New Web 2.0 tools and digital resources come online every day. Many of these tools and resources offer intriguing possibilities for teachers in our district who want to leverage technology to meet one or more of the components of Classroom 10. Others are simply Classroom 1 and 5 content and activities dressed up in digital attire. In order to avoid the trap of using technology for technology’s sake, savvy teachers need to make thoughtful choices about which tools and resources they want to use with their students.
Some teachers read blogs like Free Technology for Teachers and Moving at the Speed of Creativity to find out about new tools. Another resource is the TeachersFirst website. This site “is a rich collection of lessons, units, and web resources designed to save teachers time by delivering just what they need in a practical, user-friendly, and ad-free format. [They offer their] own professional and classroom-ready content along with thousands of reviewed web resources, including practical ideas for classroom use and safe classroom use of Web 2.0. Busy teachers, parents, and students can find resources using our subject/grade level search, keyword search, or extensive menus.”
One feature of TeachersFirst that I particularly like is their weekly email that contains a link to the featured sites of the week. When I click on this link each week I can quickly scan through the dozen or so sites, each listed with a brief description including grade-level appropriateness, and select which ones I want to investigate further.
This Week's Assignment
This week spend some time at TeachersFirst. Sign up for their weekly email or just search for tools/resources by grade-level and subject area. Get a taste of the featured sites for this week. Poke around and find one tool or resource that is intriguing to you. But don’t fall into the “technology for technology’s sake” trap. Find a tool or resource that could be used to meet a Classroom 10 learning goal in your classroom.
Have fun exploring, then come back here, and post your find (include the link to the site) explaining how it could be used to meet a Classroom 10 learning goal. (Don't worry--keep it simple, you're not writing a lesson plan here, you're just sharing an idea.)
39 comments:
http://questioning.org/module/module.html
Barb Gholston
The new writing standards require students to be taught how to research topics. After exploring this website I realized that students need the skills provided. The idea of creating a Questioning Toolkit beginning in kindergarten and continuing throughout the student’s academic career is both a learning opportunity for the students and a product that will help them in real life situations. The ability to question is one of the first steps in the learning process and this questioning module would be an asset to students and the teachers. Research is going to be a major part of the writing requirements and the ability to have great questions will produce excellent research. Using this tool to create research modules for both large and small groups will greatly improve the students’ research skills.
Http://www.myplantid.com
Marie Page
My students are constantly being asked to identify plants in textbooks and looking them up on the internet to identify what plant species they are. This site gives me and my students the opportunity to find plants that have no known identity and to help identify them. You can as a teacher create a group of plants to identify and this site also has a database to use or you can use your own pictures. This site has information on the climate zones, invasive and native species and how the plant adapts to the various climates and growing zones. My students would use this site as an active learning site, plus as a real world problem – Classroom 10 learning. We are always asked in Plant Science …” What is this plants name” ? “ Can you identify this plant”? Now there is a tool that can be used in the classroom that I never knew existed, an plus it looks like fun using it.
How cool, Marie! I think the Teachers First site is just amazing--I would have never guessed that they'd have indexed a plant ID site. I guess you just never know!
Two cool sites:
- http://www.litature-map.com
Users type the name of their favorite author in the search box and the software then maps to other authors they might enjoy. Perfect in the library to use for literature appreciation and to help students find their next book.
- http://googlelittrips.com
Using Google Earth, students explore the paths that characters in literature have taken, e.g. Grapes of Wrath, Walk Two Moons. It sounds like a great way for students to explore a book in greater detail and to make the protagonist's journey come to life. I tried to explore the Walk Two Moons lesson plan but it was in a format my computer did not recognize (doc.kml) so I'll have to figure that part out to be able to view the lessons.
http://audiopal.com/editor.html
I discovered AudioPal through the "TF Edge" section of TeachersFirst. I'm working on our persuasive writing unit for 8th grade, and one of the lessons involves students "calling" parents after some sort of bad incident - a car accident or getting sent to the principal's office, for example. I wanted to find some way for them to leave a message for their parents explaining this fictional situation using emotionally loaded language and speaking techniques. AudioPal seems like a perfect fit because it lets students use text-to-speech, record via a mic, or even record via phone and demonstrate that they can use pathos to be persuasive, and also can "Communicate with Clarity and Precision."
