When I first became a Building Technology Integrator/Computer Specialist, I used www.delicious.com to share my websites with colleagues and students. As I continued to add more and more sites to my delicious account, it became very cumbersome for my younger students to find what it was they were looking for.
This year, I found the solution to my problem: Tizmos! Tizmos is a personalized homepage that includes screenshots of your favorite sites. When I share my Tizmos page with my students (http://www.tizmos.com/mrsmarsala), students are easily able to see my favorite websites. It is very simple to use:
1. Create an account.
2. Click on Add Site.
3. Cut and paste the URL of your favorite sites, or type them in the address bar.
4. Press Add.
Once the site is added, the screenshot will appear on the Tizmos page! You can even edit what the title says by clicking on the pencil and changing the site address. Don't worry - this doesn't affect the URL.
When sites are added to the Tizmos page, they are added to the end of the site list; but you can rearrange the sites by clicking on them and dragging them to where you want them to be.
There is one "minor" downfall to the Tizmos pages: tagging. When the account holder is adding sites, the account holder can identify sites by different tags. However, when the Tizmos page is shared with others, the Tags are not viewable and the websites can not be sorted by tags. To solve this issue, when I add sites to my Tizmos page, I try to keep similar concepts or grade level pages together.
When it comes to sharing sites with students, especially K-3 students, Tizmos is my preference. Delicious.com is wonderful, but for students who are learning to read still, it is difficult for them to find what it is they are looking for. With the screenshot feature, Tizmos allows younger students more independence!
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