Some footers have a simple design. They have navigation and copyright. Other footers are more informative. In Developing a Responsive Website: The Footer, Scott Stanton shows you a footer design that has three sections: navigation, tweets and contact info. The format of this footer is simple and informative. It doesn’t overwhelm you with too much information. It simply directs you to information that you may need to learn quickly about this site. He used HTML5 and CSS to build the footer.
In part 2, Scott takes it further by adding jQuery and responsive design. Creating a Responsive Website: The Footer Part 2 breaks the process down into two parts. First, you learn how to create and add the twitter feed. Then, he shows you how to change the CSS to make the footer more responsive.
This two part tutorial shows you how to incorporate jQuery and responsive design into one section of your website. By focusing on one section of your site, you can learn what works and then apply it to the rest of the site. Small changes can be easier to do than over-hauling an entire website. Sometimes you can learn a lot when you start with a small change.