Group items tagged

If your students like doing Word Searches, then The Ultimate Word Search Maker could be just the thing for you. It enables you to quickly and easily create your own Word Search Puzzles and embed them into your blog. The puzzles are very easy to make.  This is a really simple tool to use for those of you keen on Word Searches.

Textivate is an online facility for creating and sharing interactive browser-based activities. Text re-ordering, gap-fills, text re-construction, anagrams, matching, memory, hangman, flashcards, millionaire and lots more - all automatically generated based on any text and/or list of matching items that you put into the textivate text box. Much of the site is free to use, and subscribers can upload resources to share with their students or embed activities on a blog or website. It is browser-based, so it works on desktops, laptops, ipads etc. The activities are ideal for whole-class work with any interactive whiteboard. You can see video tutorials here: http://textivate.posthaven.com/video-tutorials To help you get started, browse the hundreds of public resources on the site, or click on "textivate now" to see the range of activities available.

Booktrust is an independent reading and writing charity that makes a nationwide impact on individuals, families and communities, and culture in the UK. We make a significant positive contribution to the educational outcomes of children from the earliest age. We work to empower people of all ages and abilities by giving them confidence and choices about reading. And we want individuals of all backgrounds to benefit from the wellbeing that a rich and positive engagement in reading and writing can bring.   Our work supports children and young people, parents and carers and indeed anyone who would benefit from the positive impact that books, reading and writing can have on their lives.   Vision: Empowering people through reading and writing.   Mission: Booktrust inspires everyone to enjoy books, reading and writing and the lifelong benefits that they bring. Our aim is to build a literate, connected and creative society.

Find Words that Express Your Thoughts There are times when you know what you want to say, but you just don't know the right word in English. This can be very frustrating, but it is good to practice explaining the words you want so that you can get the word you want. OneLook Reverse Dictionary can help you with this. You can also practice using the site by doing an online crossword puzzle.

Popplet is a great service that combines the best of online sticky note services like Wallwisher with collaborative mind mapping functions. Popplet allows you to create a wall of multimedia sticky notes that you can share with others. Your stickies can include videos and images that you pull from other online services. You can also upload media from your desktop to your sticky notes. Popplet offers a browser bookmarklet that you can use to add content from other webpages to your Popplet pages. Invite others via email to collaborate on your wall of sticky notes. The mind mapping element of Popplet is the option to connect your notes. To do this just click one of the small circles that hovers near your note (Popplet calls them "Popples") while you're editing. Click those small circles will launch a connected blank note that you can edit. Popplet is available for iPads.

Story Map is a free interactive story planning tool from Read Write Think. Story Maps provides four templates for outlining stories. To use the templates students title their stories then choose one of four templates to outline their stories. The four template choices are conflict, setting, character, and resolution. Students can print their completed templates.

Spider Scribe is an online mind map creation service. Spider Scribe can be used individually or be used collaboratively. What jumps out about Spider Scribe is that users can add images, maps, calendars, text notes, and uploaded text files to their mind maps. Users can connect the elements on their mind maps or let them each stand on their own. You can embed your interactive Spider Scribe mind map into your blog or website. If you would like to see how Spider Scribe works, check out Russell Stannard's series of how-to videos or watch this two minute demo. Spider Scribe has a free product for students and educators.

Creaza Education is a great suite of tools that includes a video editor, an audio editor, a cartoon creator, and an excellent mind map builder. To access all of these tools create an account on Creaza Education then select "tools" after you sign in. Creaza Education's mind mapping tool is actually an installation of Mindomo. Mindomo is one of the most feature-rich mind mapping tools that I've used. The user interface is clear and intuitive as every important function happens through clearly labeled drop down menus. Mindomo allows you to include videos, pictures, and audio files in all cells in your mind map.

Realtime Board is a free tool for hosting online, collaborative brainstorming sessions. Realtime Board provides a blank grid on which you can type, draw, and post pictures. You can connect elements on your boards through a simple linking tool. The boards that you create on Realtime Board can be shared publicly or privately. To help you communicate with your collaborators Realtime Board has a chat function built into every board.

Text 2 Mind Map offers a great way to turn your typed outlines into mind maps. To create a mind map on Text 2 Mind Map type out an outline in the text box. After typing your outline click "draw mind map" to have your mind map created for you. If after creating your mind map you need to add more elements to just add them into your outline and click "draw mind map" again. Your mind map can be downloaded as a PDF or PNG file. The mind maps that you create on Text 2 Mind Map can also be shared via email, Facebook, or Twitter.

CreateDebate is a new social networking community built around ideas, discussion and democracy. We've done our best to provide our community with a framework that makes compelling and meaningful debates easy to create and fun to use. Our goal is to build CreateDebate into an incredibly useful learning tool that will help groups of people to sort through issues, viewpoints and opinions so that consensus and understanding can be reached and better decisions can be made.

"The Teacher's Guide To Copyright And Fair Use"

wireWax is a new service (still in beta) that takes the concept of YouTube annotations and makes it much better. On wireWax you can build interactive tags into your videos. Each tag that you add to your video have another video from YouTube or Vimeo or an image from Facebook, Flickr, or Instagram. A tag can also include an audio track from SoundCloud or a reference article from Qwiki. What makes using wireWax different from using the YouTube annotations tool is that clicking on your tags (what YouTube calls annotations) does not send you outside of the video you're currently watching. This means that you can watch a video within a video or view a picture or