Websites – Page 28 – iLearn Technology

Where’s George: Track US currency

December 15, 2010Kelly Tenkely2 Comments2458 views

What it is: Where’s George is a neat site that lets your students track the travel of dollar bills through circulation. Users of the site mark their bills with the website address, and follow the adventure of their money. On the Where’s George site, students can enter the serial number on the bill, enter their current zip code and learn about where their bill has been. If your bill doesn’t have a tracking history, you can start tracking it. Add a short note about the bill including where it was found, what condition it is in, etc. Students and classes can choose to receive an email when the next person finds and records the bill’s next location. In addition to tracking bills, you can view a report by zip code, state, bill denomination, or county.

How to integrate Where’s George into your curriculum: Where’s George is a great site to use as part of a money or currency unit. Let your students track their money and watch the journey of their money unfold. Students can track their lunch money, donation money, or sports club money. Track a dollar with your class for an entire school year. Enter the dollar serial number as a class at the beginning of the school year, record information about it, and write the Where’s George web address on the dollar. Use a class email address to track the bill throughout the year. Map where the dollar travels. Toward the end of the year, have your students write a story about the adventures their dollar has had, including the places it has visited, and the kind of people they imagine that it met on its travels. This is sure to spark some creative stories!

*** When using the site with students make sure to preview where the bill has been before sharing with students, sometimes those bills visit some interesting places that may need to be screened (i.e. strip club). Always preview first!

Tips: Need a different currency to track? Check out this page to find your country’s currency (Europe, United Kingdom, New Zealand, Russia, Switzerland, India, South Africa, Australia, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, China, Taiwan, and Germany). There is also a neat site called Book Crossing that tracks books that you have read and released. Cool!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Where’s George in your classroom!

The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators: FREE ebook!!

December 13, 2010December 13, 2010Kelly Tenkely12 Comments4964 views

I am excited to announce the release of a free ebook: The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators- a comprehensive introduction to using technology in all k-12 classrooms. Think of this as an early Christmas present!

Richard Byrne from Free Tech 4 Teachers is the brilliant mind behind this ebook. About a month ago, he approached some of your favorite educators and bloggers (myself included…still can’t wrap my brain around that 🙂 ) to contribute to an ebook. Today is the release and I have to say, it is pretty amazing!! I just finished reading through the finished product and have bookmarked some new tools, had my jaw dropped by Silvia Tolisano and her AMAZING Skype guide, and been inspired all over again by fellow educators and administrators. I am honored to be a part of this incredible resource and guide. Contributers include: Steven Anderson, Adam Bellow, Richard Byrne, George Couros, Larry Ferlazzo, Lee Kolbert, Patrick Larkin, Cory Plough, Beth Still, me (Kelly Tenkely) and Silvia Rosenthal Tolisano. Thank you Richard for the outstanding idea and for acting as editor and pulling it all together!

You can read the ebook in it’s entirety embedded below, by following this link, or download it here.

Figment: Writing community for students

December 8, 2010December 9, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments7068 views

What it is: Figment is a brand new website and writing community for students 13 years old and older (middle or high school only!). This is a place where students can read student writing, share their own writing, connect with other student writers, and discover new stories and authors. Students will find a community of writers and readers who like to share collaborate, and discuss a variety of topics in the online forum.

How to integrate Figment into your curriculum: Do you have students who can’t get enough creative writing time? Figment is a perfect match. Students who love to write can join a community of other students who enjoy to write. This is a great place for them to share their writing, read other students writing and learn how to give, and accept, critiques and recommendations on their writing. This is a great place for students to analyze and evaluate each other’s writing. Have a class of creative writers? Send all of your students to Figment to share their writing with other students. Your students can learn and practice providing constructive criticism and netiquette in Figment. Working with another class from another school, district, state or country? Send both sets of students on Figment as a platform for sharing and discussing their writing.

*There is no teacher portal for Figment, if your students are using Figment in school, be sure to sign up for an account and monitor your students use of Figment.

