Resources for teachers

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2009-11-29T16:59:00.001-08:00

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Building Circuits

2009-04-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

This Flash animation is a great way to teach electrical circuits to elementary school students. It will help students make the link between components of actual circuits and electrical symbols. After learning what each symbol means, the student can then draw circuit diagrams by dragging symbols of components. It is very simple, but exactly what is needed for elementary school students.

Interactive Autopsy

2009-04-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

Be careful, this site is not for everyone and should only be used with mature students. Interactive Autopsy is a step-by-step demonstration of what happens during an autopsy procedure. In the first step, the student will do the external examination to then move to the internal examination. Then the student will look at the internal organs by removing them. Then it is time for removing the brain and weighing all the organs. Then to finish the autopsy, it is time to return the organs to the body and sewing it up. All the steps are done interactively by dragging and clicking with the mouse. This site is easy to understand and great for students with interest in forensic science or who are big fans of CSI.

Mr. Picasso Head

2009-04-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you have artistic students who like to draw faces, Mr. Picasso Head will be a great tool to let them explore their creativity. This flash application is very simple. You get to choose a face, eyes, nose, lips, ears, eyebrows and hair and you drag them and move them to give your face a unique look. Each element of the drawing can be rotated, flipped, scaled up and down, and coloured. As with any good graphic application, there are layers that can be used to decide what will be in the foreground and background.

Biology Questions

2009-04-03T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here is a nice resource for any high school biology teachers: biology questions. This website contains more than 1800 biology questions with the answers. Questions are classified in different categories such as biochemistry, cell biology, microbiology, embryology, genetics, evolution, ecology and zoology. This site was specially written and organized to make Biology learning easier. It can be used as a reference or as a study tool. It could also become a "question of the day" in your classroom. Students can even send a question to the website and they may get an answer added to the site. Here are a few questions you can find answer on this site: What are the main types of lipids? Which are the plant tissues responsible for the supporting of the plant? What is the name of the molecule that transports oxygen in red blood cells?

States of Matter

2009-04-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

This simple Flash animation about the states of matter will help the student visualize particles, as the temperature is increase. The temperature vs. time graph helps the student visualize the "plateau" when there is a change of phase (at the melting point and the boiling point). There are also arrows to show how changes of phase are called (melting, freezing, boiling and condensing). Unfortunately, sublimation is missing.

Small Skeleton

2009-04-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

This is a great way for elementary school students to discover some of the main bones of the skeleton. The student can see the person without the bones or see the person with the bones. The student then drags the name of each bone in the appropriate box. Once the bones have been named, the student can check his or her answers and print the skeleton. This activity is way too simple for high school, but great for younger children in elementary school.

That Quiz

2009-03-30T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here is another great resource to give a chance to your students to get a little bit more practice in math, language or geography: That Quiz! The tool is totally free to use. It includes a series of randomize quizzes in arithmetic, about fractions, probability, time, money, measure, place value, graphs and geometry. Most quizzes can be configured to increase or decrease the level of difficulty and students get immediate feedback. When it comes to languages, students can practice English, Spanish, French and German. The language quizzes include definitions, translations and verbs. In geography, the students can get quizzes for the Americas, Africa, Europe and Asia. The quizzes include countries, rivers and capitals all with an actual map of the continent. It is an excellent way for your students to get unlimited practice when studying. It is perfect for parents who want some "extra work" to do with their children. I hope you like this site.

Food Chains

2009-03-29T11:00:00.000-07:00

This nice Flash animation about food chains will enhance your ecology lessons. At first, the student is presented with information about energy, producers and consumers. Then the student can complete three food chains: one for woodland, another for a river and finally one for seashore. The animation is offered for free by Crickweb from the UK.

YouTube Edu

2009-03-28T11:00:00.000-07:00

In the past few months, I presented many video sharing website that looked and worked like YouTube, but that were dedicated to education rather than general video. It seems that YouTube has decided to do that by itself by now offering a section on YouTube with videos from colleges and universities called YouTube Edu. The videos are mostly professionally produced and although some are mostly promotional about programs offered at these colleges and universities, some of them have good educational value. Many of these videos could be used in high school as a way for students to explore careers and post-secondary education.

Positive and Negative Numbers

2009-03-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are looking for a great slide show to help your students understand positive and negative numbers, I found a great one on Docstop. The slideshow is composed of 29 slides and is based on a number line. It also includes real life examples to help students better understand the difference between positive and negative numbers. The slide show also includes explanations on how to add integers. By registering with the Docstop website, you can also download the document on your computer.

Study Stack

2009-03-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today, this resource is a little treasure for your students who need some help with studying. Both students and teachers can use it. Study Stack is a website that lets you enter data that you need to memorize for a test (or just because you want to remember it). Once the data is entered, you can easily produce flashcards, study stack, study table, matching exercise, hangman game, crossword, word search game, unscramble game, fill in the blank and a bug match game. The best thing is that you can even export the data and games for various portable devices such as the iPhone or the iPod. You can also get embed code of the flashcards to include them on your website. Your Study Stacks are available to other users and you can access the Study Stacks produced by other users. You need to create an account to produce your own data, but the site is compatible with Facebook connect. Students can access your content without creating an account. On the picture to the left, I created a Study Stack about the Canadian provinces capital.

Math Vids

2009-03-13T23:00:00.000-07:00

MathVids.com is a website dedicated to providing high quality, instructional, free math videos to middle school, high school, and college students who need math help. There are videos about various subjects including basic math, algebra, statistics, trigonometry, geometry, differential equations, linear algebra and calculus. There is also a section with videos "Just for fun" presenting concept that are not necessarily part of the curriculum but are still interesting for any math enthusiast. Videos are produced by teachers across the country. You can even become a contributor to the site. Videos are reviewed by users as well as by the staff with a star rating system. You have very limited access to the videos if you don't sign up to the site. Signing-up is free and gives you access to watch unlimited videos. If you prefer to have access to download the videos to watch them off-line and if you want to see them in full screen, then you need to get a premium membership. However, if ads don't bother you, the free version works very well. Videos are added on a daily basis.

SuperKids Math Worksheet Creator

2009-03-10T23:00:00.001-07:00

You are a parent or a teacher and you need worksheets to give some drill to your child or student. It takes you a while to try to prepare random ones in your favourite word processor? Well you won't need to do that anymore with SuperKids Math Worksheet Creator. With this free online worksheet creator, you can quickly print a sheet to practice addition, subtraction, multiplication, fraction, order of operations, percentages, rounding, averages, exponents, factorials, prime numbers and many more. The great thing is that you can configure the worksheet the way you want. As an example, you can mix addition and subtraction, you can choose minimum and maximum numbers, you can choose to have only integers or to have decimals, you can choose whether you want common denominator or not, etc. And the best thing, you can also print the answer key!

The Common Craft Show

2009-03-09T23:00:00.000-07:00

If you are trying to teach modern computer science concepts to your students, especially those that have to do with web 2.0 in your computer science classroom, you will probably like The Common Craft Show. It is a series of videos produced with a white board and a few drawings on paper. But the simplicity works well as it makes concepts that are somewhat complex easier to understand. The videos are said to be in plain English so even your grandma could understand concepts like social media, twitter, web search strategy, phishing scams, podcasting, online photo sharing or blogs. The free versions of the videos are for "non-commercial" use, meaning that commerical organizations can't display the videos without their permission. However, if you need to use them for commercial use, there is a video store where you can purchase a license. I hope you will like these little videos... I do!

The visual dictionary

2009-03-08T08:37:00.000-07:00

This resource is a little treasure for all teachers and their students! The visual dictionary is now available on-line and is entirely free! It is not an imitation here. It is the real one published by Merriam-Webster and that is also available on paper and on CD-ROM. I already own the version on CD-ROM of this dictionary and I find it very difficult to always have to reinstall it when I reformat my computer or when I switch computer. Now, all I have to do is to bookmark the visual dictionary and it is available from any computer.

This is a very useful tool for students, especially those who better understand when looking at a picture. The dictionary is also useful when we can think mentally of an object, but we have no idea how to call it. As it is the case for the CD-ROM version, the dictionary is divided in 15 major themes such as plant kingdom, animal kingdom, house, food, science, arts, etc. The dictionary also include the audio version of each word, which is very useful for students who don't have English as their first language. I hope you will add a shortcut to this site on your computer desktop on in your web browser.