The struggle would be to figure out how to share them with each other, since it only seems to produce a Flash object, not a usable audio file. I actually wonder if it wouldn't be easier to just use Sound Recorder or something simple like that...
First, let me say I am somewhat intimidated by techy things (not to the extent that I don't try them because I love trying new things, but I do not enjoy the frustrations caused by tech-savvy people/sites who ASSUME a level of understanding which I do not have in order to use their sites/programs) but I did enjoy this site. Easy navigation, a wealth of content, and simple drop-down menus plus some very cool links made this fun.
The site on which I focused was BoostCast. Simply put, it is a site for storing videos. While it can be linked to ads in order to generate $, I like the application for storing videos such as my 9th graders are currently doing for their Hero's Journey culminating project. By having these videos stored on a site which could be accessed by future classes, I could then direct the next generation of students to pre-existing "models" as well as generate ideas for newer material. I'm sure many of us have gotten tired of seeing the same material re-hashed in a new color (How many variations of the Globe Theaters can One English Teacher STAND?????) without any new "tidbits" of inspiration or information. By seeing what has come before, students could/should find something to spark their creativity within the vault of BoostCast. Simply naming videos after the project and year (i.e., "I Am The Messenger" group, 2010) would satisfy cataloging needs without revealing any personal info about students. Lots of cool possibilities.
http://www.memorizenow.com
I'm just getting ready to work with students on some new terminology in Film as Literature. There are at least 50 new terms that they need to learn. Some are somewhat obvious; others are not. The tricky part is that I want them to KNOW them, not just guess at them. Consequently, the test is composed of only two types of items: (1) the term is given and the student has to write the definition, and (2) the definition is given and the student has to supply the correct term. There is no list from which to choose, so they either know the material or they don't.
Memorize Now website is a place where students can enter information to create electronic flash cards as well as create a variety of the cloze test for memorizing. As they memorize, they can click on a button that hides some of the words. Another click hides more words. Putting the cursor over a blank will reveal the first letter of the word if a hint is needed.
Seems like a good way to save some paper cards as well as provide some clues along the way without really seeing the entire thing.
Wow- the TeachersFrist site is great. I found numerous things that I can use in and out of the classroom to help engage kids in their learning, while helping them to gain important content. My personal favorite is the essay map.
http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/essaymap/. It is very similiar to what we use in class but for those students that need a little more guidance in their preparation before writing it would work very well. In addition, I have many parents that are always asking what can we do at home to help their student be successful and I found various activities that could be done at home that provide kids additional help in an area that they struggle, one of the best being GoGrammar http://classroom.jc-schools.net/basic/. Grammar activites are set up as games so students can receive extra help with these skills.
I really enjoyed this site and know that I will frequent it to find things to not only get students to actively learn but also to help them learn invaluable content that they need to have to be successful.
Kimberly said...
Regarding Dan's comment above: you may also wish to check out Vimeo for hosting videos. I believe Kevin Hurt is using it already, and that's where I host the videos we create in our office.
Regarding Rich's comment--another cool thing I've seen teachers/students do to make flash cards is with PowerPoint and an iPod--you simply make slides (slide one with the term/problem, slide two with the definiton/solution, and so on)then you save the whole slide show as jpegs and upload it to your iPod.
TeachersFirst is an awesome resource! This resource can save you so much time searching for curriculum that engages students. I particularly liked all of the sites on Geologic time, especially www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/exhibit/geology/html. I envision students working together in cooperative groups to research one particular timeline.
I also really enjoyed reading the exerpts from teachers on how this site can be used in the classroom.
I will use this a lot!
