TeachersFirst - Featured Sites: Week of Jun 26, 2022
Here are this week's features. Clicking the tags in the description area of each listing will present a list of other resources with this topic. | Click here to return to the Featured Sites Archive
Digital Citizenship: Technological Literacy - PBS Learning Media
Grades
K to 12tag(s): digital citizenship (89), internet safety (112), journalism (72), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Take advantage of the many videos and resources found on this site to include with your digital citizenship lessons. Engage students in learning about digital citizenship using playposit, reviewed here, to add notes, questions, and student-teacher interactions to any video. Enhance the learning experience by including these videos and your other resources into a digital lesson using Curipod, reviewed here. Extend learning by asking students to share their learning using different technology tools. For example, have some students create a podcast using Buzzsprout, reviewed here, while others create and share video presentations made with Animoto, reviewed here.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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OK2Ask: Social Media Literacy: Purposeful Practice in Every Classroom - TeachersFirst
Grades
1 to 12As educators, we...more
As educators, we can prepare every child to be influential by helping them understand how to leverage the power of social media. While students intuitively understand the mechanics of social media platforms, using them in a responsible, purposeful way to build influence is not instinctual and must be taught and practiced. Learn to develop your students' social media savvy by using practice spaces focused on digital citizenship, critical thinking, persuasion, and communication skills. Explore online and offline strategies and tools to create safe, authentic learning experiences for students in grades 2-12 in any content area. As a result of this session, teachers will: 1. Learn the importance of responsible social media use by students; 2. Understand the purpose of using social media practice spaces as part of regular instruction; and 3. Explore both paper-based and digital practice spaces that can be used with students. This session is appropriate for teachers at all technology levels.
tag(s): digital citizenship (89), professional development (405), social media (53), student-centered (4)
In the Classroom
The archive of this teacher-friendly, hands-on webinar will empower and inspire you to use learning technology in the classroom and for professional productivity. As appropriate, specific classroom examples and ideas have been shared. View the session with a few of your teaching colleagues to find and share new ideas. Find additional information and links to tools at the session resource page. Learn more about OK2Ask and upcoming sessions here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Teachers' Guide to Cranky Uncle - John Cook
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): DAT device agnostic tool (146), digital citizenship (89), evaluating sources (28), game based learning (186), internet safety (112), media literacy (109), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Add this game to your toolkit of lessons and activities when teaching Internet safety and media literacy skills. The Teachers' Guide already includes many ideas on integrating the game into classroom lessons and includes using technology to enhance and extend learning. Use these ideas as a starting point to build student engagement and help them understand the real-world applications for the information found in the game. For example, use the suggested Padlet, reviewed here, activity to compile quiz questions as suggested in Activity 5. After completing that activity, have students create their own videos, fake social media posts, or news articles that contain misinformation and create quiz questions for their peers to complete. Adobe Creative Cloud Express for Education, reviewed here, is an excellent tool for students to use when creating websites, flyers, and infographics. As a final project, and to extend learning, have students share what they learned with others by producing podcasts using Buzzsprout, reviewed here, or digital books for younger students using Book Creator, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Preparing Students for Difficult Conversations - FacingHistory.org
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): civil rights (200), journalism (72), media literacy (109), racism (79), social media (53)
In the Classroom
As an introduction to the lesson, one of the activities is to ask students to brainstorm a list of teens' news resources and a list of news resources used by parents or older people. Use Microsoft Whiteboard, reviewed here, or IdeaBoardz, reviewed here to create and analyze your lists. Use the whiteboard tools to create lists, Venn Diagrams, and add notes to extend student reflections on different news sources. Turn the Know-Heard-Learned Chart included in the lesson into an editable worksheet to use as a collaborative document to record student understanding of any events' timeline.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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News and Media Literacy Resource Center - Common Sense Media
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): bias (27), journalism (72), media literacy (109), news (228), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Bookmark this site to take advantage of the many curated resources for teaching media and news literacy. Use a curation tool like Padlet, reviewed here, to save and share favorite resources found on this site with students. Use the shelf option in Padlet to create columns and organize information by topic, type of content, or for use by different groups of students. Enhance instruction by asking students to become creators of information as they share their learning. Have students use Canva Infographic Maker, reviewed here, to create infographics to demonstrate different forms of media bias or to share facts learned from news articles. Extend learning even further by asking students to create blogs using edublogs, reviewed here, to demonstrate how to write and share the news using credible information and factual resources.Comments
