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Comics Workshop for Teachers - Marek Bennett
Grades
K to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): comics and cartoons (65), digital storytelling (155), stories and storytelling (32)
In the Classroom
Be sure to check out Teachers First's Comics Resources for many other ideas and tools for using comics in the classroom. Comics are great for telling the "story" of any curriculum concept, such as insect life cycles or biographies. They are also very creative for using with languages, ESL/ELL, gifted, and learning resource students for writing.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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VideoJug: School Subjects - VideoJug Corporation Limited
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): experiments (69), poetry (219), punctuation (43), video (278)
In the Classroom
Search the site for videos to use on your interactive whiteboard (or projector) with students. Share direct links to specific videos on your classroom website or blog for students to view at home. Think about using Grokit/Answers reviewed here, to put questions with the videos viewed at home. Challenge cooperative learning groups to create videos on any topic using the videos as examples. Share the videos created on a site such as TeacherTube reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Animal Tribe - Ariadne Green
Grades
K to 6This site includes advertising.
tag(s): animal homes (61), animals (322), endangered species (41), native americans (78), social skills (21)
In the Classroom
Find lesson plans under the Parents and Teachers link along the top. Find a link to the Totem Pole lesson plan to create a totem pole and understand the significance in your classroom. With Common Core State Standards, there is a push for nonfiction reading and writing. Use this site to focus on nonfiction. Make it a learning station where students look at the photos, reading the captions and articles about the various aspects of animal life. Students could have a special notebook where they summarize or write an opinion about what they learned from "Animal Tribes" that day. Young children could use the information to make a picture book of their own, summarizing what they read (or heard read to them). Include this site during a unit on Native Americans as you learn about their tales and beliefs about animals.Language arts and ESL/ELL teachers could have students write their own description of the pictures and then compare their captions to those on the site. Students could also write a fictional story about what is happening in one of the pictures. The site also mentions endangered animals. Students could research their favorite animal to see if it is endangered or threatened. Why not make it more interactive and have students create an online, interactive poster using a program like Adobe Spark, reviewed here,
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iPiccy - iPiccy.com
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): images (278), photography (157)
In the Classroom
Use this tool anytime that photos need to be edited for use on class blogs, wikis, or sites. Encourage students to use on images for projects or presentations. Use the editor to edit pictures to fit styles of pictures when doing historical reports or to set a mood. Use caption bubbles for the photos themselves to tell the stories. Have students annotate or label Creative Commons online images of cells, structures of an animal, and much more, sharing the results (with an image credit) on your class wiki.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Visit global landmarks with photo tours in Google Maps - Google
Grades
1 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): earth (224), map skills (84), maps (298), natural resources (58), virtual field trips (55)
In the Classroom
Use photo tours in Google to expand your classroom into the world. The easy tutorial flies you off immediately into the world without budget, permission slips, or travel. Social studies and history come alive in the actual settings. Examine the real look at world cultures. Bring into a world language class for a field trip. In language arts, explore settings from around the world and see how they influence the story. Look at folktales from around the world with their settings. Current events come alive and meaningful through your visit. In language arts classes or math classes, plan an imaginary trip to a different place. Google photo tours make it concrete and allow you to experience the world. Transport your students to another place, and see if they can play Where in the World. In art classes, study architecture or nature to influence art pieces. Science classes can explore landscapes, earth surfaces, natural resources, mapping skills, and habitats. Now your classroom has no walls.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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DearReader - Suzanne Beecher
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): independent reading (129), literature (272)
In the Classroom
Sign up for DearReader and receive daily emails with book excerpts. Share the excerpts with your class as a way to hook some into reading or to offer book suggestions. Use the emails as an example of a service that students may want to try; have students choose an interesting excerpt from a book they are reading and share with others via email or your classroom blog or website. Consider having students create "talking pictures" to read their excerpt using Fotobabble reviewed here. Use excerpts as a discussion starter in literacy circles or writers workshops.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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WhatWasThere - Enlighten Ventures, LLC
Grades
K to 12tag(s): communities (37), images (278), local history (15), maps (298), photography (157)
In the Classroom
Use this tool to explore the changes in your local area or elsewhere. Compare medicine, education, nutrition, and more from each of the time periods. Create a campaign to showcase your local area today by cataloguing various neighborhoods with your classes. Write stories about life in each of the historical periods. Research headline news of those days, political figures, and major achievements. In elementary grades, show how towns and cities change over time by projecting the photos and maps as part of your Communities unit. In very early grades, introduce the very idea of history by showing "what was there" at familiar local sites. Have students write stories about what happened there "once upon a time."Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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What2Learn - The Pearson Publishing Group
Grades
3 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): grammar (212), operations (123), resources (107)
In the Classroom
Find an activity that reinforces the concepts in your curriculum. Show your students how simple it is to play by using your interactive whiteboard for demonstration. Have students try out the site on your interactive whiteboard. Post a link to the specific games you want students to play on your classroom computers, wiki or class website. If students play the games in your classroom, have headphones ready.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Grockit Answers - Farbood Nivi
Grades
4 to 12Note that the general public can write and answer PUBLIC Q/A sessions, so preview for appropriateness before sharing with others. If you create a private Q/A you can avoid this problem.
