Teacher+Recommended+Sites

Teacher Recommended Sites

=Recommended Sites by Tasha Marston= http://www.voki.com/ -- This site allows users to create a life-like avatar of oneself. It is for all grade levels. I enjoy using it because students can portray famous characters and make them come alive. For example, in my business class, students create a Voki entrepreneur and make it tell a story. It makes a traditional book report more interesting. http://www.freerice.com/index.php -- This educational site poses questions to users. Whenever a question is answered correctly, rice is donated through the UN Food Program. It is for 6-12 grade students. I use it as an incentive for students when all of their assignments are turned it. Anything that helps out another country should be promoted. http://www.jingproject.com/ -- This site allows the user to screen print an image from the desktop, manipulate it, record what is happening, and present it. It can be used at all grade levels by the teacher. I think this is a useful site because I can demonstrate how-to do something on the computer, put it on my Blackboard site, and keep it as a resource tool for students who need to see the demo again or were absent that day. http://www.ning.com/ -- This is a social networking site much like Facebook and Myspace. It can be used for any classroom. More and more teachers are setting up classroom sites through Ning as a way to communicate with their students. Chatboxes, forums, blogs, and a user-friendly layout are all features that I love about this site. http://www.dumpr.net/ -- This site allows users to manipulate photos quickly. All grades can use this site with ease. Although I prefer Picnik because of its more extensive options, Dumpr is another way of creating photos in a fun way with just one click. Because not all districts have Photoshop nor do students know how to use a photo editing program, this is another great resource for picture lovers. http://twitter.com/ -- With Twitter, now users can know what their friends and family are doing at all times. All grade levels can use this site. I like it because I believe getting to know your students and what their interests are is the heart of teaching. http://tinyurl.com/ -- This site has always been a favorite of mine because it will shrink any sized URL so that users do not have to mistakenly type something else. Everyone can use this site. I hear teachers call out a URL to their students and they holler back, “What did you say?” or “How do you spell that?” Now, teachers can get a tiny URL where students will not have that problem. http://www.tadalist.com/ -- This site creates a list of what needs to be accomplished for any given time. It can be used by anyone. Students need organization. This tool is kind of like a planner where students can add things they need to accomplish and simply check them off when finished. http://www.garageband.com/ -- Looking for a song to use as background music for a Photostory or PowerPoint presentation? With Garageband, students can, with permission, use songs by real people in every genre imaginable. All grades are welcome to use this site. I like it because there is a lot of variety and every artist I have asked permission to use their material has granted it to me without question. http://delicious.com/ -- This social bookmarking site is great for tagging and keeping all of your favorite web sites in one place. Anyone can use this site. I’m so irritated with Deep Freeze at districts which clears all student favorites that were previously saved. Plus, the organization is not as user-friendly as Delicious.