This is such a valuable resource and it's so helpful to have one collection that I know has been vetted with accurate, useful information that teachers can use for themselves as well as with their students. I also love the "In the Classroom" section with suggestions for ways to use the information and resources.Peggy, AZ, Grades: 0 - 8
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Social Media Test Drive - Cornell University and the Cornell Research Foundation, Inc
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): character education (77), cyberbullying (40), digital citizenship (89), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Share these modules for students to complete during any lessons on Internet safety. Ask students to contribute to a collaborative document sharing examples they have seen of cyberbullying or deceptive news practice. Replace pencil and paper notetaking by sharing an online tool such as Webnote, reviewed here, for students to use to take notes on any website. When finished, have them share their notes using the URL created for use in classroom discussions. Reinforce online safety concepts through gameplay using Baamboozle, reviewed here. Enhance student learning by asking students to create a game in Baamboozle for their peers to play to identify best practices in creating a safe online presence. After completing your digital safety unit, modify classroom technology use and extend learning by asking students to create explainer videos using FlexClip, reviewed here, with suggestions on how to identify fake news, how to create a positive digital footprint or ways to support peers when faced with cyberbullying. Share student videos on your class website and with younger students.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Checkology - The News Literacy Project
Grades
5 to 12tag(s): journalism (72), news (228), newspapers (92), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Integrate these free lessons with your other activities when teaching students how to evaluate and judge online information and other news sources. Consider assigning lessons for students to complete on their own, then come together as a class to discuss the content. Add a link to a lesson on a Padlet, reviewed here, and share with students. Ask them to add comments onto the Padlet including links to additional examples of the featured topic. Ask students to compare and contrast information from two sources using a Venn Diagram. Create a Venn Diagram using resources found at Class Tools, reviewed here. Challenge students to become the reporter and enhance their learning by writing their own news article to post as a blog at Edublog, reviewed here. Ask them to include some misinformation within their blog, and then have other class members find and respond to the shared content. Extend learning by having students become the teacher and share their tips and tricks for evaluating news and creating a digital book for other students using Book Creator, reviewed here. Ask them to include videos sharing their tips, written examples of misinformation, and add their Venn diagram to demonstrate different ways facts are used in articles to mislead readers.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Bad News - Cambridge Social Decision-Making Lab and DROG
Grades
5 to 12tag(s): digital citizenship (89), game based learning (186), internet safety (112), media literacy (109), social media (53)
In the Classroom
This game is perfect for use as an introduction to lessons on digital citizenship, media literacy, and social media. Share the site with your students to explore on their own and encourage them to play several different times using the different options provided. Your students won't mind playing over and over; it is easy to get hooked on trying to find the best way to gain as many followers as possible! Once students become familiar with the game and the different options presented for spreading misinformation, ask them to apply their findings to online content. Have them do some online research to find sites or information using tactics such as emotion and the others featured in Bad News. As they research sites and online information, have them add links to the sites they find on a class Padlet. Padlet, reviewed here, offers an option to create columns, use this option then label a column for each badge found in the game and ask students to share a link to their sites in the appropriate column. In addition to adding a link, have students include a comment providing information on why their site belongs in the category. Instead of assessing learning with quizzes or a written report, enhance learning and transform your assessment by having students create infographics to share information learned. Canva Infographic Maker, reviewed here, provides easy to use templates to create interesting and informative infographics. Extend leaning and ask students to become the teacher using Quizizz, reviewed here. Include videos, quizzes, and other interactive activities as part of your Quizizz lesson. Be sure to share your assessment rubric with students as part of your assignment. Find many ideas for implementing rubrics for assessment along with examples and online tools at TeachersFirst Rubrics to the Rescue, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Civic Online Reasoning - Stanford University
