Why use a map for an ePortfolio?
If many of your artifacts come from different places, then the map is great way to show the geographical context of them. Dropping a pin allows you to add text and an image of your artifact. Pins can also be connected or sequenced on the map, which allows your audience to better visualize the diversity of where your artifacts come from and the connectedness of them.
Map Examples
Need some ideas? Below are some sites that use this mapping template. They will open in a new tab:
Seven Elements of Art
First Peoples Principles of Learning
Using this Theme
As noted on the home page, this site is using the free Ascend theme’s page layout. Kadence themes provides great documentation for the free version of the Ascend theme, this theme has a ton of settings and allows you to customize more than any other free theme we have used! That being said if you want to get creative you will likely need to use the themes documentation at: http://docs.kadencethemes.com/ascend-free/. Don’t hesitate to check it out and see what you can do. This is the very documentation we used to figure out how to create this portfolio grid template!
Editing the Tagline
First you’re going to want to update the sites tagline. To do this go to the dashboard and click the Settings menu option, then if necessary click the General link underneath or hover your cursor over the Settings menu option and click the General link in the fly-out menu.
Next, update the Tagline field and click Save changes. If you do not want a tagline simply delete the place holder text and leave the field empty, don’t forget to click Save Changes.
Take note of the Site Title field above the Tagline field, this is where you can update the site’s title. This does not change the URL to the site, once a site is created you cannot change it’s URL.
While you are here take notice of the Writing link under General. This is where you can control whether or not emoticons convert to graphics, change the default post category and switch the default editor. If you switch the default editor we recommend you allow users to switch editors. If you choose to reuse one of the templates pages and want to keep it’s layout you will need to use the block editor rather than the classic editor.
Update the Home Page Banner Image
Click the Appearance menu option and then click the Theme Options link underneath or hover your cursor over the Appearance menu option and click the Theme Options link in the fly-out menu.
A menu listing all of the themes options will appear immediately to the right, click Home Page Header, here you have a lot of options. We recommend playing with them to see what effect they have on your ePortfolio. The most effective way is to make one change then click Save Changes and view the change to see if you want to keep it!
To update the header image scroll to the bottom of the page and click the Remove button then click the Upload button. You will be able to upload a new image or select an image that has been uploaded to the sites Media Library. Don’t forget to save your changes!
Updating the Banner Image on All Other Pages
Follow the instructions above except this time select Default Title Options rather than Home Page Header!
Editing the Footer text
Follow the instructions above except click Footer Settings instead of Home Page Header!
Editing the Home Page Text
To update the text on the home page go to the dashboard and click the Pages menu option and then click the All Pages link underneath or hover your cursor over the Pages menu option and click the All pages link in the fly-out menu. Hover over Home – Front Page and click Edit.
Downside!
Ascend does not play nice with the Academic Blogger’s ToolKit plugin. You will notice when you hover over an inline citation your mouse cursor turns from an arrow to a hand, like something is supposed to happen. In the other templates a cool tooltip pops up that displays the references full citation. We don’t believe this should hold you back from using Ascend as tooltips are not required for proper reference formatting but we did think it was something to make note of!
Another issue Ascend has with the Academic Blogger’s ToolKit plugin is the font size of the automatically generated references list. Now this was a problem that needed to be fixed, for some reason the font is significantly smaller then it should be. We have fixed this issue or you and are making note of it here in case you lose the custom CSS and need to put it back. Below are instructions outlining how to repair the custom CSS:
- From your Dashboard, click the Appearance menu option and then click the Theme Options link underneath or hover your cursor over the Appearance menu option and click the Theme Options link in the fly-out menu.
- Scroll to the bottom of the page and select Custom CSS
- Enter the following code in the Custom CSS text box:
.abt-bibliography .abt-bibliography__body {
font-size: 16px;
} - Click the Save Changes button
Hey, I want to create this map on my own WordPress Install!
Don’t worry we have you covered! We have included instruction outlining the steps we too to create this template. Click the link below to view the file (it will open in a new tab) or click Download to save:
We recommend you delete this text and add your own. If you want to keep a version of this, you can clone it and then save the duplicate as a draft.