Tips: The sign up requires an email address, twitter account, or Facebook account. Make sure your students have one of the three before using Figment in class.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Figment in your classroom!

Go Animate 4 Schools

December 7, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments5218 views

What it is: I am really excited that Go Animate finally has an education version! Go Animate is a tool I have written about before (actually I wrote about Domo Animate which is powered by Go Animate.) Go Animate 4 Schools offers teachers 100 students accounts for free. It operates within a secured, private environment where students and teachers can create animations and interact. The moderation interface keeps teachers up-to-date with all of students creations. The Go Animate Studio makes animation easy, use backgrounds, props, and characters to create an animation masterpiece. The drag and drop interface is easy enough for all ages. Students can create their own characters which provides an endless supply of unique characters for each story. Private Social Networking tools teach students how to use social networks for sharing and commenting in a safe, controlled environment.

The Free Go Animate 4 Schools account includes 1 teacher account, 100 student accounts, 2 min animations for students, teachers have the ability to create characters, unlimited music upload, 6 text-to-voice voices to choose from, students get 50 text-to-voices a month, and unlimited mic recording.

Go Animate 4 Schools also has a Plus account with some additional benefits including unlimited accounts, unlimited time limits for animations, students can create characters, moderation, group management, 16 text-to-voice voices to choose from, up to 200 text-to-voices a month, unlimited image, video, and swf uploads. The School Plus Account starts at $12 a year (not breaking anyone’s budget!) you can request a quote for your school from the Features page.

How to integrate Go Animate 4 Schools into your curriculum: Allow students to present their knowledge creatively using Go Animate 4 Schools instead of requiring the traditional report, diorama, or poster plastered with pictures and information. Students can create an impressive alternative book report by creating an animated book talk, interviewing a character from the story, or re-creating an important scene in the story. Students can display their knowledge about a historical figure by “interviewing” the historical person of interest or an eye-witness of a historical event. Students can write a screen play and then transform them into animations. Animations are also a great way to illustrate vocabulary words and story problems in math. In the foreign language classroom, students can create short cartoons practicing the new vocabulary they are learning. The possibilities are endless! Hold a Go Animate premier party day in your classroom so that students can watch each other’s finished animations and learn from their peers.

Don’t forget that you (the teacher) can use Go Animate too! Animate introductions to lessons, special notes to your students, or complex concepts. If you are like me, this is the time of year that inevitably comes with a cold and a day without a voice. Use Go Animate characters to do that talking/teaching for you. Students will love the change of pace and it will save you from an even sorer throat.

Tips: Be sure to check out the Lesson Gallery for some great ideas for using Go Animate with your students.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Go Animate 4 Schools in your classroom!

Project Global Inform

December 3, 2010Kelly Tenkely11 Comments3900 views

What it is: Project Global Inform is an incredible movement bringing together education and a mission to do something about human rights. Project Global Inform “is an in-school project where students use media to spread awareness about human rights violations. PGI came out of the idea that we too often “teach” our students about genocide and human rights violations, but never “do” anything about it. This project’s main objective is to create awareness about current human rights violations in our schools, communities, and abroad. Through the use of media and technology students have the power to make a difference.” This is education and learning at it’s finest, it is a call to action and an invitation for students to do something important. The project is made up of eight steps. First, students learn about human rights issues through media and literature. Next students form groups based on the humans rights issue they are passionate about. Each group learns about the history of the human rights issue they chose including the current political stance, media, etc. Students come up with an action plan for creating awareness. Students use the action plan as the base for their project where they will choose a media outlet to spread awareness about the issue. At the end of the campaign, students will collect data on the effectiveness of the campaign (based on website hits, video views, “likes” on Facebook, etc.). Each team writes up a report detailing and reflecting on the project, success, and failures. Each student creates a video or slideshow (a kind of documentary) of their project. This is an opportunity for your students to learn about humans rights issues and to get involved in an authentic way that has the potential to directly impact those suffering from human rights issues.

