs written and then get them published and out there? I actually don't use any kind of marketing at all. I just word of mouth tell other friends and stuff like that, so. Well, since this is WordCamp WordPress, obviously, well, I'm on all social media, Tumblr, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, you name it. I just love putting stuff out there, creating graphics and images to go with my blog posts. So my sister and dad published with WordPress and we do all social media, like you said. When I started publishing on WordPress, I was like eight years old. So at that time I didn't have any social medias. So it was mainly just like a thing to connect with like my grandparents and stuff and tell them about my life. So I haven't really, I don't really use any social media to like spread the word about my blog. I probably will in the future, we'll see. But I haven't yet. So we'll see. Okay. So the next question is things that you prefer to use. Are you guys mobile or tablet users or do you prefer desktop? And with that, what type of third party apps are you using when it comes to your WordPress blog? Are you using any type of plugins and things of that nature? So it's kind of a two-fold question. Well, I just, I really only use a laptop. So and I don't use any plugins. I'm WordPress hosted. So that's it. Well, I like using my laptop too. I feel it gives me accessibility and like typing on a keyboard. Well, some things that I use is co-schedule. I use that for my headlines to make them pop out and make sure my readers and my target audience that will make it more appealing to them. It's co-schedule.com slash headline-dash-analyzer. And I also use Canva to create graphics that I pair up with my blog posts. And sometimes I do infographics and things like that that are really fun and really easy to do. I mostly use my laptop to publish things, but I also some occasionally use my mini iPad where I conveniently have the WordPress app. For me, it's kind of both. As far as most social media is like Instagram, Twitter, which I mainly use Instagram and Twitter, I definitely use mobile. I love mobile. So then I can just like carried around with me, especially at conferences like this at WordPress. I'm like always like scrolling my Twitter feed. But then for other things like definitely publishing on WordPress, I always do it on my computer and then stuff like Tumblr too. I just like the way it looks better on my desktop. So I usually use Tumblr on my desktop, but I also have my mobile in case of emergencies. So we'll see. Okay, so we talked a little bit about what you guys are doing in the online space. Let's talk a little bit about how you get there and your process. So when you start to write a new blog post or push something out and publish it, what is the thought process that you use to get to the final product? I go through a lengthy process to write my blog post. First of all, it starts with the idea. Usually I just do a put an ideas paper and create a brief outline of the main points that I'm going to be covering. And then basically I do my research. I read books. I go on Google. I look for statistics if I need them. And then I do kind of a brain dump. I write down everything that I want to write down. And then I spend the next few minutes organizing it and editing and kind of polishing it. And then after that, I do my images. I do my headline. And then I'm just ready to publish. Well, for my blog posts, I research. I look for quotes and statistics and also other people's outlook on the topic that I choose to be walking about because I'd like to have a broad variety of perspectives. I'm sorry for my blog. And then I write everything down and kind of put it in order. I do Canva images. Then I do my headline. And then I ask my mom to be my proofreader and check to see if anything is missing. Then I publish it. And then I do the web promotion. For me, a common theme in a lot of my WordPress posts on my blog is just different stories that I've heard. So usually it's on like a TV show that I watch or a movie or a book that I really love. So for me, when I'm writing blog posts, it's usually just like she was saying like brain dump. I usually just write everything down. And then sometimes when I'm in the middle of writing a story or writing something that happened to me, I'll think, oh, this makes me think of this such and such thing that I saw either on the internet or in a TV show or something. So then I'll get the gif of that and put it in the blog post. So I'm always putting pictures and stuff. So I usually do that. And I just write a lot. And then I'll go back and edit and proofread and do everything. And then I just post it. And then after I post it, I'll go to people I know and be like, oh, hey, check it out. Like my friends and stuff. So. I'm one of those instant gratification people. So I kind of write and then hit publish and then go back and go, I want to change this and change it and hit publish. And then so it kind of depends on which with what kind of a post I'm doing. So occasionally I'll write a poem and I'll write on my notebook paper and then just put it on my blog. Suddenly I will write on an assignment