Tag: Art

Creative Park

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Creative Park2566 views

 

What it is: Creative Park is a great free creative resource library for teachers and students.  Creativity is such an important part of child development but also an important aspect of 21st century learning and thinking.  Creative Park offers teachers and students awesome resources for putting that creativity to use.  The website offers ideas and templates that can be coupled with your lesson plans.  Projects range from 3-D paper crafts (like airplanes, the Great Pyramids, a globe, dinosaurs, and the Leaning Tower of Piza, etc.)  There are great special collections including an Architecture museum, circus land, and science museum.  Creative Park also features calendars, art crafts, a digital photo gallery, and scrapbook area.

How to integrate Creative Park into the classroom:  Lets face it, teachers don’t have the largest budgets in the world to buy manipulatives and learning displays.  Creative Park can help ease some of this burden by giving you free high quality paper crafts that your students can assemble.  I love that this taps into following directions and creativity for students.  Students can use these materials to make class dioramas or displays.  This is also a great stop for those indoor recess days.  Keep your kids busy creating when they have to be cooped up inside.  Use the scrapbook pages to create custom class memory books.  Each student can create their own as a keepsake for the end of the year (my students LOVE their memory books each year).  The greeting section is wonderful for elementary teachers who are in charge of covering every holiday and making sure that mom and dad get a card from their child.  Many of the materials available on this site would be perfect for bulletin boards.  The creative activities would also liven up classroom parties.  This is a fun site to sit and explore!


Tips:  Stock your printer up with paper and ink for these projects.  

 

Leave a comment and share how you are using Creative Park for your classroom.   

 

Lite-Brite

Kelly Tenkely4 Comments on Lite-Brite3974 views

 

What it is: Some websites just make you smile. Lite-Brite is one of those sites for me, I am a child of the 80’s so the Lite-Brite holds a special place in my heart! The site is exactly what you would expect, an online version of Lite-Brite. No fancy moving flash animations, sound effects, etc. Just 9 different color pegs to choose from and a Lite-Brite board.

 

How to integrate Lite-Brite into the classroom: Lite Brite may not appear to have much educational value upon first inspection, but being that I love Lite-Brite, I knew there had to be a way to use it in the classroom. In the primary and secondary classroom, the Lite-Brite would be a great place for students to practice “writing” their spelling words using the colored pegs. Any time you can give students a new medium for practicing spelling words or math facts, it is a good thing. Write out math problems using the Lite-Brite and students can take turns solving the facts. Create a class picture using an interactive whiteboard. Keep points on the Lite-Brite when playing a class game. I think even older kids could appreciate the Lite-Brite from an art perspective. It just gives one more medium for students to express themselves. I have yet to find a kid who uses the Lite-Brite site and doesn’t leave with a smile 🙂 Kindergarten students can practice “writing” the alphabet by forming letters with the colored pegs.


Tips: The Lite-Brite site doesn’t have a save option so make sure that for the true creations, you have a printer hooked up to memorialize them.


Please leave a comment and share how you are using Lite Brite in your classroom.

Free Pinhole Camera

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Free Pinhole Camera3141 views

What it is: CreativeTechs Tips did a post yesterday about some free pinhole camera templates. Corbis is offering free PDF templates for real working 35mm pinhole cameras. These cameras are perfect for the sunny days ahead! There are six great artistic templates to choose from for an almost one of a kind camera.

How to integrate Free Pinhole Camera into the classroom: Teach your students about science, photography, and art in one shot by having them print out and create their own pinhole camera. Pinhole cameras work wonderfully on a bright sunny day…perfect as you head into summer. This is a great science project that your students will love…how many kids can say that they made their own camera?!

Tips: After the students have created their camera use them to teach the basics of photography and hold a mini photo contest in your classroom.

Leave a comment and share how your Free Pinhole Camera worked out!

Picturing America

Kelly Tenkely1 Comment on Picturing America3173 views

What it is: 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 American art masterpieces into classrooms and libraries. The idea behind Picturing America is that bringing our nation’s artistic heritage into the classroom gives students unique insights into the character, ideals, and aspirations of our country. The Picturing America program is completely free for schools and libraries and provides them with 40 high-quality masterpieces, a teacher resources book, and the program website.

How to integrate Picturing America into your curriculum: What better way to teach your students American history than actually bringing history into the classroom and providing students with real ties to the past? I wish that I had the opportunity to learn history this way! Picturing America is going to bring authentic conversation into your classroom about American history. It would be the perfect use of web 2.0 collaborative tools where students can discuss the history and the art in Picturing America. Picturing America masterpieces would also be easily integrated into the art classroom or in literacy as writing inspiration. The teacher resource book is going to provide you with wonderful tie ins to your current curriculum. This is an amazing program, I encourage you to take part in it!

Tips: Apply for the Picturing America program today.

A big thank you to my friend Jill who shared this site with me!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Picturing America in your classroom.


Mighty Book

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Mighty Book1652 views

What it is: Mighty Book is a fun, interactive website that makes reading exciting with animated talking books…animated story songs…animated jokes, games, puzzles and riddles. All with words that highlight in sync with the stories and songs. It’s so much fun, students don’t even know they’re learning to read. The site is very engaging for students. The link I have provided is for the Mighty Books home page. These are free interactive books and games. However, this is only a small portion of what Mighty Books has to offer.  For $24.95 a year your class can have full access to the membership portion of the site and for $99 a year your school can have full access to the membership portion of the site which allows access to hundreds of animated books, 5 new books are added each month.

