It’s that time of the year again — Spelling Bee!

Spellingcity.com is a great site for helping students get ready for spelling tests.

Words of Arabic origin

After registering (free), teachers can enter their own spelling lists or use one of the 100+ “sample” lists (including “Words of Arabic Origin” and lists by grade level up to grade 8). There are thousands of spelling lists from grade 1 to high school (e.g. SAT prep).

Students can work with spelling lists in three ways — “teach me,” “test me,” or play a game.”  One of the best features of this site is a real human voice which pronounces the words (not your standard “computer generated” voice box!) which means extensive possibilities for using this site to differentiate instruction, teach English language learners as well as differently abled students.

Lists for handwriting practice (3 sizes of lines, capital or cursive) may be printed as well as lists of words.  Parent letters may also be printed to send home.  This site won the “Parents Choice Award” (deserving!).

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!

 

Wikibooks — Foreign Language Resources

Wikibooks is a collaborative, open content project. Authors around the world participate in creating books in many different languages and genres. For example,  there are thousands of pages written in English, French, Italian etc.

and hundreds of pages in languages such as Arabic,  Farsi, Norsk, Simple English, Tagalog and Turkish.

While there are several other sub projects of note (Wikijunior — books for children, Simple English — materials on various topics) because of the uneven level of coverage at this point, the Wikibooks is most useful for the foreign language resources.  

 

Visual Dictionary

Visual Dictionary Mainanimations (frog life cycle), pictures, topic listing, french language. Biology: animal, plants and the human body, Transportation, Clothing and MusicVisual Dictionary Plants

The Visual Dictionary is a beautifully excuted interactive resource. While the topics are very limited (Animal, Human and Plant Biology, transportation, music and clothing) they are visually rich. Each image is labelled in great detail.  For example, the plants category has 55 illustrations of plant topics such as berries, meiosis, leave shapes, nuts, seeds, growth cycle of a mushroom, stems, roots etc.

Visual Dictionary Plants

Plant Cell

Many topics, such as the Amoeba and Life Cycle of a Frog, have animations and/or photographs. The Dictionary may be browsed visually by image, by theme or alphabetically through the Lexicon, or searched by keyword.  some topics are linked to Wikipedia entries. The Dictionary is available in two languages — English and French making this a great foreign language resource.

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!