Cool+Tools+for+Teaching+and+Learning

====**During the course of our class, we explored various online resources that may contribute to student learning by incorporating 21st century skills or improving/enhancing teaching strategies. Here is a list of these online resources with a short explanation of the tool's purpose.**====

====**__[|Scratch] __** -- This interactive website allows students to create games, music, stories, and art through a simple programming language developed at the MIT Media Lab. Using Scratch, students 8 and up will gain understanding of computation and mathematics, design, reasoning, and logic. To further support 21st century skills, students are encouraged to share their programs and collaborate with other Scratch programmers. This online tool is free but does require a download and signing up for a free account. (Suzanne Smith)====

====**[|MakeInternet TV]** -- This website provides a tutorial for recording and publishing internet videos. Using easy to follow steps, makeinternettv.org instructs on everything from what equipment you will need to how to gain a license and publish your video. This website can be used in the classroom not only to instruct students on how to create digital-age learning experiences through media, but also to promote digital responsibility through licensing and copyright instruction. Simply follow the steps and you will be able to upload videos to your blog or teach students how to make internet tv! (Jenn Martin)====

====**[|ePals.com]** -- This is such a great tool! It gives your students a passport to the world. You can meet classes from all around the world and allow your students to communicate and collaborate with them. EPals monitors everything, and keeps you informed about your students activities. You can also setup and monitor student email. EPals also has tie-ins with a book club and a blog site. It is also a great resource for teachers due to all of the helpful information that is included in the teacher forum area. (Erin Soules)====

====**[|BrainPop.com]** -- This is a collection of animated, short (3-5 minute) videos related to classroom content. The videos are generally appropriate for 3rd through 8th grade, but can be used otherwise. BrainPopJr. is available for K-3. Both require separate subscriptions, but suggestions are given regarding ways to support grant-writing. This site contributes to 21st Century Learning by providing a number of techology related videos (i.e. - Internet Safety). Students can also get experience navigating the site indepently. Related activities and quizzes are supplied for all videos. (Jessica Newman)====

====**[|CreativeCommons.org]** - This website offers free tools for creating licenses which provide flexibility to authors, artists, and educators in protecting their creative works. There is a search option for finding other creative materials utilizing similar flexible licensing.====

====[|****Maps101.com****] - This is a subscription service that gives access to over 4,000 different maps. It also contains lesson plans, interactive quizzes and games that reinforce geography content and map skills. Maps, activities and games are leveled for students from K-12. Most maps, lessons and worksheets are PDF files and can be easily printed. This is a great supplement to all social studies areas - geography, history, economics, or civics. (Katie Diggs)====

====[|****United Streaming****] This is a subscription for a large multimedia library that has over 5,000 full length videos and over 50,000 video clips to integrate into lesson plans. This cool tool also has teacher lesson plans, assignments, quiz, and writing prompt builder options. The videos can be sorted by grade level, subject area, or state standards. There is also new options under the Teacher Center that has blogs, an interactive atlas, thematic units etc. This is a great resource for multimedia and also the new options it has will only get better with time. (Krista Webb)====

====**[|ClassChatter]** - This is a free and safe way to blog with students at all levels. Teachers can create and grade assignments from this site. Teachers can easily manage student interactions and blog posts. This is a great tool for collaboration and communication between students. (Erin McNulty)====

__Search Engines for Kids__ __AskKids:__ [|www.askkids.com] Like ask.com, you can type in a question, but we found it was best to just type in a phrase for better search results. There are different links for subject areas under the schoolhouse tab including: science, language arts, math, world places, and events. When you do a search there are different sections that come up along with the results. On the top is immediate results that can help you find what you are looking for. On the bottom there are suggested webpages that take you away from the askkids website. On the side bar there are other possible connected topics you might be interested in and can click on to find out the information. Within the schoolhouse search engine there are also filters based on age. There is advertising on this site as well, which might turn some people off. Askkids also has searches for movies, games, videos, and images. __Kidsclick__: [|www.kidsclick.org] Kidsclick is a web search for kids by created by librarians. This site allows you to search for information and then gives you lists of recommended websites to visit in order to find what you are looking for. Since it is just a list of websites, you have to leave the kidsclick website in order to find the information you are looking for. There is a book review blog that is interesting to read, but has not been updated since May. You can also search by subject and there are many listings for that option, but that is a little less user friendly and accurate. __YahooKids__: [|http://kids.yahoo.com] Yahookids is full of entertainment options including movies and games for kids. There are great pictures and videos, but sometimes this makes the site run a bit slower. We looked at the "Ask Earl" option of typing in a question, but also saw that we never received the answer to our question. When you do a search the results come up in the YahooKids website and there are other results given that take you to other websites. There is also a parents section that can help parents find out what their kids are interested in and help them connect. Overall, askkids.com seemed to be the most useful website/search engine for children, especially young students. Another critical aspect of using these "cool tools" is also to teach kids how to be critical and safe viewers of the materials they are finding. If kids have never used search engines before, guided lessons and practice would be needed prior to letting kids use search engines independently. (Melissa Grieshober)

[|www.Voicethread.com]: it is an online media "album" that allows you to save images, documents, videos and add comments in 5 different ways! You may record students voice by simply typing comments, using a microphone and even a phone! You may add videos, audio files and share them ONLY with the people you wish to share them with. You can access voicethread anywhere in the world and even better it is perfect for collaborative work.

