Last Minute Gifts for the Teachers in Your Life

from Richard Byrnes's blog

From the shameless promotion department: if you're looking for some last minute "gifts" for the teachers in your life, check out the downloads page on Free Technology for Teachers and pass along one or all eight of the free ebooks available there. Email them, Facebook them, Tweet them, or print them. In my obviously biased opinion, they're all good resources for teachers looking to improve their uses of technology in their classrooms.

What you will find on the free downloads page:
The Super Book of Web Tools for Educators
How to do 11 Techy Things in the New School Year
Google for Teachers
Google for Teachers II
Google Earth Across the Curriculum
Beyond Google - Improving Search Strategies and Results
Making Videos on the Web
Twelve Essentials for Technology Integration


Happy Holidays!

Merry Christmas to all and Happy New Year, too!

One of my technology friends posted this on his blog.
Thanks, Phillip

A great example of storytelling a familiar tale in a new way!

Websites I found interesting (weekly)

• Teach Parents Tech

  tags: teachparentstech parents google

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Explore New Habitats & Scientific Concepts with the Kratt Brothers

Animals can take you anywhere in science! Creature teachers Chris and Martin Kratt will take 6- to 8-year olds and their families along on extraordinary animal-powered adventures in Wild Kratts, a new series premiering on PBS KIDS GO! January 3, 2011. The show transforms the Kratt Brothers, creators of the award-winning Kratts’ Creatures and Emmy-winning Zoboomafoo, into animated versions of themselves, allowing the real-life zoologists to visit wild animals in their little-seen habitats and showcase key science concepts along the way. From elephants using physics to suck gallons of water with their trunks to a fleet of peregrine falcons that harness the force of gravity to speed through the air, each of the 40 new half-hour episodes of Wild Kratts presents age-appropriate science inspired by the natural abilities of the animals that the Kratt brothers – and young viewers – meet. To learn more, visit http://pbskids.org/wildkratts/.

Google Suggest

Google Suggest is a feature of Google ( it used to be a separate tool long ago ) that helps users auto-complete their search queries and search faster.

Google guesses what you are about to search using its algorithm that determines search patterns and common search terms. Apart from being a helpful service, Google Suggest is known to often show weird and hilarious suggestions which make it one of the most talked about Google features in the blogosphere.
Google Suggest Venn Diagram Generator is an innovative tool that makes use of Google Suggest to show venn diagrams of popular Google search queries.
You can enter a base query like ” How to do X..” or ” Why X is ” and enter 3 options for X. Like, the example on the site shows the base query as “Why are X so..” and has X as men, women and parents. The result is a venn diagram of 3 circles and the corresponding search results.

Likewise, you can enter many such combinations and get different venn diagrams. Overall, it’s a fun tool to play with, and also know what people are searching for on Google.

Websites I found interesting (weekly)

• Tizmos Home - SEE and Access your Favorite Websites in One Place

  tags: tizmos Bookmarking visualization

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Have Fun with Art and Music

from one of my Walden U professors, a blogger, and a great technology teacher in NJ, Kevin Jarrett:
Good morning everyone!
Found this gem – http://www.jacksonpollock.org/ – at the NJEA Convention via Kevin Sullivan, an amazing middle school science teacher at Warren Township Middle School in Warren, NJ. He used it at his session entitled “Smart Board: Who said learning can’t be fun?” It’s highly addictive, your kids will love it, guaranteed! As far as technological diversions go … creative outlets, really … it’s a fun way to spend a few minutes. I categorize it with other cool websites like http://www.thisissand.com and ToneMatrix, two perennial favorites at my school. Enjoy!
-kj-

Carrout Text

Carryout Text is a website that allows you to easily convert text into audio. It is a great way to help students access text. The audio files are in an mp3 format. The site does mention that it will not be free forever, but it does not mention when the service will change to a "pay" format. In any case, this could be a good solution to help students in your classroom! Thanks to www.edutechintegration.com for sharing this resource.

Access Online Books from Around the World

The Online Books Page is a Web site that facilitates access to books that are freely readable over the Internet. The major parts of the site include an index of thousands of online books; pointers to significant directories and archives of online texts; special exhibits of particularly interesting classes of online books; and information on how readers can help support the growth of online books. The Online Books Page was founded, and is edited, by John Mark Ockerbloom, a digital library planner and researcher at the University of Pennsylvania. The online books listed have been authored, placed online and hosted by a wide variety of individuals and groups throughout the world (and throughout history!).
Click Here to Visit Web Site

Holiday Mail for Heroes

from DEN Blog

Don’t forget that the American Red Cross is sponsoring Holiday Mail for Heroes again this year. Send your holiday greeting cards to the Red Cross by Friday, December 10, and they will get your heart felt greetings out to our troops, veterans and their families. This is a great project to do with your students, and it’s quick and easy!

To participate in the campaign, the public can send holiday cards with personal messages to:
Holiday Mail for Heroes
P.O. Box 5456
Capitol Heights, MD 20791-5456
For more information and card requirements, please visit http://www.redcross.org/holidaymail

You Tube +Vacation

Vacationer is a program that will help you seek a little virtual holiday respite during those tough days (at work or in the winter – you pick!), or even plan your next getaway. The program intends to bring you the best of the content presented by YouTube’s travel partners, all in one place.
So, what does it have to offer? Well, plenty, believe it or not. YouTube has teamed up with the likes of the Travel Channel, Lonely Planet, and National Geographic to name but a few. From these, and many other sources, you’ll have the opportunity to view reports from the experts about various destinations. You can also find out about the most popular attractions, hidden secrets of a city, and some of the best eats you can imagine.
This is a great way to get a glimpse of various destinations, but remember – YouTube is very much still driven by user-generated content. With this in mind, they are encouraging people (such as yourself) to pack your camera with you when you next go on vacation, and to post your videos on YouTube for the entire world to see. Remember, millions of people the world over do will be using the service to get a look at places they might not otherwise get a chance to visit. Make it a good video!
Source – youtube-global.blogspot.com/

Websites I found interesting (weekly)

• Handwriting Paper

  tags: handwriting paper writing

• What is 21st Century Education

  tags: 21stcenturylearning

• Your Free Online Video Editor | JayCut

  This free site allows for the creation of videos with text, still image, audio, webcam, and green screen options.

  tags: web2.0 video_editing tools jaycut flash editing

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

Find Ready-to-Use Tools for Teaching with Documents

A new online tool called DocsTeach, recently launched by the National Archives, provides a resource for teachers to search more than 3,000 primary-source documents. The site also includes seven tools for teachers, including one that customizes history activities to individual classroom needs.
Click Here to Visit Web Site

Teaching Journalism Resources

Teaching journalism teaches thinking

Consider using journalism to develop higher-order thinking skills. Try the ideas and resources assembled here.

Get Scientific Explanations for Everyday Phenomena

Have your students ever wondered why a camel has a hump? Of if they can really tell the weather by listening to the chirp of a cricket? Or why our joints make popping sounds? Everyday Mysteries will help your students get the answers to these and many other of life’s most interesting questions through scientific inquiry. All of the questions presented on this Web site were asked by researchers and answered by librarians from the Library of Congress’s Science Reference Services.
Click Here to Visit Web Site