Calorielab

2009-02-28T11:00:00.000-08:00

It is usually easy to calculate calories and nutritional values from food bought at the supermarket since all the packages include a nutritional chart. When you are eating out, it is much harder to know. When teaching nutrition, keeping track of calorie intake is often part of the assignment, so you may want to recommend « Calorielab » to your students, as they will find the nutritional value of food served at most chain restaurants. They can also find nutritional value of tons of food avaiable on the market. It is a great calorie counter.

Tip of the Tongue

2009-02-20T23:00:00.000-08:00

"Tip of My Tongue" is a cool project that helps students and teachers looking for a word with incomplete information to find it. If you now what it starts with, or what it ends with or you have an idea of the length of the word, but you can't find it, this application will be very useful. Sometimes, you just have a word on the tip of your tongue. The dictionary that runs this website is not complete, but it contains enough words that you usually find what you are looking for. The project is under development, so it can only get better as time goes by.

Volcanoes webcams

2009-02-07T23:00:00.000-08:00

Did you know that many volcanoes have webcams capturing their activity 24 hours a day, every single day? If you are studying volcanoes with your students, they might find very interesting to watch some live shot of volcanoes on the surface of the earth. It may even me more amazing if you can a volcano on a webcam while it is active. Here is a list of websites where you can catch their activity on-line :

The Live Panorama of Halema 'uma'u, Kilauea Volcana in Hawai - webcam 2, webcam 3
The Alaska Volcano Observatory
The Mount St. Helens VolcanoCams

EduTube : The YouTube of Education

2009-02-06T23:00:00.000-08:00

If you use YouTube to look for educational videos to use in your classroom, you might be interested in using EduTube. It is like YouTube, without all the cut cate videos or teenagers doing dangerous stunts. Videos are not hosted by EduTube, but are categorized and filtered by this site. Original videos are hosted by video sharing websites like Youtube. It is an excellent way to find resources for teachers and students. You can also use it as a way for your students to search videos ensuring they only have access to quality educational videos. It is also possible to contribute to the website by recommending videos or links to educational videos. The interface is available in various languages.

iSign

2008-09-12T23:00:00.000-07:00

If you work with special education students who are deaf and you need to learn sign language, you may want to get an iPod Touch or an iPhone, because there is a great application to learn sign language: iSign. You can use it to learn the language or you can use it as a phrase book to communicate sporadically with deaf students. The phrase book is animated and comes with close to 300 words. It is well worth the price of $3.99 on the App Store.

Fractions

2007-09-17T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today, I would like to present a few online practice exercises about fractions for your students.

The first one is to help them better understand equivalent fractions.

The second one will help them compare fractions.

The third one will help them understand that a fraction is a part of a whole.

Finally, the last one is a practice at naming fractions.

Kideas

2007-09-16T11:00:00.000-07:00

Kideas is a great website if you are looking for ideas of for arts and craft projects. All the projects are simple and do not require complex material. In all, there are about 40 craft ideas. They all come with a pictures and a PDF giving all the material and instructions to do it.

There are also many colouring pages. For kids who prefer to be artistic with food, there is a "creative food" section. Finally, the parenting tools will be helpful for parents with tips and ideas such as how to make your own baby sling, how to prepare a weekly chore chart, a diaper and feeding chart of a homework log sheet and some lunch box notes!

A Kid's Photos

2007-09-15T11:00:00.000-07:00

A Kid's Photos is a website that provides you pictures for you as a teacher or for your students. The photos are available in four main topics : animals, scenic, flowers and objects. They are not very high resolution, but for most student projects, they will be appropriate. The photos are taken by the two authors of the website and the terms of use state that you may use the photos in any of your projects under the provisions that you may not include the photos in another collection for distribution, you may not claim the photos as your own and you do not directly link to the photos. Even if the collection is not complete and will not answer all your needs for photos, it is a great resource and you may always opt for a membership at www.clipart.com if you need more.

The Brain for Top to Bottom

2007-09-14T11:00:00.000-07:00

"The Brain from Top to Bottom" is a great site provided by McGill University and it will cater to high school students as well as college or university students. In fact, when reading an article, you get to choose at what level you want to read: beginner, intermediate or advanced. You can also start to read it at the beginner level and if you understood most of it, you can re-read it at the intermediate or advanced level.

In addition, when the site title says "From Top to Bottom", it also refers to the levels of organization. The reader can learn more about the brain at the molecular, cellular, neurological, psychological or social level. The website is useful for biology courses, but also for psychology and sociology courses as well.

The website is also divided by themes. Among the theme, you will find memory, pleasure and pain, emotions, evolution, movement, senses, mental disorders, development, language, sleep and dreams and consciousness. It is a gold mine of information in both French and English for high school teachers who refer to the brain in their classes.

WordChamp

2007-09-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

WordChamp is a very incredible tool to let your students practice the vocabulary while learning a second language. In order to use this website, you will first need to register and create a class. Registering is totally free and I tried to find if they will charge you something at a later date, but I couldn’t find any mention of it. Wow! Registering is quick and easy. When creating a class, you need to indicate the main first language of the students and the language they want to learn. It is also possible to create more than one class with only one account if you teach students at different levels or if not all your classes are learning the same second language.

Once the class is created, there is an option to print and instruction sheet for the students so they know how to access the system. As a teacher, it is possible to create many vocabulary exercises and flashcards that may be used as homeworks and include a deadline as to when they need to be completed. You may create your own list of words or you may choose from the database included with the website. Homeworks created fall in two categories: vocabulary exercises and reading exercises. Vocabulary exercises include translation, listening comprehension, dictation, reading practice, flashcards and pronunciation. The interface not only include the written version or words but sometimes include some visuals as well as audio files to let the students hear how the word is pronounce in both languages.

WordChamp will also let the student visit a website published in his or her second language. Without providing a full translation, students will be able to mouse over some words and get a translation as well as an audio file to hear how it is pronounced. This site is produced by linguists and is truly amazing. You should register to discover its full potential. The site supports many languages including English, French, German, Spanish, Japanese and Mandarin as well as dozens of other languages such as Slovak, Swedish, Romanian or Flemish.

A very simple calculator

2007-09-12T11:00:00.000-07:00

This is a quick and easy one. It is a very simple calculator. Obviously, it is not scientific or graphic, but it does the job in elementary school when students forget their own calculator.

Systole and diastole

2007-09-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

This animation of the heart is a great way to teach your students how the heart acts as a pump. The students can visually see the systole and the diastole and the contraction of the ventricle. A graph pressure vs. time shows the pressure in different part of the heart at different time. There is also a graph of an electrocardiogram and of the heart sounds. It is a great resource for biology teachers.

Kids' Lab

2007-09-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

The Kids' Lab present reading workouts that are designed for parents and teachers to work with students who need some practice with their reading skills.

They are designed to be done with an adult because the student can get confirmation when he or she is right and may be corrected when there is a misunderstanding. The reading workouts are available for these grade levels : kindergarten, first grade, second grade and third grade. The workouts put the emphasis on vocabulary development, phonics and phonemic awareness and reading comprehension. The workouts are not easy to find on the website at first. You need to use the "GO" menu in the top left corner of the screen.

QUIA - Physical or Chemical Change

2007-09-09T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here is a great quiz to teach your students the difference between physical and chemical changes. The quiz contains 20 questions including examples such as breaking glass, a rusting bicycle, spoiling food, bleaching your hair and burning leaves. Very simple but efficient.

200 Vocabulary Exercices

2007-09-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

The University of Victoria in British Columbia presents 200 vocabulary exercises for students learning English as a second language. The exercise is very simple and looks like a resource already presented on this blog : illustrated vocabulary. An image is presented to the student and he or she must select that proper word. The vocabulary words are in the following categories : furniture, school, office, home appliances, kitchen utensils, clothes, animals, coins and food. An interesting fact, the coin category is adapted to the Canadian audience.

NRC - Periodic Table

2007-09-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you need a periodic table, well layed-out and all in colour for your student, the one published by the National Research Council is great. It is available on-line as a website with an hyperlink for each element that takes your to a description and as a PDF, ready to be printed on cardstock and laminated to be used a reference in your students' binders.

Biology4kids

2007-07-16T08:35:00.000-07:00

Still part of the "4kids" series, "biology4kids" delivers concepts in biology in a language easy to understand by students at the end of elementary school. Unlike the other ones, this one starts with the scientific method, reasoning in science, experimental evidence, logical reasoning, deductive reasoning and inductive reasoning. This content is interesting, but it is a bit surprising to see it only in the biology unit.