[|Google Earth] : You have seen your students use Google Earth to zoom in on their own neighborhoods, I am sure! However, this downloadable application is much more than just cyber-stalking yourself! Google Earth is a satellite based program that allows the user, in terms of teaching, to shows landforms, geographical real-time (and historical data), create "tours" and placemarks depicting instructor guided lessons, the possibilities are endless! If you search "google.com" for lessons using GoogleEarth, you will be astonished by the countless ways to incoporate this into any content-area curriculum! [|Google earth tutorial site with tons of files] and lesson ideas

[|**NoodleTools.com**-] This website provides help with the research process for learners of all ages. Help with creating bibliograpphies, starting the research process and organizing notes are available. Some components of thge website a free, others are only accessible via subscription. In supporting 21st century learning, students need to know how to give proper credit to published sources and to distinguish the difference between relaible and non-reliable research sources. (Beth Holt)

[|Thinkfinity.org] This website delivers free, top-quality online educational resources for literacy instruction and lifelong learning for adults and family literacy programs. The content on TLN strengthens literacy development, creativity and critical thinking skills for success in the 21st Century. Thinkfinity educational resources are aligned to the national educational technology(NET) standards for teachers. The Thinkfinity partner web sites offers resources across all grade levels and multiple curriculum areas: Arts, Economics, History, Humanities, Mathematics, Reading and Language Arts, Science and Geography. (Felmonia Cain)

[|twitter.com]- " Have you ever wanted to stay connected…with Everyone and Everything…that is Going On in the World?" Well Get in tune with Twitter! Twitter.com is a **free service** for friends, family and co-workers that let you keep in touch with people through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing t o stay connected? Twitter will allow for students in the classroom to have accessibility to a place where they can stay connected with what is going on in the “real world” i.e. presidential elections, political debates, world news, creative ideas for just about anything, from learning how to make different types of foods, to finding out what good books are out to read, or even how to finance a house and maintain good credit. You must 13 years old to join. It allows people to get quick answers and great ideas. It acts as a melting pot for people to pour out their different perspectives towards topics.  It allows “us” as people to connect and interact socially with one another about our everyday lives, which essentially advocates and promotes growth and maturity that students need to witness and have in classrooms. Akeya Harding

Quizlet.com - The website is a free study site that helps students master vocabulary. It is an online flashcard generator that in and of itself is very simple being that it is just that - electronic flashcards. However, it also has other means for student mastery including quizzes and games that are generated from the vocabulary lists that you create. Teachers can also generate their own vocabulary lists and have students find them on the site.

[|Edutopia.org] -Edutopia is part of the George Lucas Education Foundation and about "what works" in public education. There are many video examples and articles about learning for the 21st century. The site also includes links for blogs from contributors to edutopia as well as an edutopia blog. Also, this site has an excellent multiple intelligence test.

[|Bing] - New search engine known as a "decision" engine by Microsoft Corp. First thing you'll notice about Bing is the home page photo. It changes daily and usually features an exotic spot. Main navigation on the home page includes: "images, videos, shopping, news, maps and travel." (Joyce Young) • [|Ask]- Ask.com is a leading search engine on the Web. Millions of people turn to Ask.com to get what they are looking for online everyday. Founded as Ask Jeeves in 1996 and renamed Ask.com in February 2005, Ask.com is recognized for innovation in search technology and search interface design. (Joyce Young) [|Clusty]- • Started in Pittsburgh, PA in 2004 with a search software company called Vivísimo. Clusty: an innovative way to get more out of every search. Queries several top search engines, combines the results, and generates an ordered list based on comparative ranking. It helps raise the best results to the top and push search engine spam to the bottom. • Instead of delivering millions of search results in one long list, this search engine groups similar results together into clusters. Clusters help you see your search results by topic so you can zero in on exactly what you’re looking for. (joyce Young)

[|Flickr Photo Sharing]Flicker is by far one of the easiest photoshare sites available. a basic account is free. check it out! great for digital story archives! a blog includes current events world wide. The photos are spectacular, a member of creative commons.