Six Fun Educational Sites: Wonderopolis to Balloons of Bhutan

If you want to integrate technology in a fun, low stress way, here are a few of our “recent” finds we suggest exploring.   They fit into a variety of content areas and age groups.

• Wonderopolis Have you ever wondered any of the following questions:  Do sea cows moo?  Does every state have a national park?  If you or your students have such questions, look no further than Wonderopolis for answers, discussion and springboards for investigation.

• Shel Silverstein has long been one of my favorite authors.  This is a find that could be shared with multiple age groups.  In my experience if presented in the right context, even adult ELLs appreciate his poetry and books.  Watch as Shel Silverstein reads the Giving Tree in this animation.  Go to the Shel Silverstein website for more resources and online activities.

• One World Many Stories Use this site in geography, social studies or language arts. Google Lit Trips, which I blogged about here, is included on this site. Students may also share their own Google Earth stories on the site.

• Geo Greeting  Use this as an introduction to geography or to discuss architecture.  With some creativity, it could be used in ESOL/bilingual classes at the sentence level.  Check out the one I made for you. Make your own for free in a matter of seconds.

• Draw A Stickman  Use this with beginning ELLs.  It could be an entry to storytelling and a way to work with vocabulary.  Try it on an ipad. It’s fun.

• Balloons of Bhutan This is a “happy” project.  It could lead to interesting discussion on the topic of happiness, success, etc.  Perhaps some math could be included in the statistics section.  It would be fun to do a spin-off of this project small scale with a class.  The Happiness Project would be an excellent follow up activity.

Explore more educational sites we suggest.   Do you have any success stories using any of these in your teaching?  

Happy exploring!

Links of the Summer

Summer passed us by in a wink of the eye.  We stayed busy traveling and exploring.  This post reflects some of our learning and finds.  They are on the topics of Triangulation with Leo Lapport, TED Talks on the topic of language, brain-based learning, transmedia storytelling, and Google Sketchup.  Enjoy!    

NETCAST and TED TALKS PICKS

 Kacey’s picks—Triangulation: Leo Lapport has moved the TWIT.tv company to the new studio where they are netcasting even more content. (I had the opportunity to visit the studio with my husband this summer.  Stay tuned for a post about our visit.)   Recently, I’ve been listening to Triangulation where Leo and Tom Merrit “talk to the smartest people in the world about the most important topics in technology.”  It is part of the TWiT Netcast Network and streamed live every Wednesday at 7:00 PM Eastern/4:00 PM Pacific at http://live.twit.tv.  Triangulation – David Allen Getting Things Done was my most recent listen.

Cheridy’s picks-- More Amazing TED Talks:  TED Talks continue to keep me coming back for more.   Although I’ve enjoyed a wide array of TED topics, I’ll point to the language focused ones I blogged about this summer.  See my low tech intro to my upcoming series from the eyes of a newbie about gaming in education.  It highlights John Hunter’s World Peace Game. Watch and read about some excellent language and listening TED Talks here.  Check out related past posts.  Also, be sure to look at this 2011 TEDxRedmond link.  The talks organized and delivered by kids took place on Sept. 10^th.  They are truly inspirational to watch! 

Karenne Sylvester has an excellent post called 10 English Speaking Activities Using Ted.com.  My experiences using these fall right in line with her philosophy that these really work as a springboard for discussion and use of all the modes of language. As a wrap-up, keep your eyes open for an upcoming post about Raghava KK’s latest talk.

 

LINK PICKS

Kacey’s picks-- Brain-Based Learning: Recently, I came across  Steve Reifman’s blog . He has been an elementary classroom teacher for 17 years, author, and interested in brain-based learning.  I’m looking forward to further reading and exploring his books and blog! Another teacher blogger I’ve been reading who is interested in brain-based learning and technology is Diane McKinney .