The content of the biology website is very well layed-out with many pictures to enhance students understanding of the concepts. The content includes taxonomy, the kingdoms, labels and naming, relationship between organisms (commensalisms, competition, mutualism, parasitism, predator-prey), animal and plant cells, organelles, cell functions, osmosis, passive transport, active transport, mitosis, microorganisms, microscopes, prokaryotes, eukaryotes, fungus, photosynthesis, plant structure, invertebrates, arthropods, vertebrates, mammals, systems as well as some human anatomy and physiology. For each section, there is a quiz for student to check their understanding of the concepts. There is also a slideshow for some sections presenting many pictures with comments. A great introduction to biology!

Physics4kids

2007-07-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Physics4kids" is yet another website of the "4kids" family. It presents physics concept in a language that most students at the end of elementary school will be able to understand. There are quizzes throughout the website as the student get acquainted with the concepts to test their knowledge. The site presents the concept of motion including simple movements and complex movements, forces, acceleration, mass, lever, vectors, the three laws of motion, instantaneous velocity, transfer of energy and work. Even as an adult, if all of this is just a big nightmare of your past when you were in high school, you can relax and read through it. You will realize that it is not that bad.

Other topics covered include : thermodynamics (energy transfer, expansion, heat, temperatures, first and second laws of thermodynamics, enthalpy and entropy), optics (electromagnetic radiation, visible light, light structure, reflection, refraction, lenses and lasers), electricity and magnetism (charges, conductors, electric fields, magnetic fields, current, resistance, Faraday's law, Coulomb's law, magnet and AC/DC power) and modern physics (nuclear physics, quantum physics, radioactivity, fission, fusion and reactors).

Cosmos4kids

2007-07-12T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Cosmos4kids" is part of the same series than the site I presented yesterday : Chem4kids. It is a great introduction to space and astronomy with a language that most students at the end of elementary school should understand. The website design is appealing and subjects covered by this website include :the origins of the universe, gravity, the vacuum of space and electromagnetic radiations. The site also talks about galaxies and stars, including the Milky Way, constellations, black holes and clusters. Students will also get information about the solar system and all the planets that are part of it and other solar system details such as the solar wind, the heliosphere, the heliopause, the asteroid belt, asteroids, the Kuiper Belt, Comets and moons. There is also a technology component that includes spacecrafts, probes and satellites used to explore the universe.

Chem4kids

2007-07-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

Now this is chemistry made easy! "Chem4kids" presents many different chemistry concepts in a language that most students at the end of elementary school and beginning of high school will understand. It is great to present the three states of matter and the changes from one state to another. Students can also learn about mixtures and solutions, alloys and amalgams. They also discover how neutrons, protons and electrons form atoms that can be combined to form molecules. They are introduced to the periodic table of elements. It also talks about reactions, stoichiometry, thermodynamics, equilibrium, catalysts and inhibitors as well as acids and bases. There is also an introduction to biochemistry. It is certainly too simple for advanced chemistry course in high school, but it is great for younger students who have an interest in the subject.

Catalogue of Illusions

2007-07-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

No, we are not talking about a catalogue for magicians here, we are talking science. As you can see on this image, there seems that be imaginary black dots appearing randomly. This is an optical illusion. If you are teaching your students perception or just the five classical senses, this catalogue of optical illusions will be a success with your students as they will be amazed by what they see. The catalogue includes illusions in the following categories : Geometrical illusions, Lightness illusion, Color illusion and Anomalous motion illusion. Some classical optical illusions include : Müller-Lyer illusion, Ebbinghaus illusion, Zöllner illusion, Café Wall illusion, Fraser illusion and Poggendorff illusion.

Air Travelers

2007-07-09T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching the properties of fluids and the properties of air at the elementary level, the web site "Air Travelers" will certainly be a good source of ideas then planning your lessons. It will provide you activities to explore buoyancy, the properties of hot air, the properties of helium and the effect of wind on a balloon. There is also a guide in PDF to build a hot hair balloon with all the details. There is a teacher guide and well as a section providing the science background information to truly understand hot air balloons. In the gallery section, you can watch pictures and videos of hot air balloons.

English Grammar Quizzes Using JavaScript

2007-07-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching English as a second language, this site, "English Grammar Quizzes in Javascript", will be good practice for your students. It contains tons of computerized little quizzes to test their knowledge of the English Grammar. It is all multiple choice and the student gets immediate feedback after he or she answered. It covers many concepts of the English grammar including nouns, verbs, pronouns, punctuation, misplaced words, prepositions, participles, etc. It comes with five level of difficulty : easy, easy to medium, medium, medium to difficult and difficult. All the quizzes are written in JavaScript, so they should run easily in your web browser.

Curriculum Material for the Ontario Curriculum

2007-07-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you teach in Ontario in grade 9, 10 or 11 in one of the following subjects, this "Curriculum Material for the Ontario Curriculum" website will certainly be very valuable for you : Science, Language, Physical Education, Technology, Mathematics, Native Studies. The website contains Unit Plans, Worksheets, Assignments, Organizers, Rubrics, Checklists & Scales, Tests & Exams and more. All the documents and worksheets are available in MS-Word Format, so you can easily modify them to suit the needs of your students. For some of the courses, almost all the units are covered, but some courses are incomplete. As an example, the geography grade 9 course has over 50 photocopy ready worksheets. Even if you don't teach in Ontario, you may find some documents that will be useful and will match the curriculum in your state, province or country.

Graphic Organizers

2007-07-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Graphic Organizers" is a great website offering printable graphic organizers in Word or PDF format. Using those tools, students will be able to better organize their ideas when writing text. They can also use those graphic organizers to sort their knowledge in mathematics, science and social studies. There are over 70 organizers that you may download for free on that website.

Graphics organizers may be used to sort information, to compare and contrast, to research, to study, to sequence, to create a hierarchy, to determine cause and effect and to present concepts. Some of the organizers available on this website include : Two-Way and Three-Way Venn diagrams, Spider Web, Who/What/When/Why/How/Where, Compare and Contrast Charts, Comparing Maps, T-Chart, Source Cards, Boolean Search, Research Planning, Division of Labour Chart, Cycle Chart, Event Sequencing, Branching, etc.

Snacks at the exploratorium

2007-07-03T11:00:00.000-07:00

The Exploratorium is the museum of science, art and human perception in San Francisco. Since most of us live far from the museum, they have a section called "Snacks". However, they're not the kind you eat. They're the kind you can learn from and have fun with. Exploratorium Science Snacks are miniature versions of some of the most popular exhibits at the Exploratorium.

These "snaks" are short experiments that can easily be presented as demo in your classroom. They require material that is very easy to find. They include perception experiments as well as physics and earth science experiments. Students can explore colours, mirrors, Bernoulli's principle, blind spot, center of gravity, magnetism, resonance, electroscope, geyser, batteries, pendulums, peripheral vision, pinhole camera, resonators, spectra, motors, vectors and many more. Each experiment includes material, assembly steps, what to do and notice and an explanation of what is going on.

Kids Gardening

2007-07-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

Gardening may be very beneficial for youth. "Kids Gardening" is aimed at helping young minds grow. The website includes a teachers' resource room and a family resource room. You will find many classroom projects and activities and some classroom stories. If you want to get a greenhouse at your school, there is a "how-to" guide. In the teachers' room, there are lesson plans, stories, projects and web resources. Subjects include pollinator, hydroponics, plant-insect interactions, seeds, Dutch Gardens bulbs, greenhouse and harvesting. The family room include articles about the following subjects : Gardening at Every Age, What Turns Kids On and Off to Gardening, Start With a Design, Growing Big; Garden Structures Kids Love, Theme Gardens, Plants Kids Love, Starting Small; A Place a Kid Can Call Her Own, Who’s Taking Care of This Garden Anyway, Gardening Safely and So You Don’t Have Time and Space for Another Garden.

ChemTeam : A Tutorial for High School Chemistry

2007-06-29T11:00:00.000-07:00

The ChemTeam provides study resources in all standard topics for students in high school and Advanced Placement chemistry. It doesn't seem like it has been updated since 2004 and not all the topics in the menu are covered yet, however, for the information that is already there, it is worth a visit. The site is easy to navigate and information can be found without a problem. However, the look of the website is a bit too simple. It is all black text on a white background without pictures.

It covers subject such as Acid Base, Atomic Structure, Bonding & Isomerism, Chemical Equations & Reaction Types, Electrons in Atoms & Spectroscopy, Equilibrium, Kinetic Molecular Theory & Gas Laws, Matter, Physical Properties,The Mole, Nomenclature, Kinetics, Metric System, Radioactivity, Reduction Oxidation, Significant Figures & Scientific Notation, Solutions, Concentration & Colligative Properties, Stoichiometry and Thermochemistry.

