Art: 21

The US television network PBS has an excellent website for art teachers. The Art: 21 website is based on the television series of the same name and contains videos (Australian users can watch the videos, unlike the BBC iPlayer), artist biographies, slideshows of artworks and educational materials.

Art 21

Teachers are given free access to teaching guides for each of the five series of Art: 21 as well as an online lesson library that includes the topics:

  • Abstraction and realism
  • Home and displacement
  • Individuals and collectives
  • Craftsmanship and labour
  • The natural world
  • Public and private space
  • Ritual and commemoration
  • Technology and systems
  • War and conflict

A resource certainly worth referring to art teachers.

Polleverywhere

This is a fantastic tool for feedback. For quickly gauging what your students know, how your audience is feeling or which topic you should address next, Polleverywhere is ideal for the classroom or conferences and has free and premium options.

Polleverywhere 1

Participants can respond to your poll via SMS, Twitter or the web. Many schools may not have access to the SMS option due to school policy, however students can still respond by being given a URL.

polleverywhere 3

Polleverywhere is ideal for conferences as almost all delegates would have a mobile phone or iPod touch and speakers can modify or customise their session depending on the mood of the audience.

iBoard player

The iBoard player is a terrific interactive teaching resource. With resources for Prep to 2, there is lots of fun and learning to be had.

Resources include:

  • Numeracy
  • Literacy
  • New Literacy (Texts)
  • Science
  • History
  • Geography
  • ICT
  • Religion

A day in the country
A day in the country

This year 1 example above comes with the following information from the website:

Ask pupils to position the characters and construct sentences about their position or movement.
Using the whole scene, you could challenge pupils to make a wider range of statements than those given… “the bird is flying above the girl”, “the owl is on top of the big bear’s head.”
Ask pupils to position the characters and construct sentences about their position or movement. Using the whole scene, you could challenge pupils to make a wider range of statements than those given… “the bird is flying above the girl”, “the owl is on top of the big bear’s head.”
The iBoard player looks like a useful tool for learning for younger students.

Virtual Tour of the Sistine Chapel

How about a virtual excursion (field trip) to the Sistine Chapel? With 360 degree views of the Chapel that includes ceilings and floors, this is a tremendous site for art, history or religious instruction.

Sistine Chapel 1

The Vatican hosts the site and lets the magnificence of the Chapel speak for itself. There are no words or links on the site, only the ability to rotate the view of the Chapel via your mouse.

Sistine Chapel 2

Thanks to the very excellent Richard Byrne from Free Technology for Teachers for passing on this link.

World’s biggest earthquakes since 1900 – interactive map

The CNN World website has developed a terrific resource for students researching earthquakes. Showing both the biggest and most deadly earthquakes since 1900, each map has captions for each area showing date, place, magnitude and death toll.

Biggest earthquakes

Biggest earthquakes

Deadliest quakes

Deadliest quakes

Earthquakes are presented by ranking.  A very good resource to begin researching the world’s earthquakes. Thanks again to Richard Byrne from Free Technology for Teachers for informing me about this top tool!

Digital Citizenship wiki

A very useful resource is the Digital Citizenship wiki, which caters for students in grades 1-12. The wiki explains more:

This is a resource for grade level teachers to prepare students to use technology appropriately and being mindful of the citizenship skills they already possess. Come back often as this WIKI will be continually updated.

Digital citizenship wiki

There are links to topics such as cyberbullying, plagiarism and copyright as well as links to relevant videos. A very useful site which will be added to over time.

Seven tools for organising web research

Richard Byrne‘s excellent Free Technology for Teachers site has outlined seven useful tools for organising web research. Some of the tools you may have seen before, some may be new.

  1. iCyte
  2. Memonic
  3. Lumifi
  4. Wet Mount
  5. Zoho (Bright Ideas post 29/10/08)
  6. Reframe It
  7. Webnotes

Please see Richard’s post for all the details on what these tools can do and how to use them.

Periodic Table: elements and their real-world applications

This resource contains all of the Periodic Table of Elements, but what is really fantastic is that it includes their real world applications.

pt_preview_080409

Knowing that, for example, Iridium is used to develop cancer treatment, hypodermic needles, helicopter spark plugs and fountain pen nibs brings the element alive with meaning.

periodic table

An excellent resource for Science teachers. Thanks to Greg Garner for passing this link on.

Studies of Asia Resources wiki

The  Studies of Asia wiki is a fantastic resource for every primary or secondary school. Although specifically developed for Victorian schools and the Victorian Essential Learning Standards, the resources available are accessible by anyone, anywhere. The wiki states that it aims ‘to create ‘asia-literate’ students, teachers and schools with skills, knowledge and understandings of Asia to equip them to live in today’s world and the world of their future.’

studies of asia wiki

Monthly newsletters inform readers of professional development and other opportunities as well as classroom resources and study tours.

There are also links to classroom resources that include virtual tours of China, as well as teacher resources that demonstrate how Asian studies can be integrated into The Arts and English.

Acknowledging the National Curriculum Board Draft Papers, the wiki states:

With the release of the National Declaration on Educational Goals for Young Australians followed by the National Curriculum Board draft papers the importance of providing students with educational experiences that take into account the changes over the past 20 years is critical. “India, China and other Asia Pacific nations are growing and strengthening their impact on the world, representing a huge shift in geopolitical power and sparking the need for all Australians to become ‘Asia literate’. Asia literacy has emerged as a priority area for Australian schools. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd recently stated that he ‘wants Australia to become the most Asia literate country in the western world’. Similarly, the Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard has commented that ‘it is impossible to conceive of a future Australian education system that does not take Asia seriously’.

This wiki is an excellent resource for each and every school.

Interactive Content Corner

The Interactive Content Corner blog is one worth checking out!

Interactive Content Corner

Author Emily Starr says:

My name is Emily Starr.  I’m a former fourth grade teacher, President of StarrMatica Learning Systems, and an interactive content enthusiast!

I started integrating online interactive content in my classroom instruction five years ago, and teaching with technology has been my passion ever since.

This blog is dedicated to the “Now what?” of teaching with technology.  My mission is to help you bridge the gap between knowing how to operate hardware and actually integrating technology into your instruction.

As Emily says, all of her posts are dedicated to explaining how to use specific tools in the classroom for learning and teaching. Although probably more appropriate for primary overall, there are tools and examples that could also be used in secondary. One example of this is Online Comics in the Classroom. There is also a free eBook for teachers to download that centres on teaching fractions using online websites. You can find Emily’s tweets at http://twitter.com/StarrMatica