Recommended Sites by Anne Nitoski http://webquest.org/index.php - This site gives teachers access to a large number of web quests for all subjects and grade levels. The users will have to determine if the web quest is useful. The site is great for finding new web address on specific topics. Although not all the various web quest may apply to a given subject that falls, such as social studies, I have found ideas to help me create my own web quests or bring in new ideas into my lesson plans. http://www.historyteacher.net/ - This is a great site full of social studies PowerPoint’s and links to many social studies oriented sites. These PowerPoint’s are geared toward the high level student since they were created for Advanced Placement United State History and Advance Placement European History. I first learned of this site through the APUSH email distribution list. http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbor/ - This site is a valuable resource for having students learn about Pearl Harbor through the use of this multimedia map and timeline. Students can click on a timeline and see how the attack by the Japanese played out. I like to use this site to have my students gain a better understanding on how the attack occurred, but have the flexibility to jump to different parts of the timeline at their discretion. http://www.picturehistory.com/ - This site allows the user to gain access to historical photography primary sources for American History. This is geared toward all levels of students, but to the photos as a primary source, I would recommend either middle or high school levels. I have used this site to find hard to find photos, many can be downloaded with a watermark and used in the classroom. After a specific dpi the photo rights can be purchased for a fee. I like this site because when trying to build up resources for the classroom, this is quick and easy. http://www.michigan.gov/mde - The user has access to all state GLCES and press releases from the state for all subjects. This site also gives teachers information on certification, recertification, retirement and contacts for individuals in Lansing if a question arises. I have had to use this site many times for all of the above stated reasons. http://www.smithsoniansource.org/tea/viewdetails.aspx - This site allows users access to a variety of primary sources for American History from six specific eras in history. This information on this site can be used for all grade levels. Although this site is not as extensive as some of the others, I have found photos and primary source documents that are not easy to find. http://www.landmarkcases.org/ - This site offers users access to many of the landmark cases that have shaped this country. Under each case is a wealth of information and from majority and minority positions to activities that can be used in the classroom. The information on the site is for those students at the high school studying American Government. I have used this to read about the cases myself and used the many activities to help teach lessons. http://puzzlemaker.discoveryeducation.com/ - The site is for creating all sorts of puzzles. The puzzles can be created for all subjects and grade levels. The site allows you to create the puzzle and then also creates an answer key for your convenience. I have used this to word with vocabulary while incorporating brain logic to help my students develop their thinking skills and use of logic. [|http://www.murray.k12.ga.us/teacher/kara%20leonard/Mini%20T's/March%20Mini%20T-Games/Games.htm] - The site gives the user access to multiple game templates that can be used in PowerPoint. This can be used for most grade levels and all subjects. I have used these templates for a review for tests and final exams. The kids love learning while having fun. http://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/History_n2/a.html - This site can be used in a high school world history class. It includes interactive maps and timelines that can be broken into various categories such as religion, science, culture, and politics. I use this site to quickly find events in history so that I can further research specific events. http://rubistar.4teachers.org/ - This is a great site for teachers trying to create a rubric. This site allows the teacher to both create their own rubric and save it to the site or to use one of hundreds that have been created by other teachers. This site is valuable for teachers of all grade levels. I have used this site many times when I needed a rubric for grading purposes. Rubrics help a teacher stay focused when grading over a period of time. Students have the benefit of knowing in advance what is expected of them to receive an A, B or C.