tag(s): video (278)
In the Classroom
Begin by searching for pre-existing public videos that already have questions. Preview and share these with students as you begin a unit or for review. Create your own videos for students to use for review or have students generate questions for a video you choose. Assign videos for students to view at home, in the computer lab, or on laptops. You can even have students post their questions and responses within the video. Learning Support teachers could have students write questions and test each other using videos to reinforce topics they are studying without using loads of reading material.Edge Features:
Parent permission advised before posting student work created using this tool
Includes Interaction w general public/ public galleries with unmoderated content
Includes social features, such as "friends," comments, ratings by others
Requires registration/log-in (WITH email)
Products can be embedded
Products can be shared by URL
Multiple users can collaborate on the same project
Includes teacher tools for registering and/or monitoring students
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pageOrama - pageOrama.com
Grades
3 to 12tag(s): multimedia (62)
In the Classroom
Use this site for students to post simple projects such as stories, poems, and art projects. Collect a master list of links to student pages on your classroom website, wiki, or blog for easy access. If students are creating pages, be sure to check with your district's policy on student use of email as well as publishing of student work.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Refrigerator Poetry - apples4theteacher
Grades
K to 3tag(s): parts of speech (67), poetry (219), sight words (36)
In the Classroom
This site is terrific for use on interactive whiteboards. Challenge students to create entertaining sentences using as many different colored backgrounds as possible. Then ask them to identify the parts of speech. See how long it takes them to notice that all nouns are the same color! This is an excellent resource to share during Poetry Month. Why not make a poetry center on your interactive whiteboard for students to work with a partner? For create-your-own magnetic poetry at a higher level, try Triptico's free, downloadable software, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Tesla - Master of Lightning - PBS
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): electricity (92), energy (207), industrial revolution (26), inventors and inventions (92), motion (69), radio (25)
In the Classroom
Add intrigue and mystery, to your science unit on electricity, motion, or inventors as you study the life and accomplishments of Nikola Tesla. Excellent lesson plans include a concrete understanding of potential energy, mechanical energy to electrical energy. Use on an interactive white board to begin your unit or create a "Who Dunnit" with electricity or radio. Follow the structure of ideas presented to create an online "famous scientist" wiki, blog or PowerPoint to add to your class website. Use a Socratic seminar to debate which scientist should get credit for the induction motor, radio, and even the Industrial Revolution. Use the readings for older students, advanced readers, or gifted students, as they are far above the reading level of elementary and early middle school students. In language arts, writing topics could include "What a shock electricity is in my life" and "Will the true inventor of electricity please stand up?" The ideas and resources are electrifying!Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Word Dynamo - Dictionary.com, LLC
Grades
1 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): flash cards (46), vocabulary (321), vocabulary development (124)
In the Classroom
Use Word Dynamo to explore or study new words. Create lists of words to learn. Have students keep track of their progress by creating their own page. You may want to post the address for this program on your website or wiki, and bookmark it on the classroom computers. There is no need to sign up to simply play games.Comments
Be careful! The Greek and Latin root games on this site are fakes and do not offer the benefits that real root-learning does. Also, even the definitions of elementary level words contain many much harder words, meaning that students may get an inaccurately low reading.Ellisha, , Grades: 0 - 12
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Pagefin - Pagefin 2010
Grades
1 to 12tag(s): multimedia (62), portfolios (32)
In the Classroom
Use Pagefin at school for individual or group projects. Create webpages to use for anticipatory guides, polls, or even study guides. Allow students to build a content review page to demonstrate mastery. The ease of use allows even novice technology users, as well as younger students, to create their own webpage (parent permission strongly advised!). You or your students can create beautiful presentations with images, text, and links. Each website created has a private URL. Students can use this tool at home for presentations and email you the URL for their completed work. Compile the presentation URLs on your class blog or wiki so all students have access. Integrate all subjects into Pagefin. The simplicity of this site would make it an easy tool for younger students to create eportfolios with links to and explanations of their various projects located elsewhere on the web.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Rhymes.net - STANDS4 LLC
Grades
K to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): nursery rhymes (16), poetry (219), preK (288), rhymes (30)
In the Classroom
This would be a great site to share during your poetry unit as a resource for rhyming words. Create a list of student-generated rhyming words before using this site to discover words missed. Challenge students to use lesser-known words found through the site. Share with your school's music teacher to use when writing songs with students. Have students create rhyming word clouds using a tool such as Wordle (reviewed here), Tagxedo (reviewed here), or WordItOut (reviewed here). Hang printed word clouds on the classroom walls during poetry units so students see many choices or share them on a class wiki.Use the text of nursery rhymes to create class interactive books using Bookemon reviewed here, or make student-illustrated "big books" using PowerPoint to create and print. (Copyright is NOT an issue for this public domain text.)