Bill Cooper
Thought just looking at it that there wouldn't be much I could use in my Auto class,but, I did find something called the career zone.
It is an interactive activity that uses profile/interest questions and then provides you with lists of career possibilities. The surprising thing about it is that it gives a wide range of potential jobs to choose from. Clicking on the job brings up an outlook of the profession in surpising depth.
Some of the areas covered are:
Tasks associated with the work
Wages
Schooling Requirements
Qualifications
Preparatory Course suggestions for High School
Locations
I think it is involving and interesting especially for my Intermediate and Advanced classes that are at that point in life were they are concerned about making choices that coincide with their interests.
I give it a 10 for ease of use and information and a classroom ten overall
Here is a link to the Interactive Rock cycle website I found: http://www.learner.org/interactives/rockcycle/
I have come up with an assignment to navigate my students through this website. This website can show how rocks change from one to another. So it helps them understand the 3 different types of rocks and how they are formed. Instead of me just telling them that it happens. Which should make our rock cycle a more interactive then it has in the past and they can see what rock it is transformed into.
http://www.triptico.co.uk/flashFiles/wordMagnets/Word%20Magnets.swf
I hadn't thought of using a site like this in a language classroom before. This site would be nice for a warm-up for the day. I could type in a French, grammatically correct sentence, which the site would then scramble, and students would have to use their knowledge to rewrite the sentence in the correct order. The students could do the same thing with paper and scissors if I wanted to extend the activity, and then rearrange their partner's sentences.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/cbbcnews/hi/specials/2005/africa/default.stm
The BBC sites that are linked to Teachers First are really great resources for providing age appropriate content about sensitive issues such as in Africa, such as Sudan and the droughts in Kenya. I can see using this site when we do our Africa unit in place of some of the other more adult sites that I currently use. There is a wealth of information, including video, interviews, and maps.
http://www.nga.gov/education/classroom/self_portraits/zoomify/zoom_van_gogh.htm
I visited the National Gallery of Art site because I like infusing the study of literature and writing with art. You should see this site. It has specific lessons designed to connect writing and artwork, complete with printable templates and lesson plans. In addition, a click or two of the mouse allows students to investigate closely the paintings and sculptures. For example, students can create self-portraits by first reading excerpts from famous artists and then using their artwork and explanations for inspiration.
wow--after reading all the blogs i see that you all found something neat on teachers first. hope you don't mind as i write that i won't capitilize anything. i had a lot of fun looking around at the favorites and the hot topics, etc. i signed up for the weekly newsletter and put the site on my favoites. i found a really neat link to the interactive raven (Poes poem) where if you put your curser over the word it explains the reason it was used or gives the definition--sounds also. when i typed in subject (art) i found the denver gallery of art but that was about it. you could select country, media, century to narrow the field but some only had one or sometimes none (Mexico). not sure why you could choose it if nothing was there. anyway fun and i will keep checking it out
I checked out two literature sites: http://www.literature-map.com/
Resource URL: http://www.literatureproject.com/
The literature map one is fun, although very simple, as it directs students to similar authors. But it would be a great resource to have at a second's notice when you're trying to lure a student to try a new author. Not very Classroom 10 (sorry, Kimberly :-)), but still necessary. The literature project site interests me, as it has some classic books available to read online, and also links to e-books. To accommodate students' varied learning styles, and to tap into their Digital Native status, I wonder if they would be more likely to read a classic on an Ipod than in a hard copy...or to listen to it as an e-book. Not very cutting edge suggestions, here, but, hey, it's Friday afternoon of a l..o..n..g week :-).
