Digital Learning for Early Elementary — BBC KS1 Bitesize

 

 

Math

The BBC (British Broadcasting Company) has an educational site for kids divided into “key stages.” KS1 or Key Stage 1 is equivalent to early elementary (approximately K-2). The site has engaging, interactive modules in literacy (spelling, phonics, alphabetical order, pronouns, using punctuation etc) and numeracy (time, number ordering adding and subtraction, division, multiplication, money, organizing data etc.) topics for practice and reinforcement.

Time

Teacher Tube — Math Raps & more

Math Raps & More

Teacher tube is the educational and fun version of Youtube for use in the classroom. Video shorts, made by educators, are available in core subject areas such as math, science, social studies, reading as well as by grade range (elementary, middle school). While the quality ranges, there are many examples of useful, engaging materials that students will love.

Teachers can access videos by searching directly or browsing using the tabs. The “Video” tab provides a listing of all channels by subject along with options such as “recently added,” “most viewed,” “most discussed,” and “top rated.”  One of the most viewed videos is a middle school winner on “Class Rules”

Class Rules

 

The “Channels” tab provides subject or category access:

Channels

 There’s a wealth of teacher and performance talent. Of special note, is Mr. Duey Raps Fractions.  Mr. Duey, originally from the suburbs of Detroit, raps to teach about math, social studies and English. This video is a sure hit and testimonials attest to the improvement in student scores:

Mr. Duey Raps Fractions

Other great videos are “Abbot and Costello math” and the “50 States and Capitals” song — Keep track of newly uploaded videos using the RSS feeds (at the bottom of the main screen). Videos may be played full screen by selecting the squarish symbol near the volume on the player:

Other teacher tube strengths are tutorials on a wide variety of topics, “partner videos”, (social studies as of this writing) and student works. Teachers can make and upload their own videos. Inappropriate videos are flagged for removal to keep the environment kid-friendly. “Featured videos” showcase new and/or interesting shorts. Great resource, especially for middle and high school!

 

Math Applets & Lessons — eNLVM

Authored by Utah State University and funded by the NSF, the eNLVM (National Library of Virtual Manipulatives) is an outstanding, standards based resource for instruction and guided math practice in the NCTM core areas of geometry, measurement, number and operations, algebra and data analysis and probability. The interactive applets are divided into  grade ranges: pre-K-2, 3-5, 6-8 and 9-12 (younger students may have difficulty in reading instructions) within the 5 main areas.

Registered teachers may set up their own courses including materials to be used by their students, customized by class. Materials may be organized into “learning units” which

 

students may access for instruction and practice. Teachers may edit their course content, manage students (including keeping track of online work through the module), view all student answers at once, select applicable mathlets for practice and even edit select applets.

Courses

Students really enjoy learning using the animated, interactive modules such as spinners, ladybugs for logic and sequence, tangrams, and money. 

Examples of Mathlets

To learn more about the project, view either the Quick Start Manual or the tutorial powerpoint presentation for teachers.

More Info. & Tutorials

As an added bonus, the applets and interface are also available in Spanish and French.

Hippocampus — Multimedia lessons for High School courses

Hippocampus

Suitable mainly for high school, Hippocampus is a digital library of multimedia modules for instruction in popular courses such as Calculus, U.S. Government, AP Biology,

Biology

 Environmental Science, Pscyhology or Statistics. Users may browse the content in two ways, either through the Course or Textbook interfaces. 

Modules are browsable either through alphabetical or sequenetial topic listing or through a course view which is organized into main units, organized into lessons.

An especially useful feature is the “textbook” tab which presents content in correlation with popular subject textbooks. There’s also a detailed index of page numbers and topic coverage by text.

American Goverrnment

 The media modules incorporate rich graphics and text to convey content. Students may also access this resource at home making this a great resource for the classroom or independent learning after school.

Streaming Video — “Streaming” by Discovery Education

Video on demand is a very powerful way to introduce

Streaming through Wayne RESA

new concepts, to reinforce learning objectives and to differentiate instruction. Often it is critical for learners, especially visually oriented learners or ELL, to simply experience a place, a new idea or just to see how something works. Discovery Education’s “Streaming” product allows educators at all levels K-12 to select entire videos or segments (some less than one minute long) to deliver just-in-time, relevant instruction. This is a subscription service often made available through the local ISD, in our case, Wayne RESA.

Videos may be browsed according to appropriate state standards via a search interface on the main page (bottom, left) or by subjects or grade.  For Michigan, there are options to select from Curriculum Framework, Grade Level  or Extended Grade Content Expectations for K-12.  Videos may be previewed using the “play” option (which is live streaming), but for classroom use, I recommend downloading it in advance to minimize glitches. 

Advanced Search

Using the advanced search option allows users to locate materials by keyword, subject, grade level, media type as well as features such as closed captions or “editable” titles which are great for including in presentations. Often supporting materials such as blackline masters and teachers’ guides are available as a hyperlinked document.

Additional content is available such as speeches and other sound files, lesson plans, images and quizzes.

 

Egypt Video

Teachers may share ideas, questions and best practices by joining the DEN (Discovery Educator Newtork (free)). One hour training webinars are reguarly scheduled as well as the EdTech connect series which features movers and shakers in the ed. tech. sphere (exciting!).

 

Of special interest is the “Teacher Center”  which has classroom tools such as “assignment builder, “classroom manager” and “writing prompts,” curriculum resources, for planning such as the “lesson plan library” and “thematic focus.” Have questions? join the DEN teacher community.

Discovery Atlas -- Iraq

Much deserving of a special mention, is one of the resources available (“curriculum resources”) in the teacher center is the “Discovery education Atlas.” The interactive resource organizes country study video segments in four areas: culture, government, history and the natural world. Fun and effective!