for school and send it into my teacher and then put it on my blog. If I'm doing an update post on everything I've done in the past three months for my family, I will go to my journal and make an outline of everything I've done and then go by that and write my post. My mom edits some of it. Sometimes it goes unedited. But that's pretty much my process. Well, thanks so much, guys. So now that we've talked about what your process is and everything, how often do you post your content and what is the thought process behind that frequency? So usually I try to do it three times a week. Lately I've been doing it once a week, but I want to get back on track and be more consistent. For me it's like, I'm not saying this because you guys are so organized, but for me it's like just when I have something I want to say I'll say it. So usually it's like every couple months, it depends. It really depends. But because usually what I write about is something that happens to me. So if there's something really weird like in a class or something that my professor said, I'll write about it. So yeah, is there another part of the question I'm sorry? We'll see. Okay. Well, the question was how often do you post, right? Okay. Well, I try to do it three times a week too because our mom has a rule of thumb that we have three categories so we alternate on those every week and I think consistency is key to how you're doing your blogging that the more often you publish, the more often you publish, the more people will want to come to your blog because they know stuff is there. Well, I'm kind of one of those bloggers again. So I kind of just publish every once in a while. I actually haven't published since November. I was a lot more frequent before then and I just published for the first time like last week I think again. So definitely looking into getting back into that. Awesome. Awesome. And I like that there's some differences there because it shows that there's not necessarily a right or wrong way to do things. It's all personally what works for us. So now here's the big question. How are your parents involved in the process of your blogging and how thankful for that are you? So now I'm putting you on the spot. I'm definitely thankful for that. My mom is pretty much the biggest person who edits everything. She reads everything almost instantly. She basically really actually keeps track of the whole cyber security thing. So the whole cyber bullying and all that stuff. She's like that filter that everything comes through so that stops. So that's really important. So yeah, she just edits everything. She reads all my comments. Who follows me? She stalks people who follow me sometimes. It is true in some cases. A few cases. That's pretty much it though. Well, what can I say about my mom? She's incredible. But all the things that we've done have been supported by her. The idea of blogging and of getting out there in first place was through her because that's what she does and that's what she works for. And while she edits for us, she has been our book editor as well. She has helped us in all our writing processes and in proof reading and making sure that everything is safe for the cyber security as well. She does all our comments for us on WordPress. And she is just our number one supporter and biggest fan. She reads all my blog posts and checks my Canva images to make sure everything is good on there. And I'm just really thankful for her. So thank you, mom. I love my mom. She has always been there for me. And she proofreads all my stuff and makes sure that it's relevant. And that I'm doing it right. And also that it looks good as well. And she's always there for me. And she, of course, it's a pretty big deal that she even lets me blog. So thank you, mommy. Cool. OK, shout out to my parents over there. Because without them, I would literally not be here. So as far as my blogging process, it's actually kind of perfect. Because my parents kind of represent the two sides of blogging. Because my dad is like super computer with like amazing smart. And so he's really good with the techie side of it. So I actually started blogging on one of my dad's websites called Miami Fun Guide. And it's basically like a guide for people who are coming to Miami as tourists to different family friendly places. So as a kid, I used to write reviews of different restaurants, theaters, different stuff that we would go to. So that's kind of what started me blogging. Because I got comfortable with WordPress and writing posts in that way. And then I started my own blog. And my dad is the one that formatted my whole blog and made it look really pretty and everything. And then my mom is the other side of that, which is like the actual writing part. Because I'm actually homeschooled by my mom. So she, awesome. Yes. Oh, this is our home school. Awesome. So she like literally taught me how to write. So both of them are huge factors. As far as actually publishing, I mean writing posts, individual posts, I usually write most of the stuff and put the pictures and stuff. And then I'll just like run it through them to see what they think. And they're usually like, the only reason I'm