How to integrate Project Global Inform into your curriculum: Project Global Inform is an incredible resource and movement that get students involved in impacting their world in real and meaningful ways. As a result of this project, your students will be more informed about humans rights issues, have a better understanding of social networking and how to virally spread a message, how to use media as a communication tool, how to track web 2.0 data and statistics, collaboration, and reflection. This would make a great project for an ethics class, but could be used as a transdiciplinary project including literature, math, and technology (to name a few). Project Global Inform literally meets every single level of Blooms Taxonomy from knowledge and understanding to creating, apply, analyzing, and evaluating.

While the project appears to be focused on the middle school or high school age group, I think that it could be tailored to the elementary classroom. For example, I had my students use Free Rice as the basis for a similar project. They learned about hunger, created a video slideshow that we uploaded to YouTube and played on Free Rice to earn grains of rice. If using Project Global Inform with younger students, choose a humans rights issue to study as a class. Make sure the information you gather is age appropriate. Students can create posters or pictures for a local coffee shop, create slideshow videos that they upload to YouTube, or hold an information day for the local community. These are they type of projects that will make an impact on your students and the world.

If you decide to take part in Project Global Inform, make sure you let your local news organizations know about it. They love covering stories of children impacting the world and it helps spread the message. Here is our Free Rice story in the local paper. I can’t tell you how this project transformed these two boys featured in the article. They became “celebrities” in the school and were so proud of their hard work. Two average students became two of my top students after this project. Give your students something important and meaningful to do, it makes a huge impact on them.

Tips: Even if you don’t have time for the full project, make sure to take the “Plus Two Pledge”. As your students are learning about human rights violations have them sign the pledge to tell at least two people about what they have learned. I told my two…hopefully more are reading this…who are you going to tell?

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Project Global Inform in your classroom!

28 Tech Tools to Bring out the Story in History

December 3, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments10209 views

Below is an article I wrote for theapple.com. For the full article complete with links, please visit the original article.

Kelly Tenkely | TheApple

When I was in school, I dreaded history. I found it completely uninteresting, dry, irrelevant, and quite frankly…boring. This was unusual for me. Normally, I really enjoyed school. Creative writing, language arts, science, and even math were fun. History was unbearable.

I can count on one hand the things I remember learning in history. I learned that in 1492 Columbus sailed the ocean blue, that there was once a thing called slavery and it was abolished (I saw Roots in school at least 5 times), that there have been several wars and battles, and I remember my freshman history teacher breaking out in “I’ve Been Working on the Railroad” (though I can’t say why). For me history was a lot of dates, strange names, places, and events presented as points on a line. The goal of history was to memorize all of these facts and dates, recite them on a test, and repeat the process the following week. Sadly, that was about it. It wasn’t until adulthood, and my introduction to the History Channel, that I realized that history is interesting. History became engaging when it was presented as a story. It really isn’t about all of the dates, places, and facts. History is about people. History is about story. Students need more than the loosely connected events, people, and dates that fill history textbooks. They need narrative. Textbook writers are boring, history is not. In high school I vividly remember reading a first person account of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the horrors of nuclear war. Why does this account stay with me? Because it wasn’t about the dates. It was about the emotions, the aftermath, the effects on human life.

How can we engage our students with history? How can we help them make personal connections to the events of the past?

Access to history has expanded, students today have learning opportunities that have never been possible before. Today students have the ability to view and read historical documents first hand, ‘interact’ with historical characters, and observe the events of the past through the eyes of the children who lived it. Thanks to technology, students can be truly engaged in the stories of history.

Primary resources are the actual documents, artifacts, and writings from history. These resources give students an up-close view of life in the past.

Primary Resources:

1. The World Digital Library is a collection of primary materials from around the world. Students can explore artifacts that will help them to better understand other cultures. This incredible collection of resources brings museums from around the world into your classroom for your students to explore.

2. Awesome Stories is a collection of primary source materials separated by category. Primary sources include images, videos, narration, slideshows, artifacts, manuscripts, and documents. Awesome Stories is essentially an interactive textbook. With the interactive textbook model, students are able to delve deeper into topics that interest them.