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): journalism (72), news (228), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Include activities from this site as part of any online safety lesson. Use these lessons at the beginning of the school year to teach students how to evaluate online information and as an assessment for the understanding of the ability to judge the credibility of information and sources. Student responses from this site are created through Google Forms, use these responses as a template to create your own Google Forms for personalized content such as local news articles or T.V. news. Instead of creating a table to compare and contrast various sources of information, replace paper and pencil by using an online tool such as Interactive Two Circle Venn Diagram, reviewed here, for students to evaluate similarities and differences between news sources. Have students enhance their learning by creating an infographic using Canva Infographic Maker, reviewed here, to share with their peers. Challenge students to include facts, comparisons, and images to create the infographics.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Project Look Sharp - Project Look Sharp, Ithaca College
Grades
K to 12tag(s): american revolution (81), climate change (93), critical thinking (121), environment (246), martin luther king (45), media literacy (109), middle east (49), nutrition (135), OER (43), presidents (135), russia (35), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Become acquainted with these free curriculum kits and lessons to integrate media literacy within content already taught in the classroom. As you teach lessons found on the site, incorporate technology to enhance learning and build student understanding by using Word Ahead, reviewed here, or WordSift, reviewed here, to introduce and develop vocabulary as a prereading strategy or older students can use either as they are reading. Incorporate images with annotations to help students understand "big picture" ideas using Image Annotator, reviewed here. For younger students create a Image Annotator as a class to add text, video, and more to images. Ask older students to create their own Image Annotator sharing information learned throughout your lessons. Be sure to share all of your images on your class website for students to view at any time. To transform classroom technology use and as a culminating activity, use a digital book creation tool like Book Creator, reviewed here, as an alternative assessment to quizzes or tests. Include student-created writing, Annotated images, and add videos with student commentary within each book. Be sure to provide students with your rubric to use as a guide before turning in digital books. Find many ideas for implementing rubrics for assessment along with examples and online tools at TeachersFirst Rubrics to the Rescue, reviewed here. Whether students work individually or in groups, be sure to share your new digital library related to your lesson topic with students to review and revisit at any time!Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Seven Digital Deadly Sins - Guardian Weekend Magazine
Grades
9 to 12tag(s): digital citizenship (89), professional development (405), social media (53)
In the Classroom
Be very careful if using this in a classroom as there are discussions of items not appropriate for general consumption, and may be more appropriate as inspiration for discussing the main "sins" in your classroom. At a minimum, be sure to view and screen portions of the site for appropriateness before sharing with students. Have students create an online graph using ChartGizmo, reviewed here, to analyze their digital usage. Share ideas and reflections comparing the positives of digital media versus the negative impacts. Exchange information from the site with your colleagues and school counselors as part of any professional development or discussions about the use of social media and digital tools. Share with parents who have concerns about their student's digital usage.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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21things4students - Regional Educational Media Center Association of Michigan.
Grades
6 to 9tag(s): blended learning (36), careers (140), computers (110), consumers (14), cyberbullying (40), digital citizenship (89), digital storytelling (155), evaluating sources (28), game based learning (186), internet safety (112), media literacy (109), organizational skills (89), social media (53), social networking (64), thinking skills (15), webquests (8)
In the Classroom
Use the complete curriculum or selected Quests. Assign students individual Things to complete in school or at home as part of blended learning or flipped classrooms. Have students begin with the Basics and progress through selected skills. Use parts of the site to teach a particular skill to the whole class. Have students complete their work through an electronic portfolio like bulb, reviewed here, that is not included on the site. bulb includes links to some ideas and samples on the on the K-12 page.Comments
Tons of resources for all grades, love it!Ladisha, VA, Grades: 9 - 12
Lots of other links for using technology resources in the classroom.Ruth, AB, Grades: 0 - 12
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Video: Social Media - Common Craft
Grades
K to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): blogs (65), podcasts (104), social media (53), video (264)
In the Classroom
If you are looking to learn more about various social media, check out this short video. Learn more about the "flavors" you could use in your own classoom. For research projects have students create a blog, wiki, or even a podcast and compare the pros/cons of each regarding communication and safety. Create podcasts using a tool such as podOmatic, explained here. If you use "centers" in your classroom, put the video on a "center" computer, do a "right click" on the video, select "save as" and save to the "center" computer.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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