blogging, well not the only reason. But I would not be blogging if it weren't for them. So I'm super thankful. Thank you. OK, so now that I know you're all homeschooled, I can add a new question to my list. I say homeschool mom who integrates WordPress into her curriculum for her child. Is it integrated into your curriculum? And if so, in what ways? And if not, is there any way you could think to integrate it into your curriculum next year? OK. So yeah, it's integrated into my curriculum. I just finished building a blog for our homeschool co-op for the co-op wide. They wanted a blog to represent them on the internet. So I just finished doing that. And that was part of my curriculum for just coding and stuff like that. That's what I did for that. And just coding in general is actually part of my curriculum. I took a whole class on C-Sharp. So that's kind of, it's been part of my curriculum for a while. So, but WordPress is kind of like the way that I can utilize all that stuff. You know, it's one thing to learn it and then another thing to actually do it. So. Definitely, I think that's one of the biggest part of our curriculum right there is writing and learning how to create content. Graphic design is something that I'm really big on and that I love doing and I'm particularly good at. And just really learning how WordPress works. It's so simple and so easy to use, which is why I think it's so easy to love and so easy to learn doing. It's incredible and I just love doing it. Well, our curriculum is really made up of different curriculums. It's very unique and I love it. And yes, WordPress, our blog is part of our curriculum. And we are learning how to write. And one day we won't need mom's help with the writing. How? Oh, well, we actually do prefer it for our mom's blog. So that's also training and it will help us when we're older. So it is definitely part of our schooling. Yeah, I would agree in the same way. Whenever there was a specific book report or an essay or something that I really liked that I would write for school, I would post it on my blog. So it was kind of like an initiative, I guess, because sometimes when you're doing school work and you're like, what's the point of this essay? No one's going to see it. So for the example, when I would put it on my blog, I would feel like that I was doing something. And then also with Mommy Fun Guide, with writing posts and stuff, that was also incorporated into homeschooling. So yeah, I would say it's a really big part. Well, I forgot to mention too because I took a journalism class and I had to actually publish all of my stuff. And it was with FLVS. I don't know if you use that. So it was without FLVS and I had to officially publish all my stuff but not publish it. So it all went on my blog. So the whole world could see it and say, you misspelled that or you forgot to come in there. So that was part of my curriculum also. That's awesome. So when we're talking about posting out into the real world, for lack of a better term, with that comes social media and conversing with friends and things of that nature. What platforms do your friends prefer to use and are you trying to suck them into the WordPress world? Well, I'm not trying to suck them into the WordPress world. But maybe I should try doing that. I mean, I haven't thought of it before but maybe they'd be interested in something like that. I actually, my friends use Instagram. Sometimes we go to church and we see that our friends just followed us on Instagram and we're like, yay. I actually just got in touch with what we used to go to school and I stopped at first grade but I had a best friend in kindergarten and I just got in touch with her after a long time on Instagram. So that has been a big help for me and she uses that a lot. Yeah, I would say definitely social media is such a huge part of my life. I would say even the reason I haven't used my blog so much is because I'm on social media because social media is like tiny little blogs. You know what I mean? So in terms of what my friends use, definitely Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr a lot. I heard that people don't like this but I have to be honest. Snapchat is huge. Everyone uses it. So that's definitely a big social media. One thing that I don't like about Snapchat though, which is better on WordPress, is that everything goes away really quickly but on WordPress everything's there so you have the record of your life, which is something I really like. So that's why I prefer Instagram or Twitter over Snapchat. As far as telling my friends about WordPress, I actually haven't, aside from sharing my blog posts with friends, but I am actually in addition to homeschooling this semester. I'm taking dual enrollment classes here at FIU as a high school student and I was actually really impressed because my professors, it's a writing class and my professors are actually using WordPress as part of the class. So it was amazing because all the students were like, ah, now I have to learn how to use WordPress and I'm like, I already know. So it was great, it was perfect. So I'm, yeah. So and coming to WordCamp in the past years and stuff, I feel