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Saturday, February 11, 2012

Techie Tip that Saved my Life!

I follow a blog by a lady named Jacqui Murray all about technology in the classroom. She is amazing. You can check out her blog, Ask a Tech Teacher, by clicking on her name or here. I get weekly emails from her, including one that suggested having a startup/homepage with all the links you use with your kiddos. I was nervous about starting one because I have SO many websites that I use with my kids, because I teach technology. Anyway, she suggested using protopage.com to get this homepage. 






Well, I finally broke down and tried it. I AM SO GLAD I DID! I had to because I have some kids who don't even know their letters, so getting them to type in a website address was near impossible, or at least it took up way too much time. 


Anyway, it is now my homepage in my technology room, and all of my kids learned how to use it VERY quickly. They know to go right to our homepage wiki (I love that I could teach them this vocabulary word and it's not scary for them to learn a new "tech" word). You set up your links and click right on them and it takes you to the website. It's similar to blogging, and the only downfall that I saw from it was having to put each website one.at.a.time that I wanted to save. Once you put in a few, it gets faster, and if you just start out with a few, it's even easier. If you use websites with your kids for any subject, for centers, extra activities, free time, etc., I highly suggest you look at it and try it. Make yourself a page at your house - try it out. 
It is so easy to change the page(s) for your needs. 


Click here to see my tech class's homepage (via protopage)! You'll notice that I use the BOOKMARKS page, and not the home page, but you could change it up to fit your needs. I'm currently working on adding grade-level pages for the teachers to save as their math or literacy homepages.


I hope everyone's having a great weekend. I slept until 1:30 today. Clearly, I needed the rest. Have a great one!!!
And, if you have any questions about protopage, or my example of one, feel free to email me or comment! :)

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