The Teacher First site seems to be a very useful site, but I wonder how people limit thier time on sites that have so many different links. I find myslef getting so caught up in exploring the links that I forget why I am there in the first place or I find that time gets away from me and I have spent a whole afternoon sitting in front of the computer screen. A couple of sites I found compelling were the Magazine Cover Maker, Explore Photos, and Math Applets. The Magazine Cover Maker could be used in almost any subject area. Students create real looking magazine covers that synthesize their learning both visually and through headlines and short snippets of information. I really like that Teachers First warns teachers up front about the security issues that can occur with this site if they don't monitor studnets use very carefully. The Explore Photos site has amazing pictures from around the world that would help visual learners understand and connect to just about any topic. The Math Applets site is an interactive math site that both parents and teachers could use when working with students who are having difficulty understanding math concepts.
http://www.peterrussell.com/Odds/VirtualAge.php
Site allows students to complete a quick exam to determine their virtual age and individual life expectancy. They could watch the ages change with every answer. Nearly all answers SHOULD be known by students. The cholesterol and blood pressure levels may need to be determined as part of the “at home” portion of this lesson, but it is easy to guide through with little to no assistance. I could see this fitting into a nutrition or fitness plan/assignment. Provides hands on for students.
www.coe.uh.edu/digital-storytelling/
Okay, stating the obvious, teachersfirst.com is a pretty cool site – almost too cool, because one can quickly find a great deal of time passing whilst perusing this site.
One site that I found, that I think is a must see / must use is a site put together through the University of Houston, called Digital Storytelling.
It's free (from what I can gather), and it's sort of a mix of animoto, PowerPoint, and Voicethread, rolled into one. What's more, it's really aimed at educators and students for academic uses.
One could conceivably use it in several ways, for a myriad of projects -- for 6th grade language arts, students could create a digital storyboard about the books that they've read during our reader's workshop on the author Avi; teachers could gussy about up old images and tv and film clips to rouse the kids about any whatever new topic is being covered, it's pretty limitless. Check it out!
I found plenty of interesting and fun sites, but WordItOut is one of my favorites. Type in a passage from a poem or novel, and the program creates an aesthetically pleasing word cloud of the text. I'm teaching Lord of the Flies right now, and so I plugged in a page about Simon's death as well as the page concerning Piggy's death. The word cloud isolates Golding's words - takes them out of context. And, I think this allows someone to more carefully examine his word choices, which then leads to interesting discussion. The only problem is that a word cloud makes the most used words bigger, and the most used words aren't necessarily the key words. Still, cool tool.
I visited the national dairy counsel website (http://www.teachersfirst.com/getsource.cfm?id=10589)and it would be perfect for my classroom. In my cooking class my students need the information to learn how to stay healthy. By learning about the food pyramid they would gain the knowledge they need to be healthy. This site is also good for my students because it is aimed at a lower grade level which makes it easier for my students to read and understand. It also has low fat recipes which my students could make in class.
http://www.learningtoday.com/corporate/maths-applets.asp
The Teacher First site is a great way to search for all areas in math. I searched for statistics information and had over 200 entries to choose from. I ende up at the applet site and played around with the Venn Diagrams. It is a great way to get students to use the active board and create their own diagrams in a fun and interactive way. It is also something that I can assign for homework that is very different from the normal book homework. I will spend some more time looking for different applets to use in statistics to help them with the more complex problems we do in that class.
This is a great site! I had to force myself to stop looking at it. My favorite math related site was www.mathguide.com. It has a section that allowed you to quickly make a worksheet...select a topic, select the number of problems and tada...it was done! There were links to puzzles & projects. Another good site was Cobocards..another interactive flashcard site. This was allowed images to be placed on the cards. This would have been helpful in my geometry classes when we started on unit on angles and angle relationships. It was vocabulary heavy. Being able to make flashcards with a picture to go with on an interactive website really would have helped some students.
Not teacher related...well, math teacher related that is but very interesting though was the family tree generator website. It was Geni-Everyone's related. It would be fun for personal use and it could be useful for english or social studies.
