Showing posts with label Educational Websites. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Educational Websites. Show all posts

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Adventures in Art: Online Activites and Projects for Kids

The National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC (USA) has a great website that is full of resources for the classroom.

Two main education areas are:

  • NGA Kids - this resources is full of interactive flash games, programs and projects for students of all ages to engage with.
  • NGA Classroom: for Teachers and Students - lessons and resources can be accessed by a curriculum, topic, or artist.
Online Tours are available for exploration by artist, artworks or themes. There is also a large collection of videos and podcasts that can be downloaded about various topics related to art, artists and artworks.

Tuesday, February 05, 2008

Which Technologies will Shape Education in 2008?

The New Media Consortium (NMC) and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative (ELI) just released the 2008 Horizon Report. "Each year, the Horizon Report describes six areas of emerging technology that will have significant impact on higher education within three adoption horizons over the next one to five years."

The 6 technology trends identified in the report that could shape education in 2008 are:

  • Grassroots Video
    - evolved from user created content in 07 report....the popularity of YouTube has spun of many similar web services. Shooting, editing and publishing video can be done easily, even with your mobile phone.
  • Collaboration Webs
    - evolution from social networking and virtual worlds in 07 report....teachers networks have grown beyond their backyard.
  • Mobile Broadband
    - evolution from mobile phone in 07 report....people are using their mobile phones more and more. Unfortunately the prohibitive cost of telco prices - ie: NZ - in some parts of the world limit the potential for educational use.
  • Data Mashups
    - a great concept for educators to understand and be able to develop. Mashups is pulling data in from various sources around the web into one area. For example, if a teacher wanted to pull resources in from around the web for a project on climated change....they could create their own mashup for this and then host it on their school or classroom website for the students to then access. Links in the report on authoring tools to create mashups.
  • Collective Intelligence
    - bringing together the knowledge and thoughts in "real time" in what the report calls "explicit knowledge stores." An example of this is wikipedia.
  • Social Operating System
    - is an evolution of all the "social aspects" from the 07 report. The report also talks about the "third space" (see side bar under "things for thought," where I blogged about the 3rd space back in 06, with a link to a great article by Tracey Bretag.) How do people connect? How do communities of interest develop?
The 6 trends that were identified to impact education in 2007 were:
  • User-created content;
  • Social networking;
  • Mobile phones;
  • Virtual worlds;
  • New scholarship and emerging forms of publication; and
  • Massively multiplayer educational gaming
Download 2008 Horizon Report
Compare with 2007 Horizon Report

Friday, February 01, 2008

Interactive Science Models for Chemistry, Biology, Physics, Biotechnology and Nanotechnology

"The Molecular Workbench is an NSF (The National Science Foundation)-funded research project, that seeks to explore the educational value of having student solve problems using dynamic representations of linked micro and micro worlds."

Download the free Java modeler to run the simulations (download link), which will run on Windows, Mac or Linux operating systems.

Once the modeler is downloaded and installed, click on the Showcase link to download and interact with a variety of models.

Choose from:

  • Physics
  • Chemistry
  • Biology
  • Biotechnology
  • Nanotechnology
The screen shot on the left is an example of the simulation for the motion of Greenhouse Gases (found under Chemistry.)

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

All about earthquakes....make a quake

Take your students through TLC Discovery.com Earthquakes.

A great site that is broken down into several sections:

- Make-A-Quake: earthquake simulator. Students simulate different earthquake situations to see what will happen to the structure of a high rise building.

- As The World Churns: a flash simulation that shows how the world has split and the how the continents have gone their separate ways.

- Gallery of Devastation: view images and information on recent quakes from around the world.

- Tremor Tech: looks at how technology helps to predict where and when quakes will occur.

- Seismic Links: Further resources and links on seismic activity.

Monday, July 02, 2007

Websites That Simulate Drug & Alcohol Use

Two great websites to spark discussion in your classroom or in a peer mentoring group, on drugs & alcohol (designed with Adobe Flash...you will need the Flash player installed on your computer and enable "pop-ups" in your browser to view these websites).

The first website is Trydrugs.net. From Rusmiddeletaten Department of Health (the Agency for Alcohol & Drug Addiction) in Oslo, Norway. Trydrugs.net takes the unique approach to simulate how your senses are effected by these drugs....your computer mouse is even effected. The focus is on marijuana, cocaine, and heroin.

External websites are opened as your travel through the website: Memorial Funeral Home, Drug Overdoes, The Sun (article), Federal Bureau of Prisons, and Bankruptcy Website.

The 2nd website onelife focuses on: alcohol, cocaine, cannabis, ecstasy, mushrooms, speed and spiked. Students watch videos of a young man dancing to upbeat music. As you add more of the drug/alcohol and/or add a cocktail, they see the change in his behaviour. There is a safety link with each section. More information under more info takes you to the bbc.co.uk - radio1 website for further information on addictions, drugs, alcohol and other health issues.
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Happy 1st of July to all my Friends & Family in Canada.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Resources, resources, resources

Shambles is a website that was designed to support international school communities throughout South East Asia. With a database of over 25,000 education websites that have been approved and recommended by teachers it is a very rich resource!

Some of the resources available are:

There are so many great resources and links for all grade levels in this website it is a must to check out.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Answers.com - the online dictionary, encyclopedia, etc...

