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Star Teacher - Lisa Kraus
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Yola (formerly Synthasite) is the tool that I am currently using to build websites for my department and other departments in my high school. As I wrote in my original review of Yola an outstanding aspect of Yola is that not only is your website free, it is advertising free (unless you want advertising), and remains free regardless of how much content you add to it. This is a good thing if you plan to post a lot of audio or video content as some website builders and hosts begin to charge once you reach a certain volume content. Yola provides good tutorials and forums for first time users. I also learned first-hand that their responses to help requests are very quick.
Webs (formerly Free Webs) is another service that I have first-hand experience with in a school setting because my girlfriend (a teacher in another school district) uses it for her classes. Webs has all of the characteristics that you would expect to find in a free website platform. Websites built using Webs can include videos, calendars, polls, and a wide variety of third party widgets. Webs offers a wide variety templates and layouts to select from. For people with a higher level of comfort with technology, Webs might be a little too basic for your needs. In that case you may want to consider Snap Pages.
Snap Pages provides a free service as well as a premium service for creating your custom website. The free service has more than enough features for a teacher to set up and maintain a class website. The editing and customizing options of Snap Pages allow users to create pages that are little more clean and professional looking than some of the other companies in this market. The image resizing tool reminds me of the one found in Apple's Keynote presentation software. In fact,TechCrunch said that it's “a basic webpage designer that Apple should envy...”
Web Node is a simple way to build a website. The easy to use, drag and drop, interface makes it easy to change the look and feel of your website. For two reasonsWeb Node is a good tool for students to use to present and share their work with a wider audience. First, Web Node does not put any advertsing on your website. And second, the user interface is intuitive enough for most students to use on their own.
Sauropol, like other free website building and hosting platforms, is a free method for teachers to share information about their courses with parents and students.One feature that Sauropol offers that some similar services do not offer is the ability to use more than one template within your website. In other words, you're not locked into using one format for all of your content.
Hipero is the latest website building tool that I have tried. After reading that Larry Ferlazzoadded it to his list of the best ways to create a website, I had to try it. What impressed me most about Hipero is the selection of templates available to users. If you can't find a template you like in Hipero'scollection of more than 200, you are just too picky. Like Larry said in his post about Hipero, it claims to be the easiest website builder, but I'm not sure if I agree. While Hipero is feature-rich I can't say that it is the most intuitive website builder I've used, that honor still goes to Webs and Weebly.
School Rack offers a free service for teachers to build and host their own classroom websites. Unlike other free website solutions that are targeted toward a general audience, School Rack has features designed specifically for teachers. On your School Rack website you can post assignments with full descriptions, expectations, and deadlines. This is an integrated feature, not an add-on page that you have to create yourself.
Moogo is a service that provides you with a platform for developing your own website for free. Like other services in this free website builder market, Moogo offers a good selection of templates and designs for you to choose from. One of the features that makes Moogo different from some other free website services is that you can create static webpages and a blog within the Moogo content editor. One deterent for some users is that Moogo is free without advertising for an eight day trial period then the free plan starts to display advertising.
Like most other free website building platforms, Jimdo allows you to pick your own subdomain. For example, my Jimdo site is richardbyrne.jimdo.com. What makes Jimdo such a good option is the wide array of templates, layouts, background options, and editing options. On many free website builders once you pick a template or design you're locked into all of the pre-defined parameters of that template unless you know HTML and CSS. Jimdo is different because it allows you to tweak the predefined templates and designs.
Webs (formerly Free Webs) is another service that I have first-hand experience with in a school setting because my girlfriend (a teacher in another school district) uses it for her classes. Webs has all of the characteristics that you would expect to find in a free website platform. Websites built using Webs can include videos, calendars, polls, and a wide variety of third party widgets. Webs offers a wide variety templates and layouts to select from. For people with a higher level of comfort with technology, Webs might be a little too basic for your needs. In that case you may want to consider Snap Pages.
Snap Pages provides a free service as well as a premium service for creating your custom website. The free service has more than enough features for a teacher to set up and maintain a class website. The editing and customizing options of Snap Pages allow users to create pages that are little more clean and professional looking than some of the other companies in this market. The image resizing tool reminds me of the one found in Apple's Keynote presentation software. In fact,TechCrunch said that it's “a basic webpage designer that Apple should envy...”
Web Node is a simple way to build a website. The easy to use, drag and drop, interface makes it easy to change the look and feel of your website. For two reasonsWeb Node is a good tool for students to use to present and share their work with a wider audience. First, Web Node does not put any advertsing on your website. And second, the user interface is intuitive enough for most students to use on their own.
Sauropol, like other free website building and hosting platforms, is a free method for teachers to share information about their courses with parents and students.One feature that Sauropol offers that some similar services do not offer is the ability to use more than one template within your website. In other words, you're not locked into using one format for all of your content.
Hipero is the latest website building tool that I have tried. After reading that Larry Ferlazzoadded it to his list of the best ways to create a website, I had to try it. What impressed me most about Hipero is the selection of templates available to users. If you can't find a template you like in Hipero'scollection of more than 200, you are just too picky. Like Larry said in his post about Hipero, it claims to be the easiest website builder, but I'm not sure if I agree. While Hipero is feature-rich I can't say that it is the most intuitive website builder I've used, that honor still goes to Webs and Weebly.
School Rack offers a free service for teachers to build and host their own classroom websites. Unlike other free website solutions that are targeted toward a general audience, School Rack has features designed specifically for teachers. On your School Rack website you can post assignments with full descriptions, expectations, and deadlines. This is an integrated feature, not an add-on page that you have to create yourself.
Moogo is a service that provides you with a platform for developing your own website for free. Like other services in this free website builder market, Moogo offers a good selection of templates and designs for you to choose from. One of the features that makes Moogo different from some other free website services is that you can create static webpages and a blog within the Moogo content editor. One deterent for some users is that Moogo is free without advertising for an eight day trial period then the free plan starts to display advertising.
Like most other free website building platforms, Jimdo allows you to pick your own subdomain. For example, my Jimdo site is richardbyrne.jimdo.com. What makes Jimdo such a good option is the wide array of templates, layouts, background options, and editing options. On many free website builders once you pick a template or design you're locked into all of the pre-defined parameters of that template unless you know HTML and CSS. Jimdo is different because it allows you to tweak the predefined templates and designs.