Make Your Own Word Search

2007-06-28T11:00:00.000-07:00

Word searches are an excellent way for your students to review important vocabulary. Making one yourself can be painful and very time consuming. "Make Your Own Word Search" makes the development of new word searches very easy. In order to produce your own word search, all you need to do is to enter the list of words you want to include and then click the "Create Puzzle" button.

After you entered all the words, the system will then generate a grid with all the words that are included in the list. You can change many parameters before starting your grid including: Rows, Columns, Font Size, language on the grid and Background colour. Have fun using it!

Make Your Own Printable Sudoku Puzzles

2007-06-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

According to wikipedia, Sudoku is "a logic-based number placement puzzle. The objective is to fill a 9x9 grid so that each column, each row, and each of the nine 3x3 boxes contains the digits from 1 to 9. The puzzle setter provides a partially completed grid." If you students are not addicted to completing Sudoku grids, this "Make Your Own Printable Sudoku Puzzles" will certainly be very useful and it is very easy to use as well. All you need to do is to choose the difficulty level and click "Generate New Puzzle". You also get to customize the worksheet by adding your own instructions and title. You can also add a line for students to write their name. You can also generate the answer key.

Interactive body

2007-06-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

This "interactive body" game is very well designed and is highly visual. The game starts with a human body and students have to choose between organs, muscles, skeleton or nervous systems. Both the male and female bodies are available. Various organs or muscles or bones are presented to the students. He or she can rotate them to see them in 3D and must locate where they should be in the human body by dragging them to the proper location. If the student is unable to locate it properly, he or she can read a hint. This great game is sponsored by the BBC. If you are using a Mac, the site doesn't work with Safari 3, but works great with Camino.

All Kinds of minds

2007-06-25T11:00:00.000-07:00

"All kinds of minds" is a very useful collection of documents and information for kids who are learning differently. It presents learning disabilities in a very positive way. The online parents toolkit is great with sections on mathematics, reading, writing and attention. It includes firsthand experiments that simulate visual and auditory distractions for parents and teachers to truly understand what it is to learn with a disability. For each condition, the basics are given and the difficulties are described. Strategies on how to cope with the difficulties are provided as well as a list of resources. The site is constantly updated with news and recent content. This is a web resource that should be added to your bookmark no matter if you work in a special education classroom or in a regular classroom.

Powerpoint templates

2007-06-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are the kind of teacher using multimedia presentations a lot but you find the background included with PowerPoint to be a bit boring, this website is for you. It includes tons of new PowerPoint templates (backgrounds) that you can include in your multimedia presentations. Categories include business, creative, education, finance, humour, holidays, social, spots, science, technology, abstracts, frames, textures, etc. All backgrounds are available as pictures so you can use the Format Slide Background menu to change the picture. Instructions are included with each package on how to do it in PowerPoint. In total, there are 720 new backgrounds on this website.

Quiz Myself

2007-06-21T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Quiz Myself" is a good tool if you want to prepare computerized multiple-choice questions or flash cards for your students. You can produce quizzes even without opening an account, but you won't be able to modify them if you don't have an account. Opening an account is free.

This tool is a bit different from one I presented a few months ago. "Hot potatoes" let you produced computerized quizzes but you need access to a server to upload the files to make them accessible to your students through the web. "Quiz Myself" will host the quiz for you. Once the quiz is complete, you get a URL (a link) that you can give to your students. When preparing a quiz, you can assign a category, a discipline, a subject and even a specific course.

e-Pals

2007-06-20T11:00:00.000-07:00

E-Pals is a great way to foster literacy, language and critical thinking skills in a fun and safe environment. It is a network to match classrooms around the world for students to have penpals. It is a great tool for classroom-to-classroom for project sharing. Educators around the world can also connect using that service. When searching a classroom, it is possible to enter criteria such as city, province, country, age group, language and special categories (such as preschool, gifted, special education, undergrad, etc). Using that free service, it is possible to connect with over 7 million students and teachers from 191 countries in a safe online environment.

Big Valley Then and Now

2007-06-19T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Big Valley Then and Now" is a great website for history teachers who want to compare the lifestyle 100 years ago with today's lifestyle. The comparison presents similarities and differences for the town of Big Valley. The comparison includes architecture, communication, education, fashion, government, industry, railroads and Mines, recreation, religion, technology and transportation. For each of these subjects, the website presents how it was in the early 1900 and how it is nowadays. This tools is provided by "Our roots" a website sponsored by Heritage Canada, Laval University and the University of Calgary.

Illustrated vocabulary

2007-06-18T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you teach English as a second language, "Illustrated vocabulary"is a good source of exercises to help your students practice basic vocabulary. Students look at a picture and then need to select the name of the object from a multiple choice. Exercises include pictures in various categories including: food, architecture, office, colours, school, shapes, hospital, garden, days, months, jobs, music, tools, seasons, transportation, sports and zoo. After completing each exercise, students may check their answer and get their score.

Cells Alive

2007-06-15T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Cells Alive" is amazing resource for biology teachers who want to introduce their students to cell biology, microbiology, immunology and microscopy. It includes interactive demonstration such as " how big" where the students starts with the head of a pin and zoom in to see a human hair, dust mites, pollen, blood cells, E.Coli and virus. Students will see how each of the things compared in size to the others. Student may also "watch" mitosis and meiosis using interactive demonstration going through all the phases. They can also go through the cell cycle.

In addition, they can watch the organelles in a cell plant or animal plant and learn about their functions. All of these activities are interactive and highly visual. There are Word Puzzles and Jigsaw Puzzles related to cell biology to let them have some fun while learning. A few quizzes about cell biology, the immune system and microbes will let them test their knowledge.

Students may also use a biocam to look at cancer cells or bacteria. There are cell galleries of pictures and for those who prefer to look at non-living things, there is a crystal gallery of pictures. There are also some tips on how to enhance an image when using a microscope. This resource is just great! If you teach biology, you will certainly use it.

Virtual Platonic Solids

2007-06-14T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you want to show your students what tetrahedrons, cubes, octahedrons, dodecahedrons and icosahedrons really look like, this "virtual platonic solids application" will be a great addition in your math classes. The application is provided by Utah State University. It will let the student select which platonic solid he or she wants. Then, the student can apply a colour and using the mouse, rotate the solid in 3D. He or she may change the size of it using a slider and can also change the way it appears using different "skins" including filled solid or wire frame solid. It is also possible to see it as a dual solid (one inside the other).

Groundwork Exploration

2007-06-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

Groundwork Exploration is an exploration website provided by Science North, a science center is Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. There is a case study where students will learn more about the discovery of nickel and copper riches at Voisey's Bay, Newfoundland. A quiz also let students test their knowledge about Canada's mining industry. Texts are in a language that is easy to read and understand by most elementary school students. The main feature is the exploration portion of the website. In this part, students are invited to join the cartoon character to explore for gold, copper or diamonds on a "virtual property"! They learn to be an exploration geologist, to piece together the clues to help pinpoint the ideal drilling site. The site is available in both English and French.

Mineral Collection of David Jegou

2007-06-12T11:00:00.000-07:00

David Jegou owns a major collection of minerals. He has taken over 100 pictures with descriptions of all the specimens in his collection and included all of them on the website. The collection is composed of commons species as well as unusual species. The gallery is organized in four sections: French specimens, Spanish specimens, Korean specimens and everything else. It includes specimens such as barite, calcite, dolomite, fluorite, gypsum, molybdenite, pyrite, quartz, topaz and tourmaline. David Jegou states clearly that the pictures are copyrighted and may not be reproduced by anyone without obtaining permission. However, the website is great for students to browse through the pictures.

Volcano World

2007-06-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

Volcano World is a Collaborative Higher Education, K-12, and Public Outreach project of the North Dakota and Oregon Space Grant Consortia administered by the Department of Geosciences at Oregon State University. It presents news and information about volcanoes in the world with pictures and links. Right now, the East Java's Mud Volcano in Indonesia is featured on the main page. There are also pictures of Canary Island volcanic features. It also includes some sample project of volcano building in classrooms with some ideas on how to build a good volcano. There are also pictures from the space showing volcanoes on other planets. It is a link to add to your bookmarks if you are teaching earth science and volcanic eruptions.