How to integrate Mighty Books into the classroom: Mighty Books can be used for whole class instruction or individual instruction. Use the animated talking books during reading instruction. These books would be great for recall and story ordering activities. For whole class instruction, use a projector (speakers are a must on this site!). Struggling readers would also love the “read along” aspect of this site. If you are an art teacher, or study art in the classroom, be sure to visit the interactive museum together. It is organized wonderfully and includes kid-friendly information about the artist and the genre.

Tips: Make sure to visit the teachers page for some great integration ideas as well as some free printouts!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Mighty Book in your classroom.

Interactives

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Interactives2233 views

What it is: Interactives is a truly amazing website for teachers and students. Interactives provides educators and students with strategies, content, and activities that can enhance and improve students’ skills in a variety of curricular areas including math, literature and language, science, history, and the arts. The site has great webquest/interactive activities on a variety of subjects for first through twelfth grades. These activities are extremely well done. The spelling bee activity is really the only activity appropriate for first grade but I found that many of the activities that were rated for middle and high school students, would be appropriate for elementary students as well. I cannot say enough about this site, it is a truly amazing site for teachers and students!

How to integrate Interactives into the classroom: Interactives has a variety of interactive activities for the subjects listed above. These would be great to use as an introduction to a new unit, or as a learning activity or field trip in a unit. The Interactives could be completed as a whole class (using a projector), in groups (center style in the one or two computer classroom), or individually (in the computer lab setting). Any of these options would be time well spent for your students! Each Interactive presents the student with information about the unit and follows with interactive activities such as building a roller coaster, collecting rocks, or tracing the growth of the United States.

Tips: Sign up for the learner.org newsletter for some great teaching tips and ideas.

Cavantastic

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Cavantastic2382 views

 

 

What it is: Canvastic is a great student focused graphics and text publishing tool for kindergarten through eighth grade. It has easy to use tools and options. You won’t find any of the “toy” features that you find in Kid Pix type applications. The control given to teachers is wonderful. Teachers can give students access to tools gradually so that as they learn more, they can use more. It actually grows with the user. It has the best spell checking feature for students I have seen. You can try Canvastic for free in your classroom for as long as you like but the print, export, and save features are disabled. For $39 you can purchase Canvastic.

How to integrate Canvastic into your classroom: Use Canvastic as part of your publishing center. Students can publish written stories complete with illustrations. Students can create their own graphic organizers on any subject using the Canvastic software.

Tips: Join the Canvastic community to contribute ideas for improvement of the software, how you are using it in your classroom, and to foster an atmosphere of communication and exchange. In the Community you will find example lesson plans that are tied to state and national standards.

 

 

 

Doodle Bops

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Doodle Bops2422 views

 

 

What it is: The Doodle Bops website is fun learning for pre-kindergarten through first grade students. Students can write a letter, play virtual hide and go seek, paint pictures, play games that encourage following oral directions, virtual dot to dots for counting practice, and other games to help build computer mouse skills.

How to integrate Doodle Bops into your classroom: Allow kids to interact with the Doodle Bops site during center time. The site is easy to navigate and very kid friendly. Use the site to build computer skills before introducing more complex sites.

Tips: Visit the Printables page at the bottom of the site for coloring sheets that coordinate with the Website. These would be nice to have on hand for indoor recess days.

 

 

The Little Animals Activity Centre

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on The Little Animals Activity Centre3723 views

 

 

What it is: The Little Animals Activity Centre has several activities for kindergarten through second grade including read along stories, math practice, and music games. The read along stories are wonderful for following auditory directions.

How to integrate The Little Animals Activity Centre into your curriculum: Use The Little Animals Activity Centre to reinforce classroom learning. It offers read along interactive stories that invite students to follow auditory directions. The math section is great addition, and subtraction practice. Students can have fun with words and practice end sounds, first sounds, and rhymes. These are great little games and activities for practice. This site is also wonderful for teaching students how to use and manipulate the computer mouse.

Tips: Click on the teachers page for activity overviews, lesson plans, and printable worksheets.

 

 

Tux Paint

Kelly Tenkely1 Comment on Tux Paint7131 views

 

What it is: Tux Paint (http://www.tuxpaint.org) offers open source software aka FREE. Tux Paint is a painting and creativity program similar to Kid Pix. tuxpaint.org offers the free download for both Macintosh and Windows computers. Tux Paint is easy to use, includes fun sound effects, and a cartoon mascot who guides students as they use the program. Students use a variety of drawing tools to create masterpieces.

How to integrate Tux Paint into your curriculum: Use Tux Paint as part of your publishing center. Students can illustrate their writing pieces using Tux Paint. Tux Paint can be used to enhance your literacy program. For example, I use Tux Paint when I am introducing kids to the Caldecott award. Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus by Mo Willems is a Caldecott Award winning book. The Pigeon is created with very simple shapes and can be easily recreated with the tools in Tux Paint. As part of this unit, I let kids create their own Pigeons. They look so close to Mo Willems Pigeon that the students feel like successful, award winning artists. This program is flexible enough to use in math (think patterns, money units, etc.), science, and history.

Tips: Make sure you have printing abilities. The students will be proud of their work and want to print it out! Be sure to download the stamp set. This is a free download but offers hundreds of stamps (including money) that enhance this already great program. Visit the school page to find out how other schools have used Tux Paint to enhance their curriculum.

Allow students to save their masterpieces and upload them to Artsonia (see archive).