3. Picturing America takes hold of the notion that a picture is worth a thousand words and applies it to teaching American history. The National Endowment for the Humanities is providing classrooms and libraries with American art masterpieces. Bringing our Nation’s artistic heritage into the classroom provides students with unique insights into the character, ideals, and aspirations of our country. The program is free for schools and libraries, providing them with 40 high quality, poster-sized masterpieces, a teacher resource book, and the program website. Picturing America brings history into the classroom, helping students create authentic connections to the past.

4. Primary Access is a web-based tool that offers students and teachers simple access to digital images and materials that provides them the opportunity to create personal narratives. The idea behind the site is that if students are offered primary source documents, they develop better historical thinking skills. Students use Primary Access to create digital historical narrative movies that help add to meaningful learning experiences. The digital movie is 1-3 minutes in length and can contain images, text, movies, and student recorded narration. Students have a place to write, research, narrate, view, and search within Primary Access.

5. Library of Congress on Flickr is a photostream of historical images on Flickr. These incredible photographs will bring history to life for your students. Many of the photographs have no copyright restrictions which makes it a great place for students to find images for projects that they are working on. These are also great images to use in your classroom presentations, and as printouts for bulletin boards.

Videos have the unique ability to make students feel as if they are witnesses to history.

Historical Videos:

6. The History Channel has a wealth of resources to teach history in the classroom. From online historical videos, to a daily dose of history with “This Day in History”, the History Channel brings history to life.

7. American History in Video has more than 5,000 free, digital, on-demand videos in its collection. The videos allow students to analyze historical events, look at events over time through commercial and governmental newsreels, archival footage, public affairs footage, and important documentaries. These videos will make students feel as if they were a part of history.

8. Watch Know is another educational video site. All videos are offered digitally for free. Watch Know brings together the best education videos online into one convenient-to-search, safe site. Students can interact and think critically about the videos by rating them and leaving comments. There are more than 2,500 history related videos on Watch Know.

There are many websites that let students interact with history. Whether they are playing a game or exploring a virtual world, these websites help students understand history in new ways.

Interacting with History:

9. Secret Builders Students ages 6-14 can live and play among fictional and historical characters in this virtual world. Students interact with characters such as Shakespeare, Galileo, Motzart, Oliver Twist, Plato, Van Gough, and Amelia Earhart. Students take quests, publish artwork and writings, play games, enter contests, and participate in a virtual economy and social life. Students are given all the tools needed to build out the virtual world with their own ideas, activities and actions. This virtual world has the added benefit of allowing students to interact with historical figures in ways that are meaningful to them.

10. Scholastic has an email sign up where teachers and students can receive fictional emails from historical figures. These emails are written as letters from children who live in the past. Get email letters from a young girl traveling on the Mayflower and a young Native American boy. This is a fantastic way to give your class a glimpse of history through the eyes of two school-age children.

11. Scholastic’s “Our America” takes students on a journey through American history from the Colonial period to World War II. Students learn about major events in the American story by reading journal entries from the people who lived them. Students can complete their own journal entries about what they have learned. Activities accompany each time period such as arts and crafts from that time period or designing a period home interior.

12. The Oregon Trail game is one of the memories I should have listed above. I remember playing Oregon Trail in small groups on our classroom computer in fifth grade. Through the game we learned about the hardships of being a wagon leader, how to build a team, and purchase supplies that would help us make the journey from Independence, Missouri to Oregon by way of the covered wagon circa 1848. This role playing game helps students connect to events of the past through play.

13. BBC Primary History has an extensive collection of activities, short readings, and a kids point of view on the Ancient Greeks, Romans, Vikings, Anglo Saxons, World War II, and Victorian Britain. Students can explore interactive timelines, stories, primary source images, and much more. Students gain a sense of what life was like during each time period.

14. Picturing the Thirties is a virtual web activity from the Smithsonian. This virtual museum exhibit teaches students about the 1930’s through eight exhibitions. Students will get an up close look at the Great Depression, the New Deal, the country, industry, labor, city, leisure, and the American people in the 1930’s. The virtual museum is full of primary sources such as photographs, newsreels, and artist memorabilia. Virtual video museum guides explain each exhibit to students.