Animal Corner

2007-06-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

Animal corner is a website that will certainly appeal to the animal lovers in your classroom. It is the place to meet the animals of the world. The website is graphically attractive and it includes many data sheets about various animals in different categories : wildlife, reptiles, pets, insects, farm animals, marine life, rainforests and Galapagos Wildlife. Students aged 9-14 will find texts that are not too difficult to read with many pictures. It is the perfect resource for students doing a research project about an animal. Some of the animal described includes : cats, dogs, guinea pigs, hamsters, mice, camels, elephants, gorillas, hippos, lions, rhinos, zebra, ants, centipedes, bees, wasps, beetles, worms, sheep, pigs, cows, horses, crabs, dolphins, penguins, seals, sharks and whales.

Money Origami

2007-06-09T22:02:00.001-07:00

The money origami website is a great resource for teachers who want step-by-step instruction for origami. The models include: Boots, Bow Tie, Butterfly, Eyeglasses, Fan, Gift Box, Picture Frame, Ring, Sailboat, Serpent, Shirt, Spider, Valentine and Xmas Tree. All the models are made from paper bills and step-by-step instructions with pictures at each step are included. It also includes links to other website containing instruction to make origami. The models also make great gifts for special occasion such as mother's day or father's day.

Worksheets To Go (by Discovery Education)

2007-06-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

The discovery channel offers a worksheets generator on its education website. The worksheets are available in many different categories including : Arts, Mathematics, Science, Health, Social Studies, Information Technology and Foreign Language.

All worksheets were created by teachers. Worksheets are organized by category and listed by title and grade level. In each category there are many sub-categories. Each sub-category has many exercises. Worksheets include matching exercises as well as scramble exercises. They are formatted in HTML so the layout is not the best when printed.

Ludwig Van Beethoven

2007-06-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are presenting the great composers to your students in your music class, this website about Ludwig Van Beethoven is all you need. Students will find mp3 and midi files with Beethoven's music. There is also Beethoven's family tree. There are also some copies of love letters sent by Beethoven. A section containing anecdotes is called "curiosities" and includes interesting facts such as the two Voyagers space probes traveling with a recording of Beethoven's music. There is also a list of shows for the current month including radio and TV stations. A "school" section will guide the students to the most important parts of the website.

The Underground Railroad in Canada

2007-06-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you teach black history in North America to your students, this Web Site produced by Parks Canada presents lessons about the Underground Railroad. These lessons target students from 10 to 14 years old. The five topics covered by the lessons are :

Who am I? What am I? (Quiz)
Deborah Brown - Free at Last, Free at Last!
Underground Railroad Novel Studies
The Underground Railroad Pattern of Settlement
Secret Songs and Words of the Underground Railroad

Each lesson includes an overview, a purpose, the objectives, resource material, activities as well as expectations. Expectations are from the Ontario curriculum for social studies, history and geography, however these concepts could also be covered in other curriculums. Resource material includes all the texts that students will need to read. The page layout is better suited for Web browser than paper. Activities lack many pictures which are necessary with this age group. The information presented is very interesting and very appropriate for these students.

Learn about intelectual property

2007-06-05T11:00:00.000-07:00

The Canadian Intellectual Property Office offers short videoclips for students interested in learning more about intellectual property. The videos feature Canada's promising young scientists tackling tough questions in mini-interviews held during the Canada-Wide Science Fair 2006 in Saguenay.

Students who watch these video clips will found out how the science fair projects came about, how the exhibitors became interested, the process for doing the project, the scientific approach, the importance of a logbook, the most difficult step, the involvement of a mentor as well as their opinion on intellectual property. Parts of the videos are in English and parts of them are in French. All videos are in Windows Movie Player format.

Lab safety

2007-06-04T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are doing many laboratory activities with your students, there is a good list of Safety measures that should be followed on the Edquest website. This include knowing the WHMIS (Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System) system and symbols. Once the students are done studying the lab safety notes they can take the Hazardous material safety quiz and the Safety Test. The test include multiple choice questions and the answer at the end.

Spanish Grammar Exercises

2007-06-03T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching Spanish, those interactive "Spanish Grammar Exercises" will certainly be useful. They are available free or charge and are provided by Barbara Kuczun Nelson from Colby College.

Some of the exercises are written exercises while others involved the viewing of a short QuickTime video or listening to an audio clip. They include subjects such as Adjectives & nouns, Adverbs, Command forms, Conditional tense, Demonstrative adjectives, Future tense, Interrogative words, Negative/affirmative words, Numbers, Past participle, Present tense, Pronouns, Ser vs estar , Time and many others.

Another source of clipart for schools

2007-06-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Clipart 4 schools" is another good source of free clipart for students and teachers to use in the classroom. The images are provided by Jupiter Images and may be used freely as long as it is for non-profit.

The images are not full high resolution, however, they are available at 640 x 480 which is appropriate for most worksheets or educational websites. The images are available in categories such as agriculture, animals, cartoons, computers, food, Holidays, household, landscape, medical, music, nature, people, religions and many more. The interface is available in about 10 languages including English, Spanish and French. There is also a collection of animated GIF for your school or classroom website. Be careful, there is a lot of links to commercial clipart libraries as well!

The maths file game show

2007-06-01T11:00:00.000-07:00

Do you want to let your students practice maths in a fun way? The Math file game show is design to do that with the ancient mathematical hosts Hypatia and Pythagoras. The site is provided by BBC education and it includes on-line games as well as games available as printouts. The games are available in the following categories: numbers, data handling, algebra as well as shape, space and measure.

The on-line games are always available for three level of difficulty. The games use they Macromedia Showckwave technology, making they visually attractive. The printouts include games and exercises such as cross number, snap charts, writing cheques, budgeting and spending and sorting books based on the Dewey system.

Free School Clipart

2007-05-31T11:00:00.000-07:00

Here is a quick tip for today. If you need free clipart for your class and you don't need hi-resolution, this website contains many royalty-free cliparts that you may use for worksheets, lesson plans, quizzes, websites, and other classroom needs or the students may use in their assignments. However, the liscence agreement, requests that you link back to the « Free Clipart at School » website.

There are multiple subjects available including sports, books, religion, money, military, medical, science, animals, plants and computers. The cliparts are very small in size with low resolution. They are ok to be used on the Web or in small formats on worksheets, however, if you enlarge them, they will become pixilated.

The conjugator

2007-05-30T11:00:00.000-07:00

The conjugator is a great resource for students who need to conjugate verbs in English, French and Spanish. Unfortunately, the interface for all three versions is only available in French, but it is so minimal (only a few buttons and a drop-down menu) that most users should be able to get by. Once you get on the site, all you have to do is to enter the verb you want to conjugate and select whether you want the affirmative, interrogative or negative form. If you don't enter the infinitive or if you enter an incomplete verb or a verb that is not recognize, the conjugator will suggest the closest match.

The French version of the conjugator, "le conjugueur" will let you conjugate any verb in French including all the tenses (simple and compound) in the passive and active voice. There are also some buttons for students to enter the accented characters. Since the French language verbs are way more complex that the ones in English, this resource is very useful for Second Language Students.

The third version is for Spanish : "El conjugador". Again, it includes buttons for accented characters. For all versions, it is possible to print the page or to export a RTF that is better suited for printouts.

Social Studies for kids

2007-05-29T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Social Studies for kids" is a web portal is a collection of resources for social studies aimed at students and teachers. It includes a section called "this week in history. It presents an important event that happened sometimes in the past during the same week as we are. The site is geared toward social studies in the US, so there is a section about US government. The articles are presented in a language quite simple for elementary and secondary school students. It also includes information about US history and geography. In addition to the US, world geography and history are also covered. Some of the subjects link to other websites while some of the subjects are covered directly on www.socialstudiesforkids.com. There is a section with fun facts such as the fact we read from left to right for no specific reason and the fact that Galileo didn't really invent the telescope. The glossary is also well designed based on historical events rather than being solely alphabetical. There is also a discussion forum for teachers and students who want to chat about geography and history.

Literacy Development

2007-05-28T11:00:00.000-07:00

Dr. Janice Skowron is an educational consultant specializing in differentiated instruction and reading and writing development. She has her own website to advertise her services and workshops. She also provides free resources on the web available as word files about "Literacy development". If you are interested in increasing literacy in your classroom, there is information on vocabulary development and reading comprehension strategies.

There are also rubrics to help you with the assessment of informational essays, journal writing and story writing. Although Dr. Skowron is located in Illinois, the rubrics follow the four levels used in Ontario, so they may be used easily by Canadian or American teachers. The following documents are also available: How and Why Graphic Organizer, Brain Chain Organizer, Read Reflect Connect, Quick Write Organizer, Understanding Connecting Explaining. All the documents are in Microsoft Word format, so they may be modified to better suit your needs. On her website, she also advertises her book including: "Differentiated Instruction: Guided and Independent Learning for All Students" and "Understanding Stories".

