Secondary Elementary – Page 58

Wizz-e Free e-Books

October 19, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment10897 views

What it is: Wizz-e is a kids interactive e-book website. Not all of the e-books are free, but they are SO high quality and definitely worth any investment. Wizz-e does have some free e-books for you to preview. Both Puss-in-Boots and the Elves and the Shoemaker are free to play online or download to your computer. The stories can be read to students who may struggle with reading on their own. Students can also choose to read the story independently without sound. At the end of each e-book is a quiz that checks for comprehension. Wizz-e also has a few games that students can play online including puzzles and hidden picture hide and seek.

How to integrate Wizz-e Free e-books into the classroom: The Wizz-e ebooks are a wonderful way to read a story as a class on a projector or interactive whiteboard. With the large print and pictures, every student in the class can read along and see the illustrations clearly. These ebooks also make for an excellent reading center on classroom computers. They are especially good for students who may struggle reading indpendently. Students can listen to the story and follow along or read a page independently and then click to hear the story for understanding. The e-books bring reading to life and will draw in your struggling readers. Wizz-e only features two free ebooks but would be a worthwhile investment for your classroom library. The site features a variety of topics and genres and has some amazing math and science stories that teach key concepts through story. If you teach 3-8year olds the two free stories are must downloads! The quiz at the end will ask students question at the book and help them to monitor their own comprehension. The quiz models the questions that good readers ask as they read.

Tips: Because the Wizz-e books can be purchased, there is an option to purchase a gift certificate for the e-books. This would be excellent to put on your wishlist for parents to donate to your classroom. The e-books add to your classroom library but have the added bonus of creating a listening center where struggling readers can read along.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Wizz-e Free e-books in your classroom.

Virtual Dinosaur Dig

October 16, 2009Kelly Tenkely4 Comments12143 views

What it is: The Smithsonian site is full of amazing activities and interactives. A few weeks ago I stumbled on their Virtual Dinosaur Dig interactive and immediately sent it on to our second grade teachers who are teaching a dinosaur unit. During the Virtual Dinosaur Dig, students act as paleontologists who find a virtual fossil, learn how vertebrate paleontologists excavate the specimen, learn about the anatomy of the specimen and where it lived, view an illustration of what the specimen may have looked like, transport the speciman to a museum, and reconstruct the speciman (a stegosaurus) at the museum. Each step of the interactive gives students information about the tools used to excavate, and why the tool is used. Students get to virtually use each tool to excavate, transport, and reconstruct the dinosaur.

How to integrate Virtual Dinosaur Dig into the classroom: This Virtual Dig makes students virtual paleontologists. The activity is perfect for a interactive whiteboard or projector. Choose a student team of paleontologists who will help with the excavation. Each student can use one of the tools and explain their portion of the excavation to the class. While these students are at the board demonstrating the excavation, students at their seats can fill in their official “Paleontologist Field Guide” to record the steps and tools used in the excavation (I created the field guide for our second grade teachers and will post the pdf version below). The Virtual Dinosaur Dig could also be used as a center activity for teams of paleontologists to visit on classroom computers or in a computer lab setting. Students can fill out their Field Guides as they work. After the virtual dig, set up a hands on dig. Students can “excavate” chocolate chips out of a chocolate chip cookie by carefully digging with toothpicks.

Tips: I created this Paleontologist Field Guide journal to accompany the Virtual Dig. Included in the pdf is an answer guide. Print these pages back to back to create a book that is folded down the center. dino dig field guide The field guide asks students to match the tool picture with its name and order the sequence of events during the excavation.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Virtual Dinosaur Dig in your classroom.

Take a Video Tour of Planet Earth

October 14, 2009Kelly Tenkely1 Comment2446 views

What it is: Take a Video Tour of Planet Earth with the combination of Discovery channel “Planet Earth” and Google Earth. Witness animal behaviors, dive into the deepest cave on the planet, and come eye to eye with a 30-ton humpback whale in this interactive tour. Explore the earth through Discovery channel’s Planet Earth series embedded in Google Earth. Just zoom into a location in the Planet Earth tour and view video clips from the popular 11 part series. The tour is free to download and plays directly in Google Earth.

How to integrate Video Tour of Planet Earth into the classroom: Geography lessons come to life in Google Earth. The Video Tour of Planet Earth infuses even more life into your classroom with an up-close look at the incredible animals and vegetation around the world. This tour is an excellent resource for teaching students about habitats, ecosystems, geography, animals, animal kingdoms, and more. Your students will be able to virtually ‘fly’ to locations all over the world and get a real life look at each stop. This is an outstanding resource to view on the big screen with a projector or an interactive whiteboard. Allow your students to take turns acting as tour guide at each stop. Students can preview the video, do some additional research and present their findings as the class visits their stop along the tour. Set up the tour on classroom computers for a fun geography or science center. Use a stop on the video tour as a writing prompt for journaling.

Tips: Google Earth is a free download, if you don’t already have it, this is a MUST have for every classroom.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Take a Video Tour of Planet Earth in your classroom.