15. The Secret in the Cellar is an interactive web comic that is based on an actual forensic case of a 17th century person that was recently discovered. Through graphics, photos, and activities, students begin to unravel a mystery of historical and scientific importance. Students learn how to analyze artifacts, and examine the skeleton to determine a cause of death. As students act as historians, they will gain a wealth of information about Colonial life in America.

16. Kids Past is a history website created for kids that covers topics including: prehistoric humans, the rise of civilization, Middle Eastern civilization, the Ancient Greeks, Romans, African civilizations, civilizations of India, civilizations of China, Byzantine empire, the Slavs, Islam, medieval Europe, Asia in the middle ages, ancient Americans, the Renaissance, the Reformation, exploration and expansion, Asia following the middle ages, the American Revolution, and the French Revolution. All reading on Kids Past is kid friendly and age appropriate. There are several history games based on the reading. Students can also find historical quotes and songs about history that they can listen to online.

17. Historical Tweets- Students can follow history on Twitter. With Historical Tweets, history’s most amazing men and women can be more fully understood 140 characters at a time. These historical tweets can act as motivation for students to learn more about historical events. 140 characters is just enough to leave your students wanting to learn more.

Static timelines are a thing of the past, today’s timelines are interactive, informative, and fun to explore.

Interactive Timelines:

18. Franklin’s Interactive Timeline is an engaging look into the life of Benjamin Franklin. Students can play, listen, watch, observe, and have fun learning about Benjamin Franklin’s legacy. Students can explore Franklin’s life through themes such as Franklin’s character, Franklin as printer, at home, doing good, and on the world stage. This site breaks Franklin’s life down into manageable pieces for students and provides a well rounded view of Franklin.

19. Capzles is an interactive timeline creator. Students can add photos, video, audio and text to their timeline. Themes, colors, backgrounds, and background music can be added to the timeline making it unique and personalized. Capzles brings the timeline to life and allows students to add story to the dates.

20. Dipity makes it simple for your students to create and share interactive timelines. Students can embed YouTube videos, Twitter, RSS feeds, Blogger, Flickr, Picasa, Last FM, and more right into their timelines. Dipity makes timelines relevant and fun for students. Best of all, students are creating and viewing timelines in “their language” of Digital Native.

21. Time Tube is the perfect website for your YouTube addicted students. Students can type in a historical event and Time Tube will create a timeline of related videos. Students will be able to explore historical events through related videos.

Research papers leave much to be desired in the history classroom. There are ways for students to show what they know in history without the dreaded research report.

Creating with History:

22. Domonation is an animation website where students can create cartoon animations with characters, dialogue, props, music, and special effects. Instead of presenting knowledge about history through the traditional report, diorama, or poster, students can create a cartoon of an interview with a historical figure or an eye-witness account of a historical event.

23. Xtranormal is a site where students can create and direct their own animated movies. Students can recreate historical events, or create cartoons about a historical figure. Hold a historical movie day to showcase all of the animations that students have created.

24. The National Archives Experience: Digital Vaults is a site put together by the National Archives. Students can create their own digital content mashups using primary resources. Students are able to search photographs, documents, and other records collecting them to create a digital poster or movie. Students can also create a Pathway Challenge. In a challenge, students create a series of clues that show relationships between photographs, documents, and other records. Other students can attempt to solve these challenges. This is an incredible way for students to interact with history.

25. Creaza is a suite of web-based creativity tools. There are four tools in the Creaza toolbox that will help your students organize knowledge and tell stories in new creative ways. Students can arrange events in history with Mindomo the mind mapping tool. Using Cartoonist, students can create comic strips and digital narratives about historical events or characters. Movie Editor makes it possible for students to create movies with thematic universes, video, images, and sound clips. Movie Editor can import historical film clips, sound clips, and images to tell a story. Audio editor is the final tool in Creaza’s creative suite. Students can splice together their own newscasts or radio commercials that display their knowledge of any historical event.