like I was the only person who knew WordPress but now people are using it a lot more so I'm really excited. Well, I think something, yeah, Instagram and Twitter are really big among my friends and actually the same, no, I haven't thought of sharing WordPress with my friends. Aside from telling them, hey, I published this blog post. I think you might really like it and telling them about my business side of things. I think it would be really awesome for me to start letting people know that a blog is something that anyone can do. Yeah, and just to add to that, yeah, I've kind of shared my blog posts with all my friends too, but I've never, you know, encouraged them to blog themselves. I have considered starting a blog with my best friend, just like kind of like two people posting on the same blog, kind of like a cooperation kind of a thing but we haven't pursued that so that would be definitely a good idea. And yeah, so as far as my friends in social media, it's a lot of Instagram and Facebook and yeah, Snapchat. I forgot to say a couple of years ago or maybe a year ago, I'm not sure, at a word camp actually one of my friends came and she's here, so I have shared WordPress with one of my friends, I forgot to say that and I like helped her set up a blog and everything so I forgot I have shared WordPress with my friends. Yay! So, we're actually gonna do a workshop in Texas about how to start a blog for kids so we're really excited about that. So we've talked about what you guys are doing now, we've talked about what you guys have done so far and we've talked about getting your friends involved and stuff like that. Where do you see WordPress taking you in the future and how do you think it's going to play a role in potential careers later on down the road and I know some of you are younger than others but that might be something that you're thinking about, it might not and if it's not, you can skip. It's fine. Oh, me, okay. For me, yeah, definitely, I've definitely thought of it in multiple ways. For me personally, I've always wanted to have in the newspaper one of those advice columns so I've always thought what if my blog could be an advice website or either that or a movie review website because I'm really into movies and stuff. So those are ways that I'm thinking of taking my blog in the future. We'll see what happens. We'll see again. But then another more practical career way that I might use WordPress in the future is that I personally at the moment I wanna become a wedding planner. So yeah, so I'm actually, I just got accepted to FIU so I wanna come here to study hospitality management. So that with social media and with WordPress that would be a huge way of like promoting myself like as a wedding planner, if I become a wedding planner because then I could write posts about the weddings that I do and everything. So I think that WordPress will definitely be a big part of my career in the future. Well, I have thought about careers a lot and I actually wrote a book about careers when I was seven. So that goes to show you. Anyways, I do want to be a writer when I grow up and I already am now. So that sort of has set the foundation and I also want to be a singer and an artist which I am right now but I want to take that to the next level. And I think that that could help me get the connections that I need to start my business doing that. Well, I definitely see WordPress playing a part of my future. Actually, I pretty much have my life planned out right now. I know where I'm gonna go to the college and everything and I wanna major in English and because I really love writing and it's one of my top passions and I need to get in tune more of what it could do for me and I wanna be a blogger for the rest of my life basically. When I'm a mom, I'm planning on being a mom blogger like my mom is and coaching people and all those things. So it sounds like I'm the odd one out here. I definitely see in the next few years taking my blog to the next level maybe doing some sponsorships or something like that. As far as a career, I plan on majoring in marine bio so it might work its way in there somehow. It might not. Definitely, I'll probably still blog about my life and keeping up with family and stuff, but as far as a career, not positive about that but definitely, definitely will stick with me. Awesome. Well, I wanna thank you guys. I will say, I wanna thank you guys for your time and I know it's not easy to get up in front of people because I did it earlier today. So thanks for standing up here with me. So I'm not the only one up here, but we do have time for at least one, maybe two depending on how long it takes from the audience to take questions. So there's anybody that wants to ask a question. Speak now. We love questions, yeah. I could say promote that type of learning word for us to kids your age a little younger. So the question for the video is what could be done to help get kids interested in WordPress from an educational standpoint? Correct, okay. So something that would really, kids love to, like if you have long-distance friends or family, then kids love to get in touch with them and not have to say hi to them once