Recommended Sites by Susan McCray-King

 * [|http://www.visuwords.com] Visuwords online graphical dictionary/thesaurus is a free resource created by Princeton University students and language researchers to help users not only learn the meaning of words, but how words connect to each other. The user friendly interface allows students to see how words associate by using an interactive visualization tool. This website can be useful in any classroom, as well as a quick resource for teachers. I like it because it is a quick visual tool that shows the meaning of words and how words connect or are interchangeable.
 * http://www.edheads.org/ Edheads is a free website with educational activities that helps students learn hard to understand concepts in science. They are partnered with schools in the United States to meet different state and national standards. This website is useful for upper elementary through high school science classrooms. I like it because it shows students how things like simple or compound machines work in an easily understood, but interactive cartoon like fashion.
 * http://www.visiblebody.com/ Argosy's Visible Body is a free human anatomy visualization tool. It is interactive with a full 3D human anatomy model showing all of the major organ and body systems. The site is useful in middle and high school life science. I like it because it gives the user a detailed virtual 3D view of a human body and allows the user to search for anatomical structures by name.
 * http://www.nasa.gov/home/index.html NASA has a free website with information and interactive content for educators and students of all ages. It has lesson plans with audio and video for virtually any area of science – including current research and the history of the different space missions. I really like this site because of the video. It can take the user to outer space, or through a tour of the solar system.
 * http://whyfiles.org/ The Why Files explains the science behind the news. They actually take the headline news and explain the science behind it. It has a link with resources for teacher activities and interactive virtual activities for things like rainbows, lightning, and tornadoes. It is useful for any grade or subject area because it explains the science behind current events. I like it as a science teacher because it helps students understand hard to learn concepts like light refraction in rainbows.
 * http://www.exploratorium.edu/ The Exploratorium Museum of Science, Art, and Human Perception is a non-profit organization with online activities and exhibitions for anything science. For instance, a person can choose to participate in a virtual eye dissection, learn about fault lines, the science behind different sports, or where languages come from and their similarities. This website is useful as a tool for teaching any science or language arts student of any grade. I like it because there is information on topics and at all learning levels.
 * http://www.brainpop.com/ BrainPop is an animated website with topics for all subjects and grade levels. It has short video tutorials that are fun and interesting to help students learn different concepts. This website offers a free trial period, but charges after the initial time period. I like it because students love it! It has fun animated cartoon like videos that grab students’ attention. This is my favorite all around learning website for middle school.
 * http://amasci.com/unew.html This website is a compilation of different science experiments and resources. It has lesson plans and directions for interesting experiments and projects that grab middle and high school students’ attention. For instance, last year we made a generator with wire, a cardboard box, a magnet, a nail, and a led light bulb. The students were fascinated when the bulb lit up while we turned the nail. One of the things I like about the website is that the experiments and projects are not only fascinating to students, but cost effective for the teacher.
 * http://www.fi.edu/fellows/payton/rocks/index2.html The Rockhound Home Page is a website with interactive lessons on the rock cycle and is a good site to use alone, or for part of a web quest on the rock cycle. It is suitable for middle school students or anyone wanting information about the rock cycle. One of the many things I like about this website is the immediate feedback students receive as they complete the rock cycle quiz, or participate in the digging for words puzzle.
 * http://www.tolerance.org/teach/index.jsp Teaching Tolerance is part of The Southern Poverty Law Center. They offer free resources, kits, handbooks, and lessons to educators, parents, and youth-serving nonprofit organizations. The classroom activities are easy to use and searchable by academic subject, grade and topic. I believe this is a website every teacher in every grade and academic area should use to learn to teach, and acquire the necessary materials to teach, students tolerance and diversity. It has excellent information about bullying.
 * http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/jmresources/rocks/links.html This website has links to over fifty geology sites. It has many links for rock cycle and mineral lessons and activities that would help students have fun while learning earth science. A middle school science teacher could create a web quest with some of the resources. I really like the depth of subject matter offered on the website. They have lesson plans, quizzes, games, tutorials, scavenger hunts, and interactive experiments.