Now, a question for Kimberly. Are the netbooks powerful enough to run these interactive websites?
http://www.teachersfirst.com/getsource.cfm?id=9742
I really liked the Taking a Spin on Shakespeare website. While teaching a Shakespeare class last semester, I was constantly trying to find ways to make Shakespeare interesting and "come alive" for students. As other L.A. teachers may know, many students tend to approach Shakespeare with a negative attitude. I was also continually looking for new ways to assess students when we finished reading a play. For our last unit, I let each group pick their own Shakespearean play and I struggled with finding a way to assess student growth and learning when they were reading different plays. I love the idea that TeachersFirst proposes where students can use the Spin on Shakespeare website as a model for creating their own site on their selected play. They even suggested writing a blog from the point of view of one of Shakespeare's characters. I'm always open to finding interesting (yet relevant and purposeful ways) to promote kids' interest in literature.
What a terrific resource, but as Rhonda and Vasili both said, it would be so easy to get overly-absorbed with looking at all of the possibilities. One of the featured sites for the week of 2/28 is an interactive timeline application (TimeToast) that looks very interesting for our European history unit or possibly our study of global issues. This tool fits well with the "active learning" and "using technology as a tool for learning" Classroom 10 characteristics. I love that you can search the site by keyword and look forward to spending more time perusing...
It was fun playing around with the TeacherFirst site. Like those who have already posted,I too found several things that looked interesting. There were several essay sites and links that talked about Essay Punch and how struggling writers could use this site to help them along from brain storming to their final draft. Another one that caught my eye was a visual thesaurus vocab grabber. This talked of using word maps,key concepts,lit terms to form a theraurus for the students writing. Writing and the use of words are hard concepts for those whom I teach and its hard to get around to help each of them. The Essay Punch is a type of technology that I would like to check out to see if its as user friendly as they say.
My question would be, can we just sign up for these programs without going thru the district?
www.naacphistory.org
NAACP Interactive Historical Timeline
This website could be very useful in my Civics class as we learn about the Civil Rights movement in America. The website has appealing graphics, pictures to accompany each small blurb of information, is easy to navigate, and uses some celebrities to narrate different sections. It will also give students the ability to explore diffent parts of the Civil Rights movement on there own, allowing them to take charge of their learning. The website ties in nicely with the technology component of Classroom 10.
http://www.googlelittrips.com/GoogleLit/Home.html
This is a fantastic idea for teaching "real world" literature. I can imagine that using the Kite Runner resource would have enhanced my teaching the last time I taught that novel, by allowing students to explore the various locations - all hyperlinked to Wikipedia, Panoramio, etc. It would also be cool for integrating mapping skills into English and getting a class or groups to create their own lit trip for the novel/play they just read. Out of sheer nerdiness, I now want to go and make one for Ulysses.
I enjoyed Teacher First and utilized some of the links. What I really appreciated about the site was the graded level and subject specific areas. I am continually looking for activities that stimulate academic language development. Teacher First allowed me to peruse secondary ELL. My students really liked Short Clips for learning about carbon. I think the best way for me to utilize this amazing site is via subject specific, otherwise I become overwhelmed with the amount of information available. I can’t wait to use more ideas from this site this week!
http://www.iplaymathgames.com
I had fun looking at the links at TeachersFirst, too. I went to the math sites highlighted. Teaching math is not my natural strength (I’m a Special Ed teacher and have to be ready to teach anything— for the last few years, it’s been math for me.) This year, I’m teaching Math from a book that is new to me. Keeping ahead of my students’ in learning and teaching new concepts is sometimes very challenging. I found numerous sites that introduce and reinforce math concepts that I can use to brush up on my own dormant skills and that can support my students' emerging skills as well. My favorite was featured site was iplaymathgames.com. The games were a lot of fun and interactive. It was fun to try out some of them. TeachersFirst had links to so many sites, it was overwhelming.
In response to Renee Macklin's comment above. Teachers are encouraged to check out and try new tools that they think enhance/address key concepts and skills in thier curriculum. In the case of the site Renee mentions, it would be a good idea to contact me or Walt since it's something that ultimately we'd have to pay for. For any new potentialy useful tool, we love to be kept in the loop, so please don't hesitate to let us know what you're thinking of trying.
