As Britt Watwood commented ClustrMaps is a “must-have” widget for class and student blogs because it reminds students that they are part of a global voice and demonstrates how interconnected we all are. So here’s how to set up a ClustrMaps on your blog.
About ClustrMaps
ClustrMaps is a free thumbnail hit counter map widget that shows the location of all visitors to your blog. Number of visitors from a location is indicated by the relative size of the dot.
Clicking the ClustrMaps thumbnail takes you to a large World map so you can examine your traffic sources more closely. To scrutinize even closer click on each continent on the map.
How To Add ClustrMaps To Your Blog Sidebar
The ClustrMaps Widget is contained in Edublogs Widget Pack which you must first activate in your Plugins area. This widget pack also contains Delicious, Vod Pod, Twitter, Google Search and Flickr widgets. Once activated all these widgets will appear in your available widget area in your Design Tab — ready for you to use.
NOTE: If your ClustrMaps has disappeared from your blog activating your Widget pack immediately returns your ClustrMap to your blog sidebar.
- Once you have activated your Widget pack in the Plugins area click on Design > Widgets. Now click on Add on the ClustrMap Widget in your Available Widget Area.
- Set up your ClustrMap by clicking on Edit, adding your email address, clicking to agree to terms and conditions, and then click the Save Changes on the widget. For the widget to appear on your blog sidebar you must remember to click on Save Changes at the bottom of the Current Widget area after the changes to the widget have been saved.
You will receive an email advising of successful widget registration and your widget will look like this image in your sidebar — dots won’t appear for 24 hours.
FINAL THOUGHTS
- Don’t forget to share your advice on “must-have” widgets for student and class blogs.
- Would love to hear your thoughts on Miss Wyatt’s Responsible use of avatars and widgets in terms of age restrictions.
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20 Comments So Far»
Thank you, Sue, for this very useful post.
I’ve been away, with troubles with my computer and new internet connection.
Now, this is my concern about clustr maps:
as I had misunderstood about this widget and thought my under 13 years students couldn’t have it in their blogs, I “cut it off ” from their widgets section.
Now they are back, but I can’t find the “Add” button that would enable me to embed them again.
Could you help me, please?
Ines
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@Ines If your ClustrMaps has disappeared from your blog activating your Widget pack immediately returns your ClustrMap to your blog sidebar. You need to activate the Widget Pack in your Plugins area.
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Nowhere on the clustrmap website did they mention ages, so I wrote to them and they replied there is no age minimum so all students could use it. They are a bit worried though that some of the ads at the world map level might not always be family friendly. Apparently they are from AdSense in Google. Going to create a poll on my blog next week (once students are back at school) about who reads the ads with their clustrmap and will report results back to clustrmap team.
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Sue, any chance the ClustrMap folks would consider “education-related” ads for Edublogger accounts?
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Hi Gail,
Apparently they are looking into no ads for *.edublogs blogs or so they mentioned in their letter to me. They are chatting with James about it at the moment I think.
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@Miss W Thanks for checking out the age limit and letting @Blogwalker (Gail) know ClustrMaps is considering options for removing ads on Edublogs.
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Thanks, Sue… great stuff as always… in fact we’ve linked our ‘ClustrMaps On EduBlogs’ instruction page directly to yours!
Link: http://clustrmaps.wordpress.com/html-setup/clustrmaps-on-edublogs/
Regarding ads etc: right now, it’s no problem… we will handle each site on a case-by-case basis, and there is no restriction regarding age of ClustrMaps users. IF there is ever any problem regarding inappropriate ads, then let us know immediately, and we will deal with it!
Thanks, everyone!
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Regarding the comment of @Ines/@Inpi about
>I can’t find the “Add” button
I notice that if a site ALREADY has the ClustrMaps widget, then neither the ‘Add’ nor the ‘Edit’ link appears next to the widget name! On the other hand if you click [SHOW] on the right hand side (Design… Widgets… Current widgets… Show) you should see it displayed there with an [Edit] link.
Hope that helps!
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Thank you for that wonderful comment of yours!
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No problem Taylor keep up the good work.
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In Sept I was fortunate enough to attend the Learn2.008 Conference. Whilst there, I learnt from some of the US participants, that the USA had introduced a law to protect children. This means that all children under the age of 13 cannot supply their email addresses to online sites.
I would assume that this information was correct. Does anyone else know?
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@Murcha, I believe you’re thinking about COPPA. The law doesn’t say that you as a site owner can not do it. It says you must have permission from parent or guardian to do so and have to state what you;re going to do with that information. (At least that’s how I understand it.)
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@Murcha I notice that Wes Fryer has been writing about this a lot lately and @Dr Mike is correct he has been talking about COPPA. But I haven’t really looked into it as the situation is different here as it is in every country. Might have to look back through his posts to read what he has been saying.
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I just put the ClustrMap in my blog, but I’m a newbie! I’m a new teacher trying to use blogs with my 7th grade students! Does anyone have any advice for me!?
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@cspiezio Thanks for letting us know there was an issue with Clustrmaps. I contacted Clustrmaps, they isolated the problem and have now fixed it.
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My blog is just 1 day old, so I am working out the kinks.
I just added a clustrmap, and when I did, my widgets mysteriously moved from my right sidebar to the bottom left, even though it still says its on the right sidebar in my ‘current widgets’ section. My theme is primivito, if that helps
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@ka213 I had a test of your theme to see what it happening. I didn’t have the widgets going to the bottom left however when you add the clustrmaps it looks not so good because it is adding an extra colour box under the Clustrmaps.
Unfortunately the best solution would probably be to change to a different theme if you want to add a Clustrmap.
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I am a new, confused blogger. Are cluster maps really free? I see one place that says you have to be a ’supporter’ to activate the widgets. So, what is the actual truth on this? Thanks!
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Sue Waters Reply:
January 11th, 2009 at 11:02 pm
Clustrmaps are free but if you want to install them using the widget you need to be an Edublogs supporter. Otherwise you need to go to Clustrmaps get their embed code and add it to a text widget.
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65violet Reply:
April 13th, 2009 at 3:06 am
Hi Sue
still not a supporter yet , but can you explain how to add Clustrmap as a text widget. Thanks for your help.
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Sue Waters Reply:
April 13th, 2009 at 4:21 am
Hi Violet – you need to add the clustrmaps using a text widget. Here is the post that explains how to do this
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I had a clustrmap but I wanted to add another widget, when I did my clustrmap dissapered and it isn’t on the menu anymore. I don’t know what happened!
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Sue Waters Reply:
March 20th, 2009 at 11:19 pm
You might have accidentally removed your text widget that contained the ClustrMaps when you added the new widget. If you give me your blog URL I can check for you.
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Do you need to be a supporter to add clustrMmap? I am a new user to edublog and I do not see ClustrMap on the widget menu.
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drmike Reply:
April 29th, 2009 at 11:21 am
I just tried to joint the Clustrmap service to see if there was a way but they did not accept my email address. I’ve fired off an email to their support team and am awaiting a reply.
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Sue Waters Reply:
April 29th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
No you don’t need to be a supporter to add a ClustrMaps it is just that you add using a different method. Here are the instructions for adding a clustrMap using a text widget.
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