Cheridy’s picks—Transmedia Storytelling and Google Sketchup:   Unexpectedly this summer, I stumbled upon what have become new areas of interest for me in ed tech: transmedia storytelling and gaming.  See my post on Inanimate Alice and ponder the exciting potential in ed. 

 I’m also throwing in a link to Google Sketchup which my kid played with this summer for hours.  One of my College of Ed. students used it in excellent lesson plan for ESOL students in math.  

How could you use any of our links in your class or personal learning?  Happy  exploring!

Links of the Month: May

This month, Kacey highlights Keith Schoch’s blog, Teach with Picture Books, and shares interviews with John Merrow, Kevin Kelly, and Sir Ken Robinson. Cheridy focuses on bookmapping  and a Seedling’s podcast that in part explores the topic of the balance between banning technology and integrating it.  Our links include sites that we see potential in or that have worked for us in our own classes. 

PODCAST PICKS

Kacey’s picks:

John Merrow:  Here is Harvard Graduate School of Education EdCast interview with John Merrow.  John discusses how the teaching career has changed over his time of reporting on education. He also discusses his new book, The Influence of Teachers. More Harvard EdCast interviews can be found here.

The Future of Education:  Steve Hargadon conducted two great interviews for his current interview series called The Future of Education.  One was with Kevin Kelly and the other was with Sir Ken Robinson. Sir Ken Robinson talks about promoting creativity in schools and organizations and about his revised book, Out or Our Minds: Learning to Be Creative. In our previous posts Brain Food and Changing Education Paradigms: Sir Ken Robinson, you can read more about Kevin Kelly and his new book What Technology Wants and link to the amazing RSA Animate  video with Sir Ken Robinson.

Cheridy’s picks: 

Bookmapping:  My first podcast explores bookmapping.  It's a short 15 min ISTE Podcast interview with authors Terence Cavanaugh and Jerome Burg about their book Lit Trips and Beyond.  Listening to this podcast gave me the push to explore a bookmapping site that I’ve been interested in for awhile, Google Lit Trips.  Check it out!  There are some great examples for K-higher ed.  I’ve highlighted some of my favorite books:  K-5 Flotsam, 6-8 The Slave Dancer, and 9-12 The Grapes of Wrath. Here’s more information on bookmapping by the American Association of School Librarians.

Ban or Integrate?: I also enjoyed listening to this Seedlings podcast 113 with guest Rebecca Peterson.  It includes an interesting conversation about schools’ attempts to ban laptops, smartphones, and other electronics.  The conversation carries into thinking of ways we can use these as tools to engage our students rather than banning them. There is also discussion of the need to be aware that as our students face change due to new technologies, this creates the necessity for some emerging pedagogy to meet their needs.  In addition, there is some practical discussion of things to consider when using iPads in the classroom.

LINK PICKS

Kacey’s picks:  Teach with Picture Books and Teaching That Sticks are blogs by Keith Schoch, an educator in New Jersey. I enjoyed Keith’s post, Make Language an Adventure: Learning Grammar with Picture Books.  Be sure to check out Keith’s links to blogs he reads.

A picture book I was reminded of after viewing Keith’s blog is a book recommended at the Oregon Reading Association Convention by children’s author George Shannon. The book, Three By The Sea by Edward Marshall, is an easy reader but has a wonderful lesson on writing a good story. Three friends at the beach each tell a story. Each one becomes more detailed, and the final story by Lolly has lots of details and is actually a bit scary. It is fun having students try their hand at “writing like Lolly!”  I’ll be adding this to the list for a beginning lesson on writing next year.

Cheridy’s picks:  ClassTools.net.  If some creativity is employed and it is selectively used, this site has potential to add some simple technology spice to the class.  Some of their links that I have used are fakebook, random name picker,  countdown timer, and some of the graphic organizers such as the venn diagram and the hamburger diagram. 

The Seedlings Geeks of the Week inspired me.  I want to explore Storify.  Perhaps this will be a future post.  I used this TED Talk by Eric Whitacre in one of my classes.  It will be a part of a future post.  