26. Animoto for Education is a site where students can create compelling and impressive digital content quickly and easily. Teachers can use Animoto to teach complex concepts in history. Students can showcase their understanding of history through pictures, music, and text.

27. Blogging- Assign each of your students a historical character to play. They can research and learn about the time period, events, and people. Students can then blog as if they were the historical character. Other students can read and comment on the historical posts.

28. Museum Box is a website based on the work of Thomas Clarkson who collected items in a box to help him in his argument for the abolition of slavery. Students can use the Museum Box website to collect information and arguments in a virtual box of their own. They can collect items to provide a description or add to an argument of a historical event, place, or time period. Students can add images, text, sounds, videos, and external links to help them form their own virtual museum. The finished box can be shared with other students, saved, or printed. Students can view and comment on boxes created by other students. This is a fun medium for students to learn and collect information about a historical event, person, or time period.

History shouldn’t be dry, boring, or irrelevant to students. Technology makes it possible for students to interact with history in new and interesting ways. Use these resources to take your students beyond facts and help them to realize the stories that make up their past.

More Advent Calendars: Student created, creative, and imaginative!

December 2, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments21732 views

After my last post I found some new advent calendars that I just had to add to the list.

First is an advent calendar created by eighth graders at ASLS who’s teacher Mr. Akerson (@mra47) I follow on Twitter. What is so neat about this advent calendar, is it is made up of pictures of the students and teachers. Each day that you click on delivers a new devotion written by one of the eighth graders. I have NO idea how they created this site, each day all of the students pictures look a little different direction so that they are focused on the person on the date of the day (that is a total of 2200 pictures!!). Genius! They are making Weebly do things I am sure it wasn’t intended to do. The students at ASLS have a goal to get someone from every state in the US to view their advent calendar. I think we can help them out with that and do one better, let’s get them views from around the world! This student created calendar is not to be missed! This calendar is a fun one to use with your students, but why not blog lift their idea and create a similar calendar with your students? Since we are already into December maybe yours is a 12 days of Christmas calendar or a unique lead up to your schools winter break. Students could create a “word a day” calendar, math problem of the day, featured student art, story of the day, poem of the day, fact of the day…the possibilities are endless on this one. Ask your students, they will have great ideas!

The second calendar is one that is sure to spark your students imagination and creativity. Send Felicity is a beautiful idea and way to celebrate all things imaginative. Every day Felicity From Thin Air will surprise your students with fun activity ideas that are illustrated by some of the best children’s book illustrators in the world. The idea behind the Send Felicity and the illustrations are enchanting. Currently ideas are being shared on the Send Felicity website. There is an accompanying application for the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad that is soon to be released. This complimentary (read free) application will guide students in creativity and imagination. Eight arts and crafts ideas will be interspersed throughout for students to complete with their families or at school. All creations can be submitted to the Send Felicity gallery. Felicity from Thin Air is meant to be a new way of learning and engagement for the mind. It is about creativity, collaboration, and sharing with a global audience. In addition to the daily activities, there are magic surprises. I don’t know what the magic is but I am assured I will know it when I see it 🙂 Get your students families engaged in some fun holiday spirit. Instead of homework for the month of December, why not give your students (and parents) the homework of following Felicity from Thin Air and engaging in creativity as a family. I guarantee that the positive effects will be much more lasting than any worksheet you could send home. Today’s Felicity from Thin Air activity is Fancy Dress for Dinner. Pick any theme and invite the whole family to show up for dinner dressed for the occasion. Costumes can be as silly or creative as you like! Following Felicity at school? Adapt the idea for a Fancy Lunch or Fancy Math class and have your students create impromptu costumes out of classroom items. Don’t have time for the cut/paste? Have your students draw their costume. The goal is to let kids be creative and imaginative!

Librarian extraordinaire Shannon Miller of VanMeter shared the Polar Express advent calendar with me. This calendar includes the beautiful Polar express illustrations and combines it with fun activities and give away opportunities. Enter a chance to win the giveaways for your class (for example yesterday was a chance to win the Polar Express bell from Santa’s sleigh) and complete the activities together. Each day is a new surprise!