= = =**Recommended Sites by Suzanne Rubba**= http://www.readwritethink.org/ This site is filled with lesson plans for teachers in the area of language arts. Each lesson plan lists an overview, from theory to practice, student objectives, instructional plan and instruction activities. The lessons range from grades K-12. This site was great because the lessons were teacher friendly and easy to apply. The lesson A is for Apple I will be putting in my lesson plans next week. Lots of kindergarten links listed on this site that I plan to use. http://www.seussville.com/seussentennial/resources1.html This is the perfect place to read and learn about Dr. Seuss. The site is broken down into categories such as events, activities, contacts, news, books and links. For the schools who celebrate reading month in March this site is filled with ways to celebrate Dr. Seuss. Many printable worksheets for elementary school children to complete are available. This site can be viewed by parents, students and teachers. Many different subject areas were addressed. This site had something for everyone. http://www.storylineonline.net/ This site had a number of picture book stories listed. The stories can be read to the students by just clicking the mouse. A variety of activities to go with each book were listed along with websites of other books related to the topic. This site would be appropriate for elementary age children and elementary teachers. I liked that the stories were read to the students so nonreaders could still participate in the activities. This site would be used for language arts. http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Education/ConservationCentral/design/daph_broadband.htm This site allows the students to design a habitat for a panda bear. The children click on shelter, types of trees, plants etc. that a Panda would need to survive. If enough of the correct items were chosen the pandas will come out of hiding. Grades K-4 would benefit from this site if studying habitats. I liked that the pictures with words were easy to click and drag. If incorrect items were chosen the zookeeper lets you know why this would not be a good choice. Great way for students to apply learned information. This site would reinforce the science curriculum. http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Education/ConservationCentral/walk/default.cfm At first glance the home page did not catch my attention. When I scrolled down I saw a number of animal pictures that you could click on. Once you clicked on the animals it is like you are visiting the Smithsonian National Zoological Park. Easy to read animal facts were listed, videos and information about exhibits at the zoo. This site would be applicable in the area of science for grades 2-adult. I liked the photographs and the videos. For those who can’t visit a zoo it was like you were there. Great resource for animal reports. http://www.literacycenter.net/ This site contains early literacy games that children could play on the computer for prereading practice. The games are easy and colorful. This site would be suitable for children ages 3-6 or those learning letters/sounds. I liked that the children can play the games without needing much assistance. http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/ This site was amazing. I was able to learn about animals and places that I have never seen before. If your class can’t take field trips this would be the site to visit. Grades K-adulthood could really utilize this site. The subject areas would be reading, science or social studies. The purpose of this site would be to learn about the many places and animals around the world. The photographs were unbelievable. http://www.nctm.org/ This site covers five areas in mathematics; numbers and operations, algebra, geometry, measurement, data analysis and probability. The site is also broken down into grade levels K-12. Easy to play math activities were available for every grade level and in every subcategory. I liked this site because you could quickly find the area in math you were teaching and have a game for your students to play. http://www.ala.org/gwstemplate.cfm?section=greatwebsites&template=/cfapps/gws/displaysection.cfm&sec=16 This site lists a number of famous authors. Using the code you can see the appropriate age for each author. PreK to middle school students as well as parents and teachers would benefit from the information on this site. Each author listed activities to do with their books, biographies and games. I couldn’t stop reading about the authors that have written so many of my favorite books. http://www.poets.org/ This site is great for language arts teachers. You can browse poets by last name and the poem they have written is right at your fingertips. For poetry studies or to find a variety of poetry for students to read this site would be helpful. I liked being able to click on a poets’ name and being able to read information about the poet and see all of his or her poems listed.

Recommended Sites by Ron Shankin

http://dsc.discovery.com/ - This site offers articles, videos, and other interactive material useful for all grade levels. The information would be most appropriate for courses in science, or perhaps history. The site has references to each of the programs aired on the popular “Discovery Channel” found through the cable/dish network. I like this site because it is accurate, easy to manipulate, and interesting.

http://townhall.com/ - This is a comprehensive site that is known as the one-stop shopping center for conservatives. It is ideal for history / civics teachers who are looking to obtain information relative to current political issues. At present, the site is covering many of the presidential issues heard on various radio stations and seen in many publications. I like this site because it covers an array of political issues within one website. I would recommend this site for teachers covering current events.

http://www.publicagenda.org/educators - This site covers public opinion surveys, including many related to educational issues. There is a tab dedicated to educators that leads you to very informative articles, which include education reform, and other challenges facing today’s educators. I like this site since it covers surveys on issues that should be of concern to all teachers. Keeping current and being aware of changes and opinions in your field is crucial for most professions.

http://www.ed.gov/index.jhtml - This is the U. S. Department of Education website that covers many areas education related. The teachers tab links to features and resources that can assist you with classroom planning, networking with other educations, and other publications to keep you current. I think all teachers need to be aware of this website and monitor it to learn of updates and changes taking place in the education profession. I like this site since it is government based and provides information from several federal offices.

