
Drag and drop to build your website, easy to use interface, many in-built features and any extras you can code in if you wish! Nice to set up blogs too! Also free unless you want to buy your domain.
Podcasts, short snappy concept videos or longer vlogs in experimental pursuits, etc. are wonderful ways to document your learnings and share them with others with similar interests!
SET UP
Content creation
Like the idea of writing articles, blogging, reviewing or even making quirky videos about interesting concepts?
Creating your own blog, website or even youtube channel is an excellent way to get some original material out there and really hone those communication skills which may come in handy in the long run! Not only this, but you'll find it really builds on your researching skills and teaches you so much more about what goes on around any subject, enhancing your knowledge and awareness of the current research climate which can only be a plus. Setting up your own website is also much simpler than you might imagine. There many excellent development sites and resources out there so getting started is really not too difficult and it could be a really nice project to both tackle individually or do together with some friends (just like us)! You can also pick up a little bit of coding on the job (though this is not a must) and there really is no drawback apart from being prepared for this to be a bit of a time commitment!
What kind of content you would like to create and what it is you talk/write about is completely up to you! Just remember to be wary of plagiarism (it is okay to quote or refer to existing ideas but make sure you do reference or provide links to the sources on which your argument was based if it is not your own work or idea). Some examples of the sorts of things you can write about or include in your blog/website/etc.:
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o Book/Podcast/Video Channel/etc. Reviews this also provides powerful motivation to dive head first into a reading list and stick at it and can be very useful for others to later decide if they want to read the book (or equivalent) of interest. You may also pick up on interesting concepts which you may want to register your own opinion on or make a highlights reel (of sorts). You could also do this for talks/ lectures/ science fairs you may have attended.
o Experiments If you are part of any science clubs or like to dabble in experimental adventures at home/ in your free time, it's a great idea to showcase some of these pursuits!
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o Science for the General Public/ Popular Science You can write articles (or the equivalent) about complicated concepts and try to express them in a more simple, easy to understand way. This is not only useful for your readers but it also really tests your understanding while teaching you valuable written/spoken communication skills! Another idea is to keep tabs on current affairs, recent papers, research, findings, etc. and again simplifying or explaining what you think the scope of this work or the importance of this work is. This has the added advantage of keeping you up-to-date with current R&D efforts in the field, which is vital for perspective.
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o Essays expressing your views on set ideas/questions You can write essays answering interesting questions or investigating a certain idea by creating a mini-review of the work that has been done/ is being done around it. For the former, the kinds of questions you can answer may have a slight historical/ philosophical element which is very important in the sciences, or it could be a question centered around the potential scope of a particular research endeavour, etc. If essays are something you are interested in but you are unsure of what question to tackle, you can also use previous or current essay competition titles as inspiration and post your take on the question raised. Other inspiration for questions may come from reading books, articles, etc. so make sure with these that you really do your research and again remember to reference!
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o Coding progress/ Software/ Computing-based pursuits Even if it is a very small, relatively simple project, it is nice to see coding progress from beginners and advanced coders alike and is super useful to readers too! You may find interesting tricks along the way to improve your code which you can also share or maybe you modified something simple and added your own twist to it to make it that little bit different; all of these are worth sharing. For those who are into gaming or creating games, this could be something to feature too. It doesn't have to be a working game, but a blog featuring snippets of progress, cool features you may have added that month, or anything else, can also make for really interesting content and also serves the purpose of keeping a sort of log of your progress for yourself too!
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o Notes Notes (revision notes, topic-based notes for understanding, etc.) will always be useful to someone somewhere so if you are an avid notes-maker and feel happy about sharing your notes with others, a website is a great place to include these!
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This is definitely not an exhaustive list and you may have many more, far cooler ideas but we thought we would mention some just to start you off! Working together with fellow STEM enthusiasts is also a great idea and we have known many instances where students with similar interests, who didn't all necessarily start off knowing each other, have come together to work on such projects remotely. Remember the whole point is to learn a bit more about what is going on around your subject but also to have fun and think a bit more deeply about these new snippets of knowledge, rather than to just absorb and accept!