How to integrate Interactive Advent Calendars into the classroom: The season of Advent is always filled with eagerness and expectancy. Build some of that anticipation into your school day by allowing students to unlock a new secret on the advent calendar each day. Use these advent calendars with the whole class on an interactive whiteboard or projector, or set them up as a quick center activity that students can visit. Use the advent calendars that reveal a story to practice looking for foreshadowing clues, using context clues to guess what will happen next, or as story starters for students own stories.

Tips: Each of these advent calendars has some fun goodies and hidden surprises, find the one that best fits your classroom needs.

Thank you to all of you who have spread the word to fellow teachers about my Web 2.0 advent calendar, I am glad you are enjoying it!

14 Online Interactive Advent Calendars

November 30, 2010November 30, 2010Kelly Tenkely11 Comments18634 views

It is December again, which means the beginning of Advent. Advent calendars are a fun way to reveal information and “surprises” for your students to look forward to each day in December leading up to Christmas. This year I thought I would make an advent calendar of my own using Wix. I created a Web 2.0 advent calendar by choosing 25 of my favorite web 2.0 tools for the classroom. Each day you can check out a new one. (I’ll let you in on a secret, you can cheat and look at them all by clicking on the bird to get back to the calendar page…shh don’t tell anyone!) You and your students can create your own custom advent calendar like I did using Wix. Students can create an advent calendar of pictures of their school work, trivia for their parents, special audio notes, or anything they are learning. To create your own Wix advent calendar, choose a template, add shapes to the template to create your calendar pieces, add 25 pages to the site, add links to those pages. You could also create an advent calendar of your own using Glogster. Create a customized advent calendar for your students with fun surprises, quotes, video clips, sound bites, etc. It can be related to the learning they are doing in your classroom, suggestions of books to read, or reveal special rewards like extra computer time, time playing a favorite game, time for reading, etc. Be creative!

Woodlands Jr has a great online advent calendar every year that tests students knowledge about Christmas around the world. The Woodlands Jr. 2010 advent calendar is now up and ready for viewing! This is a fun way for students to test their knowledge and learn about the ways that Christmas is celebrated all around the world. As an extension, plot the places around the world that they are learning about on a world map.

BBC Radio has a fabulous Bach advent calendar. Each day your students can listen to a story about Bach or music.

The National Museum of Liverpool has an advent calendar that reveals a piece of art from the museum each day.

The Dirt Dirt advent calendar is purely fun, each day click on a number and an animation will be added to the tree.

For those of us who are app inclined, you can download a free app for your iDevice every day from Appvent Calendar.

Below you will find my interactive advent calendar finds from last year. You are bound to find one that is a perfect fit for your class!

What it is: It is December! This means the beginning of Advent along with the anticipation and excitement that it brings. The Internet is full of interactive advent calendars that you can use in your classroom to teach about how the Christmas season is celebrated all around the world. These advent calendars reveal fun facts, interactive activities, and stories.

Santa’s House Advent Calendar– This advent calendar tells a fun story. Each day reveals another secret about what goes on inside Santa’s home on the 24 days leading up to Christmas. In each picture, there is a little mouse hiding. When students click on his ears, he jumps out.

Christmas Around the World Advent Calendar– Each day students click on the date to reveal a fun fact about how countries around the world celebrate Christmas. The facts are accompanied by great illustrations and pictures. This site shows up very small inside my Internet browser (Firefox). To remedy this problem, click on “view” in your menu bar and choose “zoom”. You may need to zoom in several times.

Christmas Mice Advent Calendar– This calendar tells the story about a mouse family who celebrates Christmas. Each day a little more of the story is revealed. Each picture includes some animation.

Santa’s Advent Calendar– On this advent calendar, each day reveals a new song or activity for students to complete. There are some fun Christmas themed mysteries to solve, stories to read, and activities to work through.

French Carols Advent Calendar– This is a French advent calendar. Each day contains a new French Christmas carol sung by children. This advent calendar would be a fun one to include in a study of Christmas around the world.