Happy listening and exploring!

Links of the Month: April

This month, we chose to think about some overarching educational reform topics.  The Bit By Bit and the Teachers Teaching Teachers podcasts highlighted below fall into this category.  The November Learning Flipped Classroom Podcast demonstrates application of some of these ideas.  We also highlight a few sites we have used in our own classes.  Read on for more details and links!   

  

PODCAST PICKS

Kacey’s picks:   

Panel Discussion on Race to Nowhere: Bob Sprankle posted a podcast of a discussion that took place after viewing the movie Race to Nowhere. The discussion was part of the Wilcard Movie Series at the Portsmouth Music Hall.  Bob has listed the names and links of the panel on the Bit By Bit web site.  It contains interesting discussion from the perspective of parents, teachers, and principals about issues such as homework, utilizing class time better and differently, customizing instruction, and much more. We both enjoyed this podcast since we watched  Race To Nowhere and discussed it earlier in the year.

Cheridy’s picks: 

The Flipped Classroom: When Kacey and I started talking this summer, I recall thinking that one of the first visible signs of ed tech integration changes within the classroom would take place in the form of videos and audio, both in the hands of teachers and students.  Over the past few years, I have watched digital storytelling spread and enjoyed using it my own classes.  From a language acquisition standpoint, the use of video has long been accepted as a good means of instruction. With that background, this November Learning podcast caught my attention this month.  Jonathan Bergmann and Aaron Sams talk about how they use The Flipped Classroom Model in their high school science classes.  This podcast can be accessed here.  The basic idea is that the teacher creates vodcasts for students.  The students watch the vodcasts at home, pausing and rewinding as needed, for homework and then come to class prepared to do the hands-on stuff and receive support from the teachers.   The videos become one way of supporting student learning and individualizing instruction. Below is a video demonstrating their Flipped Classroom.  They also have an interesting  Ning site called The Flipped Class Network.  Their ideas remind us of the Khan Academy, which we discussed in this previous post.

Digital and Media Literacy: A Plan of Action:  In this Teacher’s Teaching Teachers podcast, Renee Hobbs discusses her white paper.  You can read, listen, watch and learn more about her plan of action here.   I like how she looks at the bigger picture of tech and ed, talks about the tools being tools but need for more, and looks at grass root community level implementation, involving stakeholders, etc.  These ideas reminded me of Kacey’s March podcast picks and the importance of attempting to put this thing called tech and ed in a larger framework.

LINK PICKS

Kacey’s picks:  Mr. Salsich’s third grade blog  is a fantastic example of a class blog that works. Be sure to check out the students’ Poetry Madness and the links to their Blogging Buddies in Australia, California, and New Zealand.  If you would like to spend some time looking through a whole slue of student and class blogs and even take the “Blogging With Students” challenge, check out Teacher Challenge supported by EduBlogs .  

This month our class has also enjoyed Noises Everywhere – Interesting internet tidbits for kids to ponder. Excavating a giant ant hill and watching baby eagles hatch have been our favorites.  

Cheridy’s picks:   This month, I have experimented in my College of Ed. class with some collaborative writing and sticky note web 2.0 tools.  I set out to find collaborative tools that are simple, low frills and have no login for my students.  Titan Pad and Primary Wall have worked well for us and allowed us to build on the same document both synchronously and asynchronously.  Titan Pad can be public or private.  It has some fun features such as the timeslider where changes to the document are displayed in video mode. Primary Wall is similar to Wallwisher, but with a background geared for elementary students. (See more collaborative tools under our web2.0 tab.)  I have also enjoyed experimenting with classroom tools.net and some of their online graphic organizers.  The Teacher’s Challenge blog gives a good overview of this site.

Happy listening and exploring!