http://www.schoolsecurity.org/trends/gangs.html#Defining%20Gangs - A very informative site that discusses gangs and school safety. Teachers have the responsibility of educating our children, and to some extent, keeping them safe and identifying potential threats in the classroom. This site helps teachers identify gang-related activity, the rationale behind the formation of gangs, and what the teacher can do once a problem is identified. A student’s involvement in a gang can begin at any age. Therefore, teachers at all levels need to have some knowledge about gang activity and how it effects a school environment. I think this site can provide teachers with enough information relative to gangs and gang-activity, and help keep students safe from their unruly antics.

http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/- This is one of the most comprehensive sites I have ever used. I have been able find information on almost any topic using what the site calls “subject access.” The site can be helpful for all educators, as well as their students. I appreciate the ease to manipulate through the site, and the ability to find so much information through a single site.

[|http://www.kids.gov-] This is another site that links you to so much information. It is intended mostly for elementary school educators, and covers topics useful for a history lessons. However, you will also find information in many other areas such as: science, geography, money, astronomy, computers, and government. I think this site would be a great asset to the educator looking to keep a lesson simple and to the point. It can be equally helpful to students conducting research, and is simple to work with.

Kristen Guinn’s Recommend Websites: [|http://picasa.google.com] – Picassa is my all-time favorite program. I use this free software for storing, editing, and sharing my photos. I recommend this software to everyone. You can create collages, slideshows, and make your photos accessible on the web. [|www.ustream.tv] – This site is great for recording live videos. I like to use this program to record my student’s presentations. The class then watches the videos. The site also allows you to broadcast your video globally. It only requires a camera and an internet connection; you don’t have to worry about transferring, formatting, and editing data. [|http://www.gcast.com] – Gcast is an awesome tool for my students with a hearing impairment, and also for my average students. It can be used to record a story or social studies lesson, and most importantly, it’s free! If you don’t have a microphone, you can use your everyday phone. It’s also a great way to hear podcasts, or create your own!! [|www.tinyurl.com] – This is the site to use if you want to shrink those long websites down!! Often time I find a great quiz or article I want my 5th graders to access, but the process we go through just to retrieve it on the internet wastes a lot of time, and my energy. Shrinking the website down to a more reasonable size is a great way to make things easier for yourself, and your students. [|www.jingproject.com] – This is another great site to capture images and videos and then transfer them to multiple places online. It’s free to download. Simply select an area of your screen, capture it as an image or record it as a video, and then click Share. Jing conveniently places a URL to your content which you can paste into any of your conversations [|www.kiva.orq] – This site is used for my 5th grade social studies class. It allows students to get a perspective on the world outside our classroom. Lessons on economy and Core Democratic Values can be tied into this website. It’s also a great way to get your students involved in a group project as citizens making a difference in someone’s life. The next sites are very useful Election websites for elementary students: http://americanpublicmedia.publicradio.org/engage08/selectacandidate - Engage 08 - Select a Candidate: By asking you a series of questions about major issues, Select A Candidate helps you learn which presidential candidates' views most closely align with your own. You can also learn more about the candidates and find out how your results compare with those of others who take the survey. This is a great way to help a student understand how we choose the person we want to vote for!! http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/election2008/games/poster – “Design a Campaign Poster” - The students will design campaign poster. It’s a great way for students to develop a position/opinion, and then express why they choose their candidate. http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/election2008/games/candidate - “You’re the Candidate” - This gives the students the opportunity to decide which issues are the most important to them. In doing so, students gain a larger perspective on which candidate has policies similar to their own. http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/games_quizzes/electiongame/game.asp - “You’re the President” - You make the decisions and talk to the press. Print out the resulting news story to see how you fared as President of the United States. The print out is a great way to assess your student’s understanding. http://teacher.scholastic.com/scholasticnews/indepth/election2008/games/candidates_stand - “Who Am I?” Can you guess where the presidential candidates stand on the issues? Read the clues below and guess whether it's something that John McCain or Barack Obama wants to do as President. Click on the box with the question mark to see if you're right. **For more clues, check out [|Where the Candidates Stand and Learn About the Issues] .**