Christmas Around the World Advent Calendar Quiz– This advent calendar tests students knowledge about how other cultures celebrate Christmas. Each day students are asked a question and given hints to help them answer. When the answer is revealed, students can click on links to learn more about the Christmas celebrations in that country. This site also includes great activities and teaching resources for Christmas.

Christmas Advent Calendar– Follow the adventures of Zac the elf as he tries to find a Christmas present for Santa. Each day a little more of the story is revealed.

Christmas Activity Advent Calendar– This advent calendar has fun little games and activities to play each day. The games and activities are quick and easy to complete, building mouse and keyboard skills. This advent calendar would be a good one for the classroom computers as a center activity.

Tips: Each of these advent calendars has some fun goodies and hidden surprises, find the one that best fits your classroom needs.

Leave a comment and share how you are using Interactive Advent Calendars in your classroom.

The Street: World Music

November 29, 2010Kelly Tenkely4 Comments2835 views

What it is: I am currently working on a fun project for Starrmatica tagging and organizing websites and resources. One of the resources that was new to me is The Street: World Music. This is a neat interactive learning journey from BBC radio where students can learn about other countries and cultures through music. The Street features five families from five different countries including India, Ireland, Brazil, Turkey, and Nigeria. In each house students can learn more about the country, instruments, musicians, religion, and food from the country. Students have plenty of opportunities to listen to the music.

How to integrate The Street: World Music into your curriculum: Music is a neat way to introduce students to other cultures. It allows an inside look into the culture by sharing the sounds of the culture. What I like about The Street, is the way the music is introduced along side religion, food, and information about the country. This site gives students a wonderful overview of five countries where they can not only read about the differences, but they can see the differences (through photos) and hear the differences (through music). The Street is a great site to introduce into any classroom, music teachers will appreciate the look at the instruments and musicians of the country. As an extension activity, have your students create their own “house” for The Street. This can be done offline with paper and a collection of music, photos, and information. Alternatively use a website builder like Weebly or Wix or a Wiki to collect the information in an online space. Students can choose a country to learn more about or create a house for their own country, thinking about what is important to their culture. Want to extend the activity even more? Connect with teachers from different countries and have the students learn about different cultures together. Use Skype or Wetoku to connect the classes and play music from each culture. Create a wiki together to collect and share information learned.

Tips: If you are looking for teachers to collaborate with, use and search the #glolab hash tag to connect.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using The Street: World Music in your classroom!

Skype Classroom Directory- Global Collaboration #glolab

November 17, 2010Kelly Tenkely7 Comments2492 views

What it is: Skype is an incredible tool. It is a free download that allows you to video chat with anyone in the world (who also has Skype downloaded) for free. Teachers have been using Skype in the classroom for years now to connect to other classrooms, to connect with experts, and even to introduce their students to favorite authors (Skype an author). There is a new tool coming for education, a Skype classroom directory. This directory will connect teachers and help them to use Skype to enrich students’ educational experiences. The directory will be launching in December (English only) but you can pre-register for it now. Once you sign up with your Skype account, you will be able to search for other teachers and classes by searching by subject or region.

How to integrate Skype Classroom Directory into your curriculum: Skype Classroom Directory will be a leap forward in connecting teachers and classrooms around the world. Use Skype to connect your students to others around the world who are learning similar content, for a debate, for an inquiry unit, to teach and learn from each other, to connect with experts, for a global virtual book club, or just to bring some cultural richness into your classroom.

Tips: Yesterday the topic of the first #edchat (a chat on Twitter) was global collaboration. Skype is an excellent way to collaborate globally. The Skype directory will be an enormous help in connecting teachers on global projects, right now there isn’t a great way for teachers to connect purposefully for global projects. As it stands, you send out a tweet request for help and wait for someone to answer. Yesterday on #edchat I proposed that we come up with a Twitter hash tag to use when we are talking about global collaboration tools or opportunities. Anyone looking for someone to connect with can just search the hash tag #glolab. If you are looking for teachers to collaborate use and search the #glolab hash tag to connect.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Skype in your classroom!