Links of the Month: March

PODCAST PICKS

Cheridy’s picks:   For as long as I can remember I have been interested in the idea of space and how we utilize it.  This Clever Sheep podcast called  The IDEA about school learning environments, space, and 21st Century technologies caught my attention. Rod Lucier, The Clever Sheep blogger, also blogs about it in his post entitled IDEA, which includes an interesting video. Lucier's 7-10 minute podcasts are ideal for packing in interesting ed/tech ideas in a short amount of time.  Another one of his podcasts I enjoyed was Teach vs. Reach.  It's in part about reaching out with interactive smartboards and network learning by using tools such as Skype, Scribblar, etc.

Kacey’s picks:  I continue my podcast“professional development commute.” Here are some things I’ve been listening to.

·         The Future of Education  with Steve Hardigon offers interesting interviews that give many perspectives. I like how Steve’s questioning follows what I want to ask his guests. All the podcasts have been good listening. Recently, I enjoyed this interview with Kevin Kelly.  I also liked this interview with Yong Zhao on Education, China, and Tiger Moms.   

·         ED Tech Crew is new to me and worth it for its quality and topics.

·          Bit By Bit "Play Time (Please Don't Cry)” is a blog post by Bob Sprankle with an embedded audio of Bob’s “Sandbox” routine recorded during one of his kid tech classes. You can also download the short podcast from iTunes. Look for “Play Time! (Please Don’t Cry) between shows 109 and 110. Happy Listening!

LINK PICKS

Cheridy’s picks:  Glogster EDU is my web 2.0 tool pick for this month because I have had so much fun employing it in the classroom.  See my post below.  I also RSS feed to Technology and Education Box of Tricks and appreciate this gold mine post of useful web 2.0 tools called A-Z Resources for Education gleaned by Jose Picardo.  I have added it as a link in our web 2.0 tools tab.

Kacey’s picks:  When I found this one I e-mailed Cheridy, “bazzinga!” Cybrary Man's Educational Web Sites has a wealth of links and information for students, teachers, administrators and parents. This section is by grade level with links to teacher’s web sites. This part of the site could be useful for new teachers.

Happy Exploring!

Links of the Month: February

Thanks to one of Cheridy’s TCE students this term for the picture created with Make Beliefs Comix.  This question inspired us to begin what we hope will be a monthly series of our favorite podcasts, webcasts, blogs, and/or links.

PODCAST PICKS

Cheridy’s pick
Click HERE to link to Women of the Web 3.0: Ed Tech Talk #121 (Scroll to the bottom of the page for the audio.) I’ve been intrigued by Skype in the classroom since my father did a Skype presentation at NECC. I am mulling over its possibilities and was delighted to listen to this podcast with one of my favorite bloggers, Syliva Tolisano of Langwitches.  

Kacey’s pick:
Angela Maiers interviewed Debbie Miller, retired Colorado teacher and writer, about her latest book Teaching With Intention. You can listen here.

LINK PICKS

Cheridy’s pick:
In keeping with the Skype theme, here’s a link to Syliva Tolisano’s seemingly amazing project Around the World With 80 Schools.  There are opportunities for connecting with classes grades 1 – possibly higher ed.  Drop me a line if you participate!

Kacey’s pick:
Last weekend, I attended the Oregon Reading Association's Annual Conference in Portland and came home with new reading strategy ideas swimming in my head! One of the presentations I attended was about iPod use in the classroom (stay tuned for the post). It got me thinking about Apps and how I might use them in the classroom. Perfect timing as Michael Gorman blogged ...There's an App For That and reminded me about I Education Apps Review! Thanks Michael! 

In wrapping up the post, here’s a stab at answering the question asked in the comic… Our ideas and links in our tabs at the top of our site are inspired by our passion to learn more about tech and ed integration by listening to podcasts, reading blogs, and exploring applicable sites.  We RSS feed to various blogs, podcasts, and webcasts.  We also find ourselves trying out sites that are in beta.  We are enjoying the journey.  Thanks for adding to the inspiration Theresa!  

Co-post by CA and KK