The Why files

2007-05-27T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you want to give your student a better understanding of scientific news, the "Why Files" are specifically design for that purpose. The files are published by the University of Wisconsin in order to get the science behind the news. The site is updated weekly with new articles that uncover scientific concepts based on the news. Topic such as BBQ, Hepatis C, Vioxx, Hurricane Season, Archeology in the ocean, Managing malaria and the necessity of Sharks are all subjects that have been covered in the past few weeks. The top five subjects include electric cars, school violence, skin cancer, steroid in sports and tornadoes. The website also includes some interactive demonstration. They are in Java and users get to control some parameters and look at their effect. Subjects include:

Make rainbows

Control a tornado

Play with lightning

Make a snowflake

Hit a home run

There is also a section called CSI. It doesn't have the regular meaning. It actually means "Cool Science Images". Those images are available in the following fields of science : biology, Earth and Space, Environment, Health, Physical Science and Technology. Each image is described in details (e.g., the image on the right is a picture of pollen). In general, the images are very cool and not easy to get for a school.

The lessons plans for teachers are also very useful. They are based on the article of the Why files, however, they include some discussion questions, some ideas for activities and a multiple choice quiz for students to check their understanding of the topic.

US History

2007-05-26T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching history in the United States, this US history site is an amazing resource. The site doesn't contain much information but it is a great collection of links to other websites. It covers the history of the States from the early beginning to today. It includes topics such as the revolution, civil war, industrialization, World War I, World War II and the US presidents.

About the presidents, the site also includes some presidential quotes for each of them. There is also a timeline going from the Native American, the arrival of Columbus and the original 13 colonies, all the way to today's history including the conflicts in the Middle East and global economy. There are also some lessons plans available specifically developed for teachers.

Maps4free

2007-05-25T11:00:00.000-07:00

Maps4free is a great resource for geography teachers. It is a database of all the countries from A to Z. When clicking on a country, a page of the country appears on the screen including a map, some background information about it, a lot of detailed geographic information, information about people (such as population, age structure, age, growth rate, birth rate, death rate, sex ratio, nationality, languages, HIV, etc.)

There is also information about the governement, the economy, communications, transportations, military and other issues. There is also a picture of the national flag. It is a great resource for students doing research project on a country.

50 United States Quiz

2007-05-24T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching American geography, this "50 United States Quiz" is for you and your students. It includes over a 1000 multiple-choice questions that are presented randomly. The questions are available in the following categories: State Capitals, Bordering States, State Nicknames, State Flowers, State Birds, State Trees, State Induction Dates, State Sizes, Presidential Birthplaces, Historical Parks, National Parks, Bodies of Water, State Populations, Cities and Towns, and Famous Places. The look of the website is very simple and plain, sometimes too much. In addition, the buttons are not intuitive. They are using radio button (usually for options) instead of the regular "OK" or "Continue" button. However, once the user gets used to the odd interface, the quiz is a lot of fun.

Egyptian name translator

2007-05-23T11:00:00.000-07:00

If you are teaching the Great Civilizations including the Egyptians to your students, this "Egyptian name translator" is for you. The tool is so simple, anyone can use it. All you have to do, is to click on the letters to type your name. As you click on each letter, an Egyptian hieroglyph appears on the top row. When you are done writing your name, you have the Egyptian "translation" on your screen. The maximum number of letters that can be entered is 11. If you have a long name, you may have to enter it in two parts. There is no export feature, but you can always do a screen grab. Have fun!

Cyberwise

2007-05-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

Whether you are a parent, a teacher or a social worker, Cyberwise will certainly be a very useful resource if you have children or students using the Internet. Children and teenagers are using the Internet more and more yet, they don't seem to be aware of the dangers in that world. They are giving out personal information to stranger, something they would never do when they go downtown. The website includes five section: one for children, one for teens, one for parents, one for teachers and one for professionals.

Teens are often more knowledgeable than parents and teachers when it comes to the on-line world. It is necessary for parents and teachers to get to know more the Internet in order to guide children and teens in using the Internet safely. Luring has been a common problem on the Internet, however, recently, cyberbullying has increased in secondary schools. Sometimes, the bullying comes from people they know at school or in their classroom, not from strangers. Teachers need to be aware that some of the bullying in their class may not happen in their classroom or at recess time, but in a virtual world. The website offers many videos that may be used in the classroom to make students think and start discussions.

Pattern Blocs

2007-05-21T11:00:00.000-07:00

You want to use pattern blocs with your students in a fun and easy way? This pattern blocs application let your students use pattern blocs virtually on the computer. The blocs are exactly the same as the one you have at school (yellow hexagon, red trapezoid,, green triangle, blue parallelogram, wooden lozenge, orange square). Students can move them and rotate them. They can put them side-by-side or have them overlap. It is also an excellent tool to assign homeworks with the pattern blocks without the need to send boxes of pattern blocks home.

MapMachine

2007-05-20T11:00:00.000-07:00

MapMachine is a great resource available through the National Geographic website. You can get road map and satellite views of the earth, but it is more than your regular map website such as mapquest or google maps. It also provides a physical map showing the landscape as well as theme maps. The most interesting feature of this map website is the collection of theme maps. They are very useful for teaching geography. The theme maps include population density, habitats, natural resources, vegetation, mining, farming, natural disasters and weather. The picture on the left shows a map of the earthquakes on the west coast of the United States. The application also includes the usual feature such as the possibility to drag the map or zoom in and zoom out.

Biodidac

2007-05-19T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today's resource will be very useful for biology teachers : it is a database of pictures for biology classes : Biodidac. It is possible to search for pictures and drawings in both French and English and this site is hosted by the university of Ottawa. Pictures are available for organismal biology, human biology as well as histology. In the organismal biology category, there are entries for the five kingdoms. Pictures may be used for free in the classroom as long as they are not used for a commercial purpose. It is also important to mention the source of the picture and we have to register each use on the website. This last step is necessary to help the Biodidac team to get the funds necessary to provide this resource on the web.

English Banana

2007-05-18T11:00:00.000-07:00

English Banana is a site similar to the one presented yesterday, except that the format of the worksheet is better. It includes over 750 worksheeets to teach English. All the worksheets can be photocopied for use in the classroom and they are free. You have to be careful however, because on the site, there is all stuff that you need to pay. They are all available in PDF and some are also available as word documents. There are tons of activities on various subjects including verbs, adjectives, spelling, grammar, syllables, numbers, speaking and listening, sentence building, etc. Worksheets are available at three levels : elementary, intermediate and advance.

Spelling it Right

2007-05-17T11:00:00.000-07:00

"Spelling it Right" is a website providing worksheet for student to learn spelling. Most of the exercices are easy enough to be used at the elementary level. The website is very simple as it is only text-based. There are no graphic or animation, which sometimes make the site too plain, however, it will be very fast loading on a dial-up connection. The worksheets are also text-based, which is not the best format for printing. It would have been better to have formatted PDF ready for printout.

Exercices cover the following topics : syllables, consonants blends, prefixes, suffixes, word endings, vowels and plurals. There are a few interactive games such as a hangman game. There are word search worksheets as well as instructions for other games. For teachers of other subjects, there is a section with word-lists in Science, Maths, English, Geography

Hands-on filmmaking

2007-05-16T11:00:00.000-07:00

Today, I would like to show you a resource published by the national film board (NFB). They are "hands-on workshops" that will let students discover the magic of filmmaking. The visual layout of the website is interesting but download speeds are terrible. In addition, videos are available as Real Player files instead of the popular format of Windows Media Player or Apple QuickTime.

One of the most interesting activity on the website is producing animation movies using modeling clay. I have tried this activity myself in my history class and it was a success. The material needed for this activity is quite simple: modeling clay, a digital camera and movie editing software (such as Windows Movie Maker for Windows XP or iMovie that comes on the Mac). All your students need to do, is to build a background and make some characters using modeling clay. They take a picture (e.g. one every half second) and then slightly move the characters between each picture. Pictures are then imported in movie editing software where students can add voice, music and sound effect. Students just love this activity. Unfortunately, the website provides very little information on how to do it, but don't worry, it is very easy! The site provides videos showing some sample projects.

The site also includes a section on how to do a storyboard (a story, frame-by-frame of your movie with pictures) as well as "picture-this", a section where students can imagine their character based on their own style.