I went to the teachersfirst.com and went under Physical Education and found at site called Track Your Progress. This is a walking program that I might try and have the SAILS students do while they are in PE. They would make a map of where they want to walk and they can log on a track their progress. Yeah, something that can be useful for them.
I was impressed by all the lessons and resources that Teacher First has available. I saw a couple of things that caught my eyes. The first was found at http://www.teachersfirst.com/getsource.cfm?id=10730. It is a visual way to show balancing algebra problems. When we teach this concept to the 6th graders they have such a difficult time with it. I think this will help them to visualize the idea better.
I also saw many sites to use with ancient civilization. We have a new 6th grade social studies SWIFT site, so I plan to look through links that First Teacher had and add them to our SWIFT site. That way students will have easy access to the information through technology.
Cool site. Thanks for sharing!!
http://www.virtualblackboard.com/trips.htm
Tramline Virtual Field Trips looks fascinating to me. I would love to replace part of my family cultures assignment with a student created field trip. The samples I found at Teachers First (I was looking at the Economics when I found this link) would require students to find appropriate links, point the "tour takers" to the most important information and hopefully weed out distractions. This would require a site license, but it might be worth it. I may have students look at a bread baking field trip in my foods class.
I started a list of sites from teachersfirst that appear to have possibilities in my units, including Magazine Cover that Rhonda mentioned, Time Toast and digital story telling.
The first link that caught my eye had to do with budgets and personal finances http://mashable.com/2008/08/14/accounting-and-budgeting-tools/.
The list is long and I looked at several free sites. I would also need to recreate an assignment to use these after I have had time to play with the sites and feel confident having students create an account.
http://www.digitaldialects.com/
After looking through most of the websites under French-High School, I finally found one I will definitely use in class. Classroom 10 is centered around the process of understanding the language in its context, not breaking it down and analyzing everything (that is Classroom 5 to me, as it is too content-oriented). Many websites were translation websites which enable students to take it easy with the language and not take risks, especially when the translation is horrendous and plagiarism. It does not support their understanding of the language as a whole, When I finally found the digital dialects website, I was happy to find many activities that were content-oriented BUT also done in a way that fosters understanding of the input. An example of using this language in a Classroom 10 would be to assign the color quiz as a homework assignment so students get to hear colors then a color-wheel appears and they have to click on the appropriate color they just heard. It is not a translation one where they would hear the French word and see the English word. They see the color instead. That part really appealed to me.
http://www.teachersfirst.com/getsource.cfm?id=5444
This virtual exhibition is a valuable resource to educate students on the impacts of war and conflict on Americans. It is highly visual and fairly interactive. Students could easily get the essential information regarding multiple conflicts in American history and exposure to many primary sources. This site is perfect as a hook or overview. I would need to do some more thinking regarding how to have students demonstrate their learning from the site, but there are teacher resources available on the site as well. This site is also a good resource for further research regarding one aspect of a conflict that particularly interests them.
Technology stresses me out at times and so I was a bit intimidated to peruse the listed sites, but I did so and was pretty excited about what I found! I LOVE the TeachersFirst site! I found a number of ways I could easily incorporate their information into my lessons. First, I like the jeopardy link because I could use this to make fun review sessions on things like idioms, vocabulary words, and other topics before tests. Additionally, I like the Urtek Polling idea. This would be good to use to survey students possibly at the beginning of the year when I'm still getting to know students as well as to survey kids about assessment material. I can see myself using the Wacky Web Tales link to creatively teach parts of speech or on a day where we have a few minutes to spare before the bell rings. Lastly, the TED talk link is great! I've used some talks already from the site but think the talk about the brain (by Tom Wujer) would nicely mesh with what I've been teaching kids about the brain (I am currently taking a class on the Brain Rules by Medina).
Digital storytelling is an appropriate means for teaching English Language Development. I like that it offers an integration of oral and writing presentations. It is difficult to find oral ELL material that provide a safe environment for my kiddo's to practice their oral language skills.
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