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 CLASSROOM RESOURCES (updated 12/20)
"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest
appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them." -- John F.
Kennedy, Thirty Fifth US President
Title: You Can Do the Cube New! Apart from the “how-to” feature, which is particularly interesting to anyone who grew up the 1980s, the rest of the site’s content is terrific. Lessons help students master important math concepts including area, perimeter, volume, angles, algorithms and enumeration, among many others. Some teachers are even using the Rubik's Cube to teach life lessons and 21st century skills such as focus, following directions, memorization, sequencing, problem solving, critical thinking and perseverance. The people behind YouCanDoTheCube have taken steps to ensure that all lessons meet National and Common Core Standards. Newer lessons feature a specific focus on STEM concepts. Additionally, the site offers a ton of downloadable content—everything from award badges to activity sheets to instruction manuals.
Title: Wonderopolis New! For teachers, this is a terrific resource. Seemingly mundane science lessons can be made fun by posing questions such as “Why doesn’t glue stick to the inside of the bottle?” to the class. The entire site has a light and whimsical feel, but balances that with high-quality information. Any one of the daily questions can be used as a makeshift lesson. Title: Education Atlas
Educators, home schooling parents, and students are sure to find the resources they need at Education Atlas. Resources are grouped into subjects such as adult education, colleges and universities, distance learning, employment, financial aid, higher education, home schooling, instructional technology, methods and theories, and many more. Clicking on a link brings up an alphabetical list of resources for that topic with a brief description. Thousands of reviewed resources that meet specific criteria are available. The K-12 section covers such topics as administration, bilingual education, counseling, curriculum, discipline, gifted education, lesson plans, school safety, school improvement, teaching resources, and others. Title: Classroom Learning 2.0 This is a great site for teachers to brush up on or learn to use the latest Web technologies in the classroom. The 23 free tutorials include text, images and audio and are designed to be completed in a nine-week period but you can do them at your own pace also. Tutorials can be done independently or in groups (groups are recommended). The design of the program was built on the Web 2.0 technologies that are freely available on the Internet. Users will learn about how to set up and use a blog, image hosting sites, RSS feeds and newsreaders, wikis, copyright, Creative Commons, online application tools, podcasts, video and downloadable audio, and more. The tutorial offers direct links to the Web 2.0 tools and offers suggestions for ways to incorporate these tools into your classroom and teacher collaborations. Title: MIT Open Courseware MIT is committed to advancing education and discovery through knowledge open to everyone. OCW shares free lecture notes, exams and other resources from more than 1800 courses spanning MIT's entire curriculum. Title: Financial Football
A new video game designed to help students learn to manage their money tries to make the fullness of balancing a checkbook look more like the thrill of driving for a touchdown. The game tests high school and college students' fiscal skills in an online simulation based on the rules of the NFL. The level of difficulty varies, with questions like what to do when you run out of checks and the limits on an IRA. The game comes with two general settings--high school and college levels. Teams have the options to pick tougher questions worth more yardage. Title: BibMe A totally free, fully automated bibliography maker. Title Vocaroo
Helps educators create simply podcasts through voice recordings. All you need is a computer with a microphone. By clicking on the "record" button, you can record any message. You then can send the recording to the email address of your choice and you can add the message to any website or blog. Title: File Dropper
A free and easy tool for educators. You can upload any file up to five gigabytes in size and the tool will generate a link you can send to people so they can access the file. Title: Tammy's Technology Tips for
Teachers
Hundreds of great ideas for technology integration. Many links to Web 2.0 tools. Back to Top Title: Energized Learning Energized Learning is a great way for students to get hands-on experience in analyzing energy use and calculating potential savings in homes and other buildings. There are two sets of lessons, one for the student and an annotated version for the teacher. The standards-based lessons are interdisciplinary and include assessments, activities, spreadsheets, and worksheets for use in the classroom. Students are exposed to concepts such as: how energy and the environment are linked; that quality of life can be increased without increasing energy use; that achieving energy efficiency is an investment, not an expenditure; that managing energy use requires concepts and information from many areas, and others. Students will also be introduced to the interactive web-based energy calculator, Home Energy Saver, a professional level tool that is used in predicting building performance in terms of energy in order to assist not only in design, but also in policy-making. Title: Oceans Alive Earth Science teachers will certainly want to bookmark this site for future reference. It offers a wealth of information on anything pertaining to the study of the global seas. The water planet section explores the physical features of the ocean, the changing oceans and plate tectonics, the water cycle and vignettes of the four oceans and their varied environments. Oceans in motion provides detailed information on how ocean currents are formed, wind and waves and how tides are affected by the gravitational pull of the sun and moon. Life in the sea offers information on plants and animals that live near the surface of the ocean as well as predators and prey. Visitors to the site can dive deeper into the sea, in the scientist at sea area, to learn more about underwater exploration and remote sensing. Classroom activities are provided for learning about the water cycle, water currents, web of life and tides. Title Paleontology Portal Whether you are an expert or a novice, the Paleontology Portal has something to grab your interest. The interactive map of North America in the Exploring Time and Space area allows users to learn more about the geology and paleontology of any U.S. state, Canadian province, and region of Mexico, or explore by geological time period. There is a gallery for viewing fossil images and learning more about fossils found in North America. The site includes plants, fungi, vertebrates, bacteria, and vertebrates. Another interactive map of North America in the Flora and Fauna encourages users to learn about significant fossil finds by viewing slide shows and other information. Teachers will appreciate the resource section with maps, fact sheets, classroom activities, courses, and lectures. Other resources include career information, maps, field guides, images collections, publications, and curriculum, as well as a section of interviews with working paleontologists. Back to Top
SUBJECT AREA: SCIENCE Chemtutor is a useful resource for students and teachers. It can be used for independent study, review of lessons taught in class, or a tutoring program for students in basic chemistry. The content is grouped into sections by topic including how to learn, the periodic table, kinetics, reactions, atomic structure, elements, solutions, and thermochemistry. Within each topic area, users can read the text and view charts, tables, sample problems, and diagrams. According to the site, “Chemtutor begins with the fundamentals and gives expert help with the most difficult phases of understanding your first course in chemistry."
