Building a Digital Face for the World
Students can also take advantage of this tool by publishing their work for teachers to view and accessing it from any computer with an internet connection. You can also save research information to your site without having to print it which elimates the chance of losing your work.
Several web hosting services offer free sites and include a multitude of easy to use applications.
Case Study and Findings: A group of sixty 6th graders were set loose to build their own personal sites using any provider they wanted. Only three of the students had ever built a website before and at the end of one week, all of them had fully functioning websites. It was an interesting project of collaboration and innovation as students wrestled with the different providers as they decided on their sites. They shared and debated ideas about the best functions and dependability of the different providers. Some experimented with different sites while others found one they liked and stuck to it. Once the dust had settled, two free website providers were clear favorites while a couple others had small followings. |
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Here are their top choices for building a free website:
Best Free Website hosts
 1. Webs.com
If you have never built a site before this is one to try- and it costs nothing
A very easy to navigate web builder with hundreds of premade templates which can be personalized and even offer html code writing for those who are more advanced. Webs.com offers tools such as blogs, forums, wikis, albums, calendars and a handful of other usefull functions that are simple to set up. Setting up videos including Youtube is a snap as well. If you want to have a few more functions and choices such as a custom domain, password protected pages, email and a webstore you can pay for their services which range from $6-$10 a month. The downside to webs.com was the difficulty to attach downloadable documents and presentations for others.
An example classroom site from Webs.com garbersclass.com |
 2. Google Sites
Very basic on the surface but the power can be found within.
Google sites is simple to set up but to unlock its real power you need to dig around a bit. Unlike Webs.com which shows you everything up front in colorful little buttons, Google Sites has some very impressive tools but you have to look for them. Attaching documents and presentations is very simple and you can keep it a closed network of viewers if you are worried about others outside of your school seeing your site. More teachers tend to like this provider because of its collaboration capability but most of the students in the project liked the slick flair of Webs.com.
An example classroom website from Google Sites: Mr. Choma's Class |
3. Yola.com
Formerly Synthasite, they are another good free alternative |
4. Weebly.com
A number of the students enjoyed this provider at first but started switching over to Webs and Google Sites after watching what some of the others students were doing |
Pay Providers
If you are looking for more and want to pay a provider to host your site you should expect to pay between $4-$8 a month for a custom domain and many offer unlimited bandwith and space. You should also recieve a few hundred email slots with your custom domain as well. There is plenty of competition in this market but some of the leaders as far as price and function are:
- BlueHost- one of the popular leaders as far as price, space and capabilities (just saw $4 a month special).
- inmotionhosting - good offers for storage, multiple domains and easy to use site builder included
- Yahoo web hosting - wide range of plans and prices-they are made for a small business but work well for school as well
- dreamHost - inexpensive host with friendly service - even if you don't want to pay for service, check out their website and profiles - great employee pics.
(deals come and go and this list was outdated the day after it was made, so the best idea would be to shop around for todays best deals) |
*image "connect the world" taken with permission from http://www.sxc.hu/profile/iamwahid
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