Must-See Websites for Educators

Today’s Topic:
Must-See Websites for Educators
Tech Tip: Powerpoint Attention-Grabber

  • What are some of the most engaging and innovative K-12 Websites?

  • How are the best new Websites using multimedia to create rich, interactive learning experiences?

(Most of these sites will require the free Shockwave and QuickTime plug-ins to view, as well as a broadband Internet connection.)


Sound Junction
This incredibly rich multimedia site is bursting with information about all aspects of music –- styles, musicians, world music, and instruments. A special feature is the excellent Composer Forum where students compose and play music.

Make Beliefs Comix
Bill Zimmerman’s creative and interactive website where ELL students and other learners can write printable comic strips and improve reading, writing and language skills as well as practice sequencing and predictions.

Can I Have a Word?
Barbicon’s Education’s innovative and visually appealing site, a 2006 Webby Award winner, provides amazing new ideas and resources to inspire creative writing including poems by leading poets, video animations, and classroom activities.

If These Walls Could Speak
This stunningly-designed Atlanta History Center site provides a virtual tour of four historic homes in the Atlanta, Georgia area and the people and lives connected with them. Take your students through each home to view pioneer farm life, the emerging black middle class, rural pottery making, and the grandeur of Atlanta’s early suburbs.

Invention at Play
This engaging and playful Smithsonian site focuses on the link between kids' play and science, and explores the role that toys and play have had in invention. Included are interactive games that teach problem solving, visual thinking and exploratory learning.

Tech Tip – Powerpoint Attention-Grabber

Here’s a quick and effective way to get your audience’s attention when showing a Powerpoint presentation with a multimedia projector:

1. Go to the View menu and choose Slide Show.

2. When you come to a slide where you’d like to draw attention to you, the speaker, simply press B to make the screen black, or W to make it white. Then when you want to resume the slide show, simply click B or W again to reveal the slide where you stopped.

Announcements

Are you looking for a graduate course to meet your recertification requirements in 2007? Sign up today for a summer online course. No travel to campus required.

June 4 EDUC 744 957 Differentiated Instruction
June 5 EDUC 763 960 Instructional Design for E-Learning
June 7 RDGED 701 960 Developmental Reading K-12
June 8 EDUC 761 960 Creating Collaborative Communities in E-learning
June 11
EDUC-744 958 Teaching Art for Non-Art Teachers
EDUC 744 914 Teaching Middle School Math with Technology (Grades 4-8)
EDUC 744 924 Inclusion—Strategies for Special Needs/ELL Learners
EDUC 744 956 Building Better Instruction with Technology
EDUC 744 962 Poverty in the Schools
RDGED 702 960 Reading in the Content Areas K-12
EDUC 744 927 Emerging Issues for Media Specialists
June 12
EDUC 744 929 Web Design for Educators
EDUC 744 939 Intermediate Web Design

Registration closes ten days prior to the course start date to allow time for assigning user name, password, university email account and online orientation practice activities.

Register online at: http://www.uwstout.edu/soe/profdev/register.shtml

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About the E-Learning for Educators course:

“It was a great first experience with online learning! I would, I have, and I will, recommend the course to colleagues with whom I work. I couldn't have asked for a better experience!”
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posted by Karen Franker, Editor @ 5/28/2007 09:06:00 PM