Math and flight

2007-05-15T11:00:00.000-07:00

Your students have a passion for flying objects such as jets, space shuttle, rockets or airplanes? You would like to use this passion to make mathematics more interesting? The "Math Activities for K-12 Teachers" website developed by the California Polytechnic State University in conjunction with the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center is an amazing resource to do that. Math activities are divided by grade including K-4, 5-8 and 9-12. Each lesson plan is based on one or more aircraft.

Lessons are based on the NCTM Standards 2000 (US Curriculum), but could also stir the interest of any student who likes aircrafts. Units used are imperial, so activities might have to be modified for school in countries where the metric system is used. At the elementary level, lessons include concepts such as estimation, shape identification, basic graphing, subtraction and symmetry. At the intermediate level, lessons include concepts such as angle measurements, area and volume, converting units, Pythagorean theorem, rational numbers and graphing. At the senior level, concepts include logarithms, parabolic paths, relationship and Pythagorean theorem.

Kids Health

2007-05-14T11:00:00.000-07:00

Kids health is a great website to provide information to kids about health and is sponsored by the Nemours Foundation. The site is available in English and Spanish. There are three versions of the website : one for parents, one for kids and one for teens. The site is visually attractive and in the information is presented in a language easily read by kids or teens. It includes tips for dealing with feelings, for staying healthy and for dealing with everyday illnesses and injuries. There is also an excellent guide on puberty.

There is also a section about the human body where the student can use a magnifying glass to zoom on certain parts of the body and learn about them. There is a lot of easy to read information about each organ. It is a very good resource for research projects on the human body. There are also a few games such as Halloween Candy, a game in which the student realize how many calories there are in candies. "Mission Nutrition" is also a game in which they determine how good is their nutrition. It also includes some movies about asthma, how body works and how we play. For those who would like to do science fair project about health, there are some easy to do experiments that are described in details.

The teen version of the site includes information about topic such as drugs, alcohol, tattoos, etc. It also provides information about sexually transmitted diseases and birth control. There are also some tips on how to cope with school and a part-time job. The site is very complete and provides good information. Also, many sites about health are sponsored by pharmaceutical companies and they have a commercial interest. This site doesn't seem to promote products.

SMARTS

2007-05-13T11:00:00.000-07:00

You have students who are very high achiever and they would like to enter the science fair? The Smarts Guide to Science Fairs is a document that is aimed at advanced students who are willing to compete at science fair at a high level. It doesn't seem to be designed for elementary students or for beginners. It's produced by the Youth Science Foundation, which organize the Canada-Wide Science Fair. Even is some of the information related specifically to science fairs in Canada, most of the tips presented can be useful to anyone entering a science fair. It is presented as a list of 20 steps from choosing a topic to participating in the international science fair. It also includes topics such as doing research, picking your project type, writing a hypothesis, experimental design, conducting the experiment, statistical & data analysis, discussion, writing a conclusion and writing a report.

Explorelearning

2007-05-12T11:00:00.000-07:00

Explorelearning is an amazing website designed to let students experience math and science with Gizmos. What are Gizmos you may think? They are on-line simulations that power inquiry and understanding of the concepts. They are short "Shockwave" application that will run directly in your web browser, provided that you have the shockwave plugin installed.

Each Gizmo will let the students change some variables and watch the impact directly on the screen through the simulation. As an example, this Gizmo about Golf Range let you change the initial speed of the ball as well as the angle. You can also choose whether the atmosphere will be composed of air or nothing. It is even possible to change more advanced variable such as gravity and the height of the golfer. During and after the experiment, the student can then measure final speed in x and y, the range of the ball, time, height reached, etc. There are even multiple choice questions for assessment after the experiment.

There is also a demonstration video that shows you hot to use Gizmos to their full potential. Gizmos are sorted by grade and subjects, so it is very easy to find the one you need. In mathematics, they cover geometry, algebra, number sense, measurements, etc. In Science, they cover physical science, life science, physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy and earth sciences. Some examples of Gizmos are : Kepler's Law, polling, cells, ecology, human biology, solving equations, patterns, linear functions, nonlinear functions, perimeter, area, volume, etc. Activities are included for grade 6 to 12. There is one downside to this website. It is only free for five minutes per day, which means, each computer at your school may only access Gizmos for 5 minutes each. There is a cookie stored in your Internet browser cache that keeps track of your usage of the Gizmos. However, the site is well worth paying because there are so many Gizmos.

Treble Clef and Bass Clef

2007-05-11T11:00:00.000-07:00

Treble Clef and Bass Clef is a very cool program to teach your students, in a fun and easy way, how to read music notes on the staff in both treble clef and bass clef. It is a shareware, which means you can download a demo version, but you will not be able to access all the notes. You can pay a small fee to access the other notes. This program works well with Windows Vista, XP, Me, 98, 95, NT or 2000, but doesn't work under Mac OS X. This program is part of a collection of programs to learn music through games published by Happy Note!

When the program starts, the student may choose the notes that he or she wants to practice. At first, the student can start with only two notes and gradually add more notes. It is also possible to choose the speed of the game: adagio (the slowest), moderato (average speed) and allegro (full speed). The notes appear on the staff and the student must recognize each note. He or she then needs to select the proper name of the note and then shoot a projectile on the note. If it is a miss, the projectile may come back and make him loose one live. There are also explosives that must be avoided. At full speed, the scrolling of notes and the presence of projectiles and explosives make the game very interesting and enjoyable. It is a challenge to complete each level. The student really has the impression of playing a game rather than learning notes. It is possible to either use syllabic names for notes (Do, Re, Mi, etc.) or alphabetical (A, B, C, etc.)

Videos from the McCord Museum

2007-05-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

These videos are taken from the The Photographic Studio of William Notman and are available both in French and English on the McCord Museum Website. They are edited from still pictures and sound and are narrated. The topics presented in these videos include Canadian Confederation, Montreal in 1855, sports, Canadian winter, composite photography, genealogy and Western Canada. It is a very precious source of authentic documents that may be used by your students in history classes. Each video is about 2 to 6 minutes and is available in Quicktime format.

From the Warpath to the Plains of Abraham

2007-05-09T11:00:00.000-07:00

The Flash animation that I am presenting today is a little treasure for history teachers: « From the Warpath to the Plains of Abraham ». It is very appropriate for history classes in North America, but may also be useful in Europe. In fact, it presents the stakes of the war in Europe and its results on conflicts in North America. The site is sponsored by the National Battlefields Commission. Everything is so well design and illustrated and includes some short videos from time to time presenting actors impersonating historical characters. The activity is very interactive and students are invited to clicks on different parts of pictures to go through all the content.

At the beginning of the activity, students must choose among four characters: the French, the British, the Canadian or the Amerindian. These characters represent the four main chapters of the activity. By clicking on the French, we realize that the King of France, Louis XV was really in a catch-22. By clicking on the British, we get introduced to the king of England, George II and its desire to exercise his power and authority. We get to know him better and we learn about his desire to colonize land west of the Ohio Valley with the Amerindians being a barrier. That is how he realized that he had to fight and start a war to win North America!

By clicking on the Amerindian, we realize that they decided to team-up with the French and they were very useful warriors to support French troupes during the war. They obviously had different combat techniques. Traditional symbols related to the Amerindians are also presented as well as rituals that come with alliances. Finally, we get to see where each tribe were located in North America as well as the ones who were involved with the war in Quebec.

By clicking on the Canadian, we learn a lot about the problems brought by the war in New France and its impacts on Canadians. We realize that they were hungry, discouraged and harvesting was very poor. That is why food was not readily available. In addition, everyday, their chance of winning the war was diminishing. The colony was difficult to defend. On the other hand, rich people could celebrate, take part in festivities and had a lot of food.

This interactive game is a must for anyone who wants to learn more about this period.

A virtual trangram

2007-05-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

Your students really like to solve problems using puzzles. This « virtual tangram » program will certainly be useful. It includes the seven traditional pieces, that is five triangles of three different sizes, one square and one parallelogram. The objective of this Chinese game is to completely cover a model without overlapping any pieces. The program includes fourteen models and works with Macromedia Flash. If the student finds it too difficult, he or she may also ask for a hint. If you would like to know more about the history of this traditional Chinese puzzle, you can also check out this article in wikipedia.

Wiktionary

2007-05-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

Based on the same concept as the "Wikipedia" encyclopedia, "Wiktionary" is a free collaborative and multilingual dictionary that everyone can work to improve. The user interface really looks like wikipedia, so students already familiar with the encyclopedia should have no problem using the dictionary. At the time of publishing this blog entry, the dictionary already included 314 049 articles describing English language words as well as words from 648 other languages such as German, French, Chinese, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Dutch, Polish and Russian.