Big Universe

October 14, 2009October 14, 2009Kelly Tenkely2 Comments3768 views

What it is: Big Universe lets you read, create, and share children’s books online. Read hundreds of children’s picture books right from your web browser. It’s like having a huge library of big books for your whole class to read and enjoy. Publishers that contribute picture books to Big Universe include: Charlesbridge, SeaSquirt, Lobster Press, Saddleback, Matthew Price, ISSA Step by Step, Andersen, Dawn Publications, Tanglewood Press, ee, Teacher Created Materials, Illuminations Arts, Weekly Reader, and Elora Media. Big Universe has both fiction and nonfiction picture books to read with your students. Books are easy to search by category, grade, reading level, interest age, and language. Students can create their own ebooks on Big Universe or share books on a virtual bookshelf. The catch: the free version of Big Universe offers a limited look at the premium publisher books (you can read through half the book before being prompted to upgrade or close the book). You can read any of the user created books for free. With the free version you can only create one ebook per user account. Students can create bookshelves and share an unlimited number of books, recommend books to others, and add friends. The accounts on Big Universe are reasonably priced (especially considering how much it would increase your classroom library).

How to integrate Big Universe into the classroom: Big Universe is an awesome way to expand your classroom library and share quality picture books and stories with your students. The big books on Big Universe are ideal for use with an interactive whiteboard or projector. Students can read along and see the rich detail in the illustrations. Big Universe also makes for an excellent reading center on the classroom computers. Allow students to create their own book on Big Universe to add to the library. They will be published authors! Students can share the books they are reading on Big Universe on their own virtual bookshelf. They can swap book recommendations with friends and share stories they create.

Tips: If it is possible for your school to purchase a school license of Big Universe, students would have access to an extensive library of books at school or home. This is a fantastic way to get hundreds of books into the hands of your students. Because they can be accessed from any Internet connected computer, students can enjoy the books and stories from nearly anywhere.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Big Universe in your classroom.

Faux Paw and the Dangerous Download

October 12, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment5616 views

What it is: I love iKeep Safe and have blogged about it in the past as an excellent introduction and support for Internet Safety. I learned today about a new Faux Paw book and video called “Faux Paw and the Dangerous Download”. In Faux Paw the Techno Cat’s new adventure, she learns that downloading is a great way to get information, but only when it is done the right way. Faux Paw uses a risky new file sharing program to download a song and learns a lesson the hard way. The video is extremely relevant to the online world that our kids live in and teaches a valuable lesson about illegal file sharing. You can download the pdf version of the book or watch the video (created specifically for iPods but can be viewed with a Quick Time player as well).

How to integrate Faux Paw and the Dangerous Download into the classroom: This is a well made video, book, and story to share with elementary students. The cartoon is easy to understand and will help younger students grasp the difficult concept of illegal downloading and the problems it can cause. Often students can’t discern between safe and non-safe websites and why getting something for “free” isn’t always a good idea. Use this video as part of your Internet safety unit, as an introduction to copyright, or as part of your character education program.

Tips: The Faux Paw series is worth owning. You can purchase books and DVDs for your library. Students will love being able to check out these books to read again and again.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Faux Paw and the Dangerous Download in your classroom.

eduperience

October 11, 2009October 12, 2009Kelly Tenkely1 Comment2162 views

What it is: eduperience is an easy blogging tool for students and teachers based on the WordPress platform. “Start a blog in seconds with unlimited storage, bandwidth, premium themes and plugins. It is too easy to publish Your academic calendar, newsletter, video, podcast, and photo.” You can choose to use an eduperience sub domain or your own domain hosting. Automated weekly and monthly backup of your blogs ensures safety. You can choose to earn up to 90% revenue on advertisements shown on your blog. eduperience is a great blogging platform for both students and teachers.

How to integrate eduperience into the classroom: eduperience is an easy way for you to get a classroom blog up and running. Use a classroom blog to post current assignments, class discussions, calendars, links to other websites relevant to classroom learning, and notes to your students. Students can use blogs as writing journals, an online portfolio of written work, or to collaborate with other students. Students tend to write more and with higher quality in an online environment. This is due in part to a greater sense of audience. Students know that teachers, students, and parents may be reading their writing. Blogs are also a great addition to the science classroom where students can reflect on experiments and labs.

Tips: eduperience offers outstanding 24/7 support. This makes it simple to get started with blogging, even if you haven never done it before!

Related Resources: think.com, Live Binders, edWeb 2.0, Weebly, Word Press, Blogger,

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using eduperience in your classroom.

DomoNation

October 11, 2009Kelly Tenkely2 Comments4410 views

What it is: DomoNation is a free animation website that is powered by Go! Animate. The site is very intuitive to use and makes impressive cartoon animations. Students can create animations with backdrops, characters, dialogue, props, music, and special effects. Students can create on scene or several to make up their animation. The interface is very simple to learn, the drag and drop platform will be familiar to students. To make their cartoon come to life, each character has a set of actions and emotions that can be added by clicking on the character and choosing from a drop down menu. Special effects, such as weather occurrences or zooming, are simple to add to the project. Animations can be saved for personal or public view on the DomoNation site. This is an impressive little web application that makes students the director of their very own movie.

