Group items tagged

"fairy tales, classics and poems for children"

"It's a sheet music reader for the iPad. The app is free and comes with a few classic song sheets (Amazing Grace, Take Me Out to the Ball game, etc.) but every other song you'll have to buy in their small but growing collection. Sadly, you can't upload any sheets on your own, you'll have to rely on their store. What's great is that the app has a built in metronome (audible or visual) so you can keep your tempo right and see where you are in the piece. Also great: automatic page turning as the app will flip the page once you reach the end of the previous one."

Free online books library for students, teachers, and the classic enthusiast.

From the Top is a non-profit organization that celebrates the passion, dedication and personal stories of the nation's outstanding young classical musicians.

"Founded in 2011, The Public Domain Review is an online journal and not-for-profit project dedicated to promoting and celebrating the public domain in all its richness and variety. All works eventually fall out of copyright - from classics works of art to absentminded doodles - and in doing so they enter the public domain, a vast commons of material that everyone is free to enjoy, share and build upon without restriction. Our aim is to help our readers explore this rich terrain - like a small exhibition gallery at the entrance to an immense network of archives and storage rooms that lie beyond. With a focus on the surprising, the strange, and the beautiful, we hope to provide an ever-growing cabinet of curiosities for the digital age, a kind of hyperlinked Wunderkammer - an archive of materials which truly celebrates the breadth and variety of our shared cultural commons and the minds that have made it. "

"So often, we make learning more complicated than it has to be. Local planning requirements are usually at fault here-plan this way and prove that you've done so here and here, fill out this and this, etc. Those legitimate concerns aside, the following series of fill-in-the-blank prompts can be used by teachers to create lessons, students to create projects-or teachers to collaborate with students to create lessons-or projects. Or, well, you get the idea. I use these sorts of stems to create "learning blends" for students-either with them, or for them. I couple these prompts with other components-technology like apps or social media channels, texts from literary classics to postmodern non-fiction, creativity, or even local matters of citizenship. Please steal them, add to them, or otherwise do with them what you will."

"The vinegar and baking soda volcano is a science fair classic, but making science fun for your kids can mean a lot more than making a mess of your kitchen. If science at school doesn't sit with your children, there are plenty of fun and even delicious ways to get them excited about biology chemistry and physics - without a single worksheet."

"iStoryBooks is a good service that for the last few years has offered classic children's books for free through their iPad and Android apps. Today, I received an email from their PR department in which they announced that now all of the books in the apps will be free to teachers. Directions for getting a free premium subscription are copied below."

"There are plenty of new Christmas songs each year, but it's not that easy to make a Christmas song that becomes a classic holiday tune. You know, one that you can repeat each year that still feels relevant. Straight No Chaser may have just made the first Christmas song fit for this new Internet 2.0 generation. Together with Kristen Bell, they sing Text Me Merry Christmas, a catchy tune about spreading holiday cheer via text. "

"About two decades ago The MIT Media lab introduced the concept of block-based programming. The idea was to develop an interface that allowed computer programs to be built by simply dragging and dropping puzzle blocks to represent complex programming constructs and commands. With this new method for teaching and learning computer science, the hugely popular Scratch platform was born. This approach lowered the bar for experimenting with programmatic thinking, making it possible for students to create interactive animations and small games without writing a single line of code. This simple concept removed the need to learn the syntax of a formal programming language, and made teaching and learning the basics of computer science accessible to younger learners and to teachers with no formal coding background. Outside of the classroom though, coding has always been, and still remains, a process of typing letters, numbers and symbols. This text-based programming, used in programming language such as C, Javascript and Python, requires coders to obey and conform to formal syntax. Despite the pain of dealing with typos in names of variables and inevitable syntax errors, no other coding method designed to be more "user friendly" has really caught on. Tools have been offered for managers to define business logic through a graphical user interface without writing lines of codes. Or for web developers to add interactive behaviors to their websites without learning Javascript. But in reality, neither of those substitute the power and flexibility of text-based programming. And with neither winning significant adoption, the demand for the classic skill of text-based coding continues to grow and grow."

"Cardboard puts virtual reality on your iPhone. The Google Cardboard app helps you set up a Cardboard viewer and includes a few experiences to get you started: Explorer: Explore exciting environments. Exhibit: View 3D objects from a museum collection. Urban Hike: Take a hike through iconic cities around the world. Kaleidoscope: Enjoy a fun stereoscopic take on the old classic."

""The best camera, is the one you have with you." Chase Jarvis It's a classic photographic mantra, a call to action for image-makers everywhere. And these days, the camera you are most likely to have with you is the one embedded in your smart phone. But do you know how to use it? What about your students? There are many great features built into our mobile devices for photography, and a myriad of apps to produce exciting visual imagery. While some teachers and students are experienced users creating highly original work using complex workflows and inventive techniques, in my workshops I am constantly amazed that it's some of the most basic tips and tricks that get the most cheers, the practical solutions that are big wins for our classroom context. So, here are six foundational tools built into the iPhone and iPad camera that all teachers and students should know."

"In 1962, Princeton psychologist Sam Glucksberg performed an experiment based on the classic candle problem test. He presented two groups with the same task, but with different rewards: One would receive monetary rewards based on speed, while the other was told only to complete the task as quickly as possible. The results were counterintuitive. The latter group performed the task on average three and a half times faster than the first. Why? As career analyst Dan Pink (Watch: The puzzle of motivation) has learned, traditional motivators like money can be far less effective than intrinsic motivators like autonomy, mastery and purpose. Indeed, productivity itself is a mystery we still struggle to unravel. Below, find seven must-reads (and a playlist) that look closely at how work works, provided by Pink for his TED Talk."

"Computational thinking is the set of skills you need to be able to get computers to do useful things. It includes logical thinking, planning ahead, working with data, being able to give precise instructions and make predictions. There are lots of activities that can help young children aged 4-7 to develop these skills. Computational thinking skills can be developed through coding but there are lots of other activities that help too. A lot of them are screenless which helps to develop modern skills while also developing other important skills including motor skills and communication. Some of the ideas here are classic kids games and activities that you might have tried anyway, they just happen to be great for computational thinking skills."

"High school English teacher Michael Godsey's favorite work by William Shakespeare is Hamlet. But a few years ago, he stopped teaching his students about the centuries-old classic in favor of a story that was unfolding in the fall of 2014: Serial, the podcast. Michael Godsey The story of Adnan Syed, Hae Min Lee and the community at Woodlawn High School captivated podcast listeners around the world, including Godsey. The story was so engaging, he made listening to Serial in real time an assignment for his students and eventually made podcasts a regular part of his English class. He also teaches with episodes of This American Life, RadioLab and Serial Season 2 that cover subjects relevant to the lives of students."