SUBJECT AREA: MATHEMATICS
This site offers students a chance to review or
learn about probability. It covers almost every aspect of the
subject within twenty detailed tutorials. Topics include
measurability, product spaces, Jensen inequality, finite variation,
differentiation, and Gaussian measure among others. These tutorials
are accompanied by a page of Proved Theorems, a glossary of terms,
and a history page with links to biographies of all the
mathematicians mentioned in the tutorials. The solutions to
exercises are provided and can be printed. Included is a discussion
board, a page describing the notations used and links for further
exploration.
Western Trails is a rich resource of primary documents that
can be used by American History teachers to enhance their lessons. The Western
Trails exhibits feature several themes, such as Native American Trails, Explorer
Trails, Military Trails, Settlement Trails, and Population Trails. The exhibits
include textual information, maps, images, and other primary sources. The
Teacher Toolbox (located in the navigation menu) includes a collection of
resources and information that would be helpful to educators who are just
starting to use digitized primary source materials or to those who are looking
for new ideas. The lesson plan collection features ready-to-go lessons available
on a range of subjects and can be organized by title or subject. Additionally,
the Digital Toolbox offers strategies to help digitization projects of all
scopes and sizes as well as project management tips.
Inspire your students to become creative writers with the
resources and activities at Can I Have a Word? The site features four projects
including the elements, the human body, the Odyssey, and changing voices. These
four projects cover various areas of creative writing such as descriptive
writing, conversational and narrative prose, creative character prose, and
influential writing. Students learn to create these writing assignments by
listening to new poems by such poets as Margot Henderson, Michael Rosen, and
Valerie Bloom, watching stimulating visual presentations and participating in
the classroom activities and ideas that are provided. Teachers will find
worksheets and poems, classroom displays, teacher tips, and a link to download
the Flash animation to their desktop for easy viewing in the classroom. Also
included are profiles for all the poets featured on the site, top tips for
writing, curriculum connections, and other resources. Art teachers and students will want to spend some time visiting Smart History. It includes more than two hundred artworks and one hundred and fifty videos and podcasts. All those resources are organized thematically, by style, by artist, and by time period. Themes include “For the Very Beginner,” “Image and Power,” “The Skill of Describing,” “Oil Paint,” and “Print Making.” The video section includes “Mies's corporate classicism," “Odysseus at the Getty,” and “Magritte’s treacherous pipe.” Visitors to the site easily can locate the works of more than a hundred artist, including Jean Arp, Caravaggio, Gauguin, Monet, and others. Smart History gives visitors reliable content and a delivery model that’s engaging, with podcasts and screen-casts that are spontaneous conversations about works of art. SUBJECT AREA: PHYSICAL EDUCATION/HEALTHTitle: Get Body Smart URL: http://www.getbodysmart.com/ Get Body Smart is a fine resource for anyone interested in learning more about human anatomy and physiology. Visitors to the site can view detailed instructional diagrams, drawings, and other items related to the systems of the human body. Within the sections, users can view illustrations of the various anatomical parts and read through the tutorials to learn about each system. The site also features quizzes. Teachers, students, healthcare professionals, and others can “use the free tutorials and quizzes in Get Body Smart to help explain the body's complex physiological interactions and illustrate its important anatomical landmarks."
Title: Aero-Pop This high energy site
may be the cure for getting youngsters to moving and improving
their health. It can be incorporated into the school fitness
programs or done at home and is appropriate for all children.
Best of all, the entire program can be downloaded for free.
Teachers will find thirty-five easy to follow lesson plans with
a video clip to demonstrate each new move. A PDF file is also
available explaining in detail the lesson plan for each session.
Parents can easily use the program at home to get and keep your
kids moving and having fun while they’re doing it. Just choose
your own upbeat music and start Aero-popping!! It’s the fun way
to change the way children think about exercise and physical
education. SUBJECT AREA: TEACHING RESOURCES
Title: Teacher Lingo TeacherLingo is a place where teachers can connect with other teachers from all levels. This community includes a general teacher blog as well as teacher blogs for elementary, ESL, college, high school, middle school, preschool, retired, and many more. There is also a directory of lesson plans for all grade levels and subject areas that have been submitted and rated by community members. The directory can be searched by grade level or subject matter or by clicking on a keyword in the tag cloud. Included are message boards that include the Lingo Lounge with teacher introductions, inspirational stories and new teachers and the educational discussions.
Title: On-Line Journal of School Mathematics (ON-MATH) Teachers of mathematics will welcome the informative articles found at ON-Math. Articles can be browsed by grade (elementary, middle, and secondary) or by issue. All of the articles are peer-reviewed and offer ideas for teaching such topics as area and perimeter relationships, transforming linear graphs, electronic explorations of tessellations, real-time traffic data, angles and circles, developing algebraic thinking, projectile motion, tangents, and much more. These interactive articles include applets, video clips, information about the author, related resources, and a link to the printer-friendly version. The current issue is available as are all the back issues since the journal’s first issue in 2002. Mathematics teachers are encouraged to submit articles for review and inclusion in the journal.
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