How to integrate DomoNation into the classroom: Allow students to present their knowledge creatively using DomoNation 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. DomoNation would be a great platform for creating public service announcements (how about the importance of hand washing with the H1N1 outbreak?) or short video commercials that persuade in a debate. Students can write a screen play and then transform it into an animation. 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 DomoNation premier party day in your classroom so that students can watch each other’s finished animations and learn from their peers.

Tips: Direct your students to the Create page of DomoNation, some of the content created by other users may not be appropriate for your school.

Related Resources: Kerpoof, Shidonni, XtraNormal, DoInk

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using DomoNation in your classroom.

Reading Logs

October 11, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment2606 views

What it is: Reading Logs is a free website that makes reading, spelling, and vocabulary simplified. Reading Logs is a great way to organize student reading, spelling, and vocabulary practice. Learning material can be uploaded by teachers to be accessed by students online. Once the material is online, students can use the electronic reading log, vocabulary card creator, and and use the listen and spell practice system. Teachers can upload reading lists and reading goals for their class. These can be weekly or monthly goals and can be set up to track the number of minutes or the number of books read. Online competitions can be setup by the teacher (example: first student to read a certain number of minutes). Teachers can quickly post a vocabulary list where students can look up words with the online dictionary and add definitions to the cards. The cards can be studied online or downloaded as a pdf to print out. With the listen and spell system, teachers can upload spelling lists for students to practice. Students click on a button to listen to the spelling word and practice spelling it. They receive immediate feedback from the program. Reading Logs tracks students reading logs and updates teachers with progress.

How to integrate Reading Logs into the classroom: The Reading Logs website is a great place to organize your classroom. It eliminates the need for paper spelling lists, vocabulary cards, and reading logs. Parents and students will appreciate the one stop shop for these common weekly tasks. I am not normally a fan of reading logs, I think they can stress students out about reading unnecessarily (readicide!), but this online reading log works more as a motivator and goal setter for reading. I like that the focus is not on the number of pages read but on what books that a student is reading. This could encourage great conversation about reading between students who are reading similar books, or between the teacher and student. The focus is on encouraging the love of reading and not on the task of reading. The spelling practice center is great for vocabulary development, pronunciation, and self guided learning of spelling words. The vocabulary card creator allows students to easily create vocabulary cards, look up words in the online dictionary, and practice the words. I like this site for student and home connections and for the self guided learning and pacing. The spelling portion of this site could be great for English language learners because they will hear the pronunciation of words and can look up the definitions within the program.

Tips: When you register for this free website, you will get some great printouts explaining the site to parents and students.

Related Resources: Spelling City, Shelfari, Book Adventure

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Reading Logs in your classroom.

Picturing the Thirties

October 11, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment2946 views

What it is: Picturing the Thirties is another great virtual web activity from the Smithsonian. This virtual museum exhibit teaches students about the 1930’s through eight exhibitions. Students will learn about the Great Depression, The New Deal, The Country, Industry, Labor, The City, Leisure, and American People in the 1930’s. Art from the Smithsonian American Art Museum are supplemented with other primary sources such as photographs, newsreels, and artist memorabilia. Students can explore the virtual exhibits complete with museum guides that explain each exhibit to students. The feature presentation of the museum is a series of interviews of abstract artists describing the 1930’s. User created documentaries can be viewed from the theater’s balcony. Students can visit the theater’s projection booth where they can find primary access and a movie making tutorial.

How to integrate Picturing the Thirties into the classroom: I am always amazed by the virtual content that the Smithsonian has produced. Picturing the Thirties is an incredible virtual field trip to museum exhibits that will put your students face to face with primary resources that will help them understand the events and culture of the 1930’s. This is SO much better than learning from a textbook! This interactive site is a great way for students to explore the 1930’s and learn at their own pace. This site is perfect for the computer lab environment where every student has access to a computer. You could also take a class virtual field trip to the museum using an interactive whiteboard or a projector.

Tips: Make sure that students have headphones or speakers for this website, there is quite a bit of audio content.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Picturing the Thirties in your classroom.

Math Apprentice

October 11, 2009Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment1807 views

What it is: Math Apprentice is an awesome flash site that shows kids how math is used in the real world, with real world jobs. Students can explore math through games that feature bicycle designers, biologists, artists, mechanics, inventors, doctors, engineers, astronomers, game designers, programmers, chefs, veterinarians, sportscasters, and meteorologists. Students can explore the math of these jobs as a math apprentice by selecting a character and cruising around a virtual world where they can visit places of business where math happens. The character describes how they use math and provides a fun interactive activity that gives students a chance to practice using the math.

How to integrate Math Apprentice into the classroom: Math Apprentice is a fantastic site that teaches students about how math is used in the real world. Students are often asking “where will I use this?” of math. This site answers those questions through a fun virtual world. Kids can explore first hand how math is used and then act as an apprentice and solve problems. Use this website in the computer lab where students can explore the virtual world individually and work through the math at their own pace.

Tips: To begin playing the Math Apprentice games, you have to click on “Explore the Math” button on the bottom of the homepage.

Leave a comment and tell us how you are using Math Apprentice in your classroom.