in a year and spend all that time getting caught up and then not seeing them in forever. So that would definitely be a way to look at it and also being able to express themselves more. Yeah, I definitely agree. Like that was like almost exactly what I was gonna say. So I definitely think that that's something. Yeah, so basically one, to connect with people. Definitely, I'm just like repeating what you said. But yeah, to connect with people, friends and then also just cause a lot of people, like kids a lot of times I feel like they think that like people don't wanna listen to what they have to say. So I think definitely a way that could promote having a blog for a kid would just be to like share their ideas or share their art if they're artists or just to like to be able to be themselves like on a blog, I think that would be good. I think the biggest thing is letting them know that they can do anything they want. Not keeping them to a restriction, you have to blog about this or do this or do that or the layout or design has to look like this. Just let their imagination run wild and that they can do anything and the possibilities are endless. I agree with the connecting with other people as well and also what I heard saying about the essays and poems for school that it's really fun to know that it's going to good use and that other kids can see it out there too. I would say something like I personally journal for a lot of kids, especially nowadays, they don't like to write or hand writing, typing is much easier for them. So I would see it as a journal of sorts that you can look back on 10 years from now and go, wait, I did that or I wrote like that or who says that anymore? You know, I mean, so it's a journal of sorts and it's, but again, to somebody's point here that you can say whatever you want and people won't criticize you necessarily, you know, you just get it out and you're not talking to a human. A lot of people have qualms about talking to a human, saying something to their mom or their dad or their friends that they think, oh, they won't like it. Just, you know, post it on blog, it's a little different. So. Yes. I think for what things would you like to change that word to press and this is your last question, guys. No pressure. Sure, I'll start. Sure. I know. Okay. I know what my mom wants me to say about this. Rave me on this question. I'm sort of joking about that. But so something that I could see would definitely be, could be paid attention to. I know that there are some fixes for this. Is the cyber security thing. So the cyber bullying, that stuff does go on. It does happen. It could happen to anybody. So just something, you know, definitely stay involved in your kids' blogs and their social media, but is, you know, anything that will aid that, aid in that not happening. So that's one thing I would change. Well, I don't really see right now anything that I would personally like to change about word press. Just probably going back to kids doing word press, just advertising and marketing it more that kids can do it and that kids can share their stories and share their message. Because there are lots of adult blogs, but kids can blog too and I would really love to see more kids getting out there and doing things like all of us are doing and just sharing their stories, sharing their opinion and expressing themselves. Well, I think that something that would make it a lot easier for me to publish a blog post would be if I could take those apps that I use like Canva and Co-Schedule and be able to use them on the word press site. Like if I could download an app on the word press site and use it right there and then be able to upload my pictures and the things that I want to use in my blog post, right there. That would be so much easier because then I don't have to open new tabs and go here and then download it and then put it in my post. Yeah, the only thing I think that could be improved which is already being improved as we see with kids camp, just what she said about spreading the word to kids. So yeah, that's it. There was a little girl in the audience. Is it Alicia that had a question? Alicia, what's your question? Oh no, in front of Alicia? I'm sorry, I don't know your name. Ava, what's your question? Who wants to take it? Okay, Anna. Yeah, definitely. Anything you want, basically. You can do, you can write a post with embedded or like, I don't know if you know what embedded means but like, you can put photos and videos in your post with writing or you could even just post a photo. Like I've seen a lot of photography blogs and stuff that have just videos and photos and that's your blog. So yeah, basically you can do whatever you want, post whatever. Yeah. You could also just do, you could have a vlog which is a video blog that you get a YouTube channel and then basically you write up descriptions and make videos and that's a blog but it's a video blog, so it's a blog. Do I have any other questions? Okay, we only have like five minutes till closing remarks so I'm gonna go and wrap everything up. I wanna thank you guys for coming out again. Thank the parents for letting us borrow their children. Thank you.