Answers.com is an online information portal that has a collection of over "4 million answers that are are drawn from over 120 titles of brand-name publishers, the Answers.com editorial team, Wikipedia and user-generated answers."

Answers.com can be launched from Internet Explorer, Firefox and Opera browsers.

The unique thing about Answers.com is that it goes beyond the search box and offers free software that a user can download (Windows only) and when you alt + click on any word in any program on your screen.....a pop-up windows appears with an AnswerTip. Read more information on this application here.

Answers.com teacher toolkit is a great reference and search option for teachers and students. Answer.com teacher toolkit was the Winner of the 2006 Codie Award for Best Education Reference or Search Service.

This portal starts with a lot of links that would interest educators such as: lesson plan tools, free worksheets & posters, free downloads, ESL, Education Blogs, Librarian Lowdown, just to mention a few.

Take Answers.com for a spin and give it a try!

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Quest Network BlueZones: "Explore * Question * Ask"

Quest Network BlueZone is an inspirational site for journeys through global education. BlueZone was founded by explorer and National Geographic writer Dan Buettner.


Registering online for free gives educators access to all the resources and videos for a variety of global projects from looking at common threads in lifestyle (health and fitness) to looking at your senior community.
Two quests to check out are on Central America and Okinawa, Japan.

How BlueZone works is registered classes log onto the website and interact with the exploration team that may be anywhere in the world. They vote online to decide what the exploration team will explore the next day. The next day the students get to watch through video, exactly what the exploration team was voted to do.
Pretty cool.

Monday, March 12, 2007

Read * Write * Think

Read * Write * Think is brought to you by the International Reading Association, National Council of Teachers of English and marcopolo. A great website that supports literacy for K - 12.

The student materials section is full of online flash applications that supports literacy learning for students while they also have some fun playing the various games.


Read*Write*Think also has a collection of great web resources to support teachers and a large selection of lesson plans for all grade levels.

Great ideas to support literacy and literature!

Monday, March 05, 2007

Maths & Science Web Simulation Technologies

Shodor is a non-profit research and education organization that focuses on the advancement of science and math - specifically through the use of modeling and simulation technologies. This site is full of wonderful tools and interactive java models for students to work through or demo with the teacher.

The National Library of Virtual Manipulatives is a project from the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at Utah State University. The virtual library is divided into grade levels: K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12. The topics covered are: number & operations, algebra, geometry, measurement, and data analysis & probability.

Friday, February 16, 2007

Social Sciences Tools

DiscoverOurEarth is based on the research done in the geoinformatics lab at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (University of California, San Diego). There is a wide range of information related to the Earth sciences, accompanied by images, graphs, maps, and movies. Discovery topics: Earthquakes, Volcanoes, Topography, Plate Tectonics, and Sea Level Change. Web tools for on-hands learning such as: interactive mapping, virtual experiments and interactive 3D graphics.

USGS (US Geological Service) website has an online tool called Map-It that is a simple form that you fill in the longitude/latitude pairs as input and the form "plots them on a Mercator projection map along with land/sea and political boundaries."

Strange Maps is an mapping blog that has postings on a wide range of interesting maps and wonderful annotations. Today's posting is a world map on driving orientation....who drives on the left or the right hand side of the road. Some great stories and maps to spark discussion in your class.

PRI's The World is a is a co-production of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston.
With podcasts, colourful pictures and stories with a global perspective, this site brings the world to your students. Check out the Geo Quiz that has a new question posted everyday for your students to ponder.

Wednesday, February 14, 2007

Web Tools for the Teacher Toolbox

EasyTestMaker is an online test generator that helps you create tests easily and quickly. Creating multiple choice, fill in the blank, matching, short answer, true and false are just some of the features.

Rubistar is an online tool to easily create rubrics for all of your project-based learning activities. Registration is free with an added feature that enables a teacher to analyze the performance of their whole class. "After students have completed the project the teacher can then enter the scores into Rubistar to determine which items were problematic."

Rubistar is made available from 4teachers.org which has more tools available for the classroom - such as: QuizStar, Academic SKill Builders, Assign-A-Day, etc... Check some of these out.

FunBrain a great site for K-7ish where kids have fun while they are learning. Interactive games to help students with their math and language skills.

With daily postings, Diary of a Wimpy Kid can be read everyday for general interest or to help improve reading skills.


Discoveryschool.com has a wonderful free online tool called Quiz Center. You can use it to create, administer, and grade quizzes online. You will be able to make online quizzes that provide instant feedback to you and your students.




Happy Valentines Day

Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Mathematics & Technology

The MAA Mathematical Sciences Digital Library is published by the Mathematical Association of America and has a huge amount of online resources for both student and teacher. Such as Convergence which is an online magazine that intersects math, history and technology.

Math Projects Journal website has quite a few lesson plans and documents on math projects for the classroom.

OnMath is the Online Journal of School Mathematics. With articles for the math teacher from Primary to College.

iEARN (International Education and Resource Network) is a non-profit organization made up of over 20,000 schools in more than 115 countries. iEARN empowers teachers and young people to work together online using the Internet and other new communications technologies. Some activities for Science, Environment, Health, Math, and Technology .