Words can be entered in the search bar and the Wikitionary will immediately send you the appropriate page in the dictionary. If you are not certain how to write a certain word, it is also possible to enter it with spelling mistakes and the wiktionary will suggest words that are closest matches It is also possible to search word using the following categories: nouns, adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, pronouns, determiners, interjections, etc.

The dictionary also includes lexicons by themes on subject such as animals, computer science, health, cooking, fruits, etc. It is a multilingual dictionary so it may be useful to teach English as well as other foreign languages. Despite the fact that the community is trying to make it as complete as possible, there are still some words of the English language that are not recognized yet by the dictionary. In addition, anyone can become an author and write a definition. It is important to be prudent with some definitions and in case of doubt, check in another recognize dictionary.

Nutrition Explorations

2007-05-06T11:00:00.000-07:00

Nutrition Explorations is a website for teachers, parents and students dedicated to health through a balance diet. It is sponsored by the National Dairy Council and although it covers all aspect of nutrition, a big emphasis is put on the importance of dairy products in the diet. The look, music and graphics of the site will please elementary school student and make it fun. In the Educators section, you will find ideas on how to implement a School Wellness program as well as lesson plans to teach nutrition. The material is available on the Web and may also be downloaded as printable PDF. It includes student worksheets and artwork. There is also an interactive pyramid for the food groups.

The section for parents includes a Family Guide to eating healthy with ideas and recipes. There are also some tips for busy families. For the students, there are fun and interactive activities such as "Little D the Dragon" or "Monster Nutrition". They can also use the "Nutrition Tracker" to ensure that they eat food from all the food groups.

Math-drills worksheet

2007-05-05T23:00:00.000-07:00

If your students need extra practice in basic arithmetic, this resource is for you. Sometimes, drill is necessary. You may have spent some time building basic multiplication and division worksheets for your student and unfortunately, the process was long trying to randomize number as much as possible and trying to insert the multiplication or division sign.

math-drills.com will provide you with PDF of many different math worksheets and the best about that, it is all-free. For each concept, you can decide exactly what you want, e.g. for division, you may select division by 2, by 3, etc. up to 12. You may also select more random division but limit the highest number it will include to better control how difficult they are. Also, for most exercises, there are five version A, B, C, D, E. If a student needs more practice after completing version A, they may then practice with the other versions. The worksheets also include an answer sheet for the teachers to correct them quickly. These worksheets may also be used by parents to help their child who struggle with basic arithmetic in school.

The math worksheets cover the following topics : multiplication, addition, subtraction, number sense, money, division, fractions, integers, decimals, powers of ten, geometry algebra, order of operations and base ten blocks. It also includes worksheet especially for some Holidays such as Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas. You will also find some of the worksheets available as large prints for visually impaired students. You can also download PDF of imperial and metric graph paper.

Organelles in plant and animal cells

2007-05-04T23:00:00.000-07:00

"Animal cell mix and match" and "Plant cell mix and match" are two flash animations written by Karen Hagen and presented by the University of Alberta on their cell biology instructional multimedia website. These two multimedia games will help you review the structures and roles of organelles in cells. Not all of the major organelles have been included.

The activity is presented like a chart with each organelle on top. The first row is called "looks like" and the second row is called "Role". At the bottom of the chart, there are pictures of each organelle and description of the roles. Students are then invited to drag-and-drop each picture and each role at the proper location in the chart. The feedback to correct the answers is not always clear. When a picture or a role is in the proper location, it fades a little bit and can't be moved anymore. It is not always clear for the student. A better signal such as a sound would have been more appropriate.

The multimedia file may be viewed on-line or they can be downloaded on the computer :

Animal cell mix and match (PC / MAC)
Plant cell mix and match (PC / MAC)

A kind of Youtube for science teachers

2007-05-03T23:00:00.000-07:00

This website has been recommended by Charles, a reader of this blog. EduMedia Share is a kind of Youtube especially aimed at science teachers. Any teacher may signup to upload science related videos and other multimedia files. It recognizes many file types including gif, jpg and png for images, avi, mpg, mov and wmv for movies and flash for animations.

If you have multimedia content prepared by you for your own classroom, why not share it with the rest of the world! The site already contains files in the field of physics (including mechanics and optics) and biology, however it is lacking files in other fields of science. If you are teaching the properties of light, the site already contains a lot of files on that topic.

Also, any teacher may access any file uploaded on the website freely for use in their classroom. As the database grows, this website may become a "must" to show multimedia content to your students. Some experiments are just not feasible in elementary and secondary school laboratories. In that case, a video may be reasonable replacement. The search for videos is based on tags, which may sometimes make it hard for people who prefer to use a directory to find the files. A quick note for Mac users : the site works best with Firefox and Camino. It is difficult to use it with Safari.

Bridge building simulation

2007-05-02T23:00:00.000-07:00

"Bridge Construction Set" is a small shareware, meaning you can try it for free but if you want to unlock all its features, you have to pay a small fee of about $20 or 15 euros. It works under Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. Despite the fact it is all in 3D, it doesn't require a high-end computer. It is the perfect tool to help students apply practically their knowledge of structures, stability and constraint. They will take advantage of their knowledge of the following concepts: symmetry, choice of material, types of bridge, center of gravity, triangulation, structural efficiency and constraint.

At first, a budget is given to the student. This will encourage him or her to judiciously manage the resources available. As the game goes on, new materials will become available, iron, steel, cables, etc. Students can use their creativity and at any time during the game, they can simulate the passing of cars or other vehicles on their bridge. It is also possible to visualize the constraint on each beam or each cable. The program presents the bridge in 3D and it is possible to change the viewing angle as well as zooming in or zooming out. Many features will help adding to the realism of the situation. It is possible to change the angle of the sun, meaning you can view your bridge at any time during the day or night. It is also possible to add reflection and shadows.

Even if it is always fun to have a bridge that will resist to the passing of cars, trucks and trains, it is also fun to see it collapse like a castle made of playing cards. This is when the learning experience really starts. The student has to troubleshoot and modify the bridge to make it withstands the weight of vehicles. The possibility of retrying is not available for real engineers, but it is great for students to have access to it. When using the program for the first time, it is highly recommended to use the tutorial to have a better understanding of all the features. By paying to upgrade to the full version, you will also get more levels of difficulty, new building materials and new vehicles, you will be able to create your own maps and you will be able to enhance the realism by adding decoration and other 3D objects.

Hot Potatoes

2007-05-01T23:00:00.000-07:00

You want your student to be more "Web Savvy" by having them practice with exercises on the Web? These types of exercises seem more appealing to your students? You found some websites with exercises on the Web but they do not match the content of what you are teaching to your students or they do not match the curriculum of your region, province, state or country? Why not produce them yourself? You have no experience in coding interactive websites? No problem! “Hot potatoes” is a tool that will fulfill this need easily and painlessly.

This program includes six parts:

JQuiz: will let you produce web-based quizzes using multiple choice, shot answers and true or false questions.
JCross: will let you build crosswords of any size.
JCloze: will let you build fill-in the blanks exercises.
JMatch: will let you build association exercises.
JMix: will let you build jumble exercises.
Masher: will let you build entire learning units.

The program will let you know export the file in Unicode, which means that you can produce exercises in foreign languages. This is very useful if you are teaching French, German, Spanish or other languages. The program will also run on Mac OS X, Windows and Linux. Once the file is exported, all you have to do is to upload it to a web server. "Hot potatoes" does all the formatting for you.

SOS ! It is Science Fair Season!

2007-04-30T23:00:00.000-07:00

Science Fairs may be very stressful for some parents who really want to get involved and help their child complete the whole project. Often, parents see science fair as too much work in their already busy life. For teachers, this activity is very time consuming especially with a very demanding curriculum.

The solution? A project-based approach for teaching science is often the most natural way for lesson-planning. When science fair season approches, the students will already have the inquiry, research and design skills to carry out a project. The document Using Projects to Engage Students and Meet the Goals of the Ontario Curriculum is all you need. It provides the theoratical ideas as well as worksheet and tips that may be used in the classroom.

This document is produced both in French and English by Sci-Tech Ontario. It is linked with the Ontario Science and Technology Curriculum, however, the pedagogical ideas presented can be relevant for any teahers, no matter where they teach. It is available in three version for different age groups :

Grade 1-6 (6-12 years old)
Grade 7-8 (13-14 years old)
Grade 9-12 (15-18 years old)