In world language classes, share a translated nursery rhyme each day as a challenge for students to decipher and guess the "real" nursery classic
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Think - Cathy Sheafor
Grades
K to 8tag(s): creativity (118), critical thinking (120)
In the Classroom
Use this site to create a "think outside of the box" space in your classroom. Keep the area stocked with materials and activity sheets. Use the area as a place for students to go when they finish up work. Better yet, make design thinking part of your science curriculum by tying in some of these challenges with curriculum topics such as gravity, forces, materials, and more. Set one Friday a month aside as "think outside of the box" day, and use the activities from the site. Send home an activity as extra credit homework and create a museum of student's creations. Make this link available on your class web page for parents to access during school breaks or snow days.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Reading Rockets - WETA Washington D.C.
Grades
1 to 6This site includes advertising.
tag(s): authors (120), dyslexia (7), literacy (106), literature (272), parents (57), phonics (70), reading comprehension (124), reading lists (81), reading strategies (51), speech (89), spelling (168)
In the Classroom
Reading Rockets is a fantastic resource for teachers, librarians, parents, and principals. Be sure to sign up for the newsletter for the latest information, blogs, thoughts, and ideas for teaching reading. Use this website as a resource for your classroom, library, or even with you school action committees. Provide a link to this site on your class webpage. Install widgets for reading, and find the latest apps to support literacy. Join reading blogs, and add widgets to make your reading strategies complete. : If your district blocks YouTube, the videos may not be viewable. You could always view them at home and bring them to class "on a stick" to share. Use a tool such as Freemake Video Converter, reviewed here, to download the videos from YouTube.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Lalo.li - Franz Enzenhofer
Grades
K to 12tag(s): text to speech (18)
In the Classroom
This would be great for ESL/ELL learners; have them type a short sentence and listen to the playback to verify that the sentence is correct. It would also be a great practice for beginning readers. Use your interactive whiteboard and have the class tell a very brief story or say a sentence. After typing the sentence into the program, user a pointer for each word as the synthesizer reads it, or have students take turns pointing out the words. Share tonight's homework on your class web page as a link to an audio reminder simply by typing or pasting in the assignment and copying the link to place it on your web page.Comments
When I tried to use it with Safari on a new Mac in 10.7, it said I needed to use only Firefox or Chrome Too bad.Constance, RI, Grades: 0 - 12
Note from the editorial staff: thank you for your comment. We have added this information to the review.
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Interactive.I - interactive.illimitably.com
Grades
K to 12tag(s): drawing (78)
In the Classroom
You can avoid the public galleries entirely by creating the space for your students to use. It takes only seconds, and they can join directly by url. Have students collaborate on the creation of story webs or classroom presentations. Encourage visual prewriting for the students who "think in pictures." Allow students to use this site as their visual during speeches. Have young students use a whiteboard to draw out ideas before they can even write entire sentences. If you know an artist, cartoonist or illustrator, invite him/her to visit your classroom virtually to share his/her drawing process while you class uses the chat to ask questions.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Little Animation for Kids - Kids' Stories International
Grades
K to 2tag(s): audio books (28), conservation (128), earth day (105), environment (325), preK (288), recycling (60)
In the Classroom
Use the story section to model how to write a story. Have students create their own environmental stories and submit them to the website. Using an interactive whiteboard, have students play one of many games. Bookmark the site on your classroom computer, and use it as a center during language arts time. Be sure to click Guide for additional classroom activities.Comments
Magic Town is no longer available, as of 5 May 2013 when I looked. There is a new App called My Story World for ipad.Donna, IN, Grades: 0 - 8
Note from the editor: we checked this site on May 6, 2013 and it appears to be working fine. Thank you for your comment and we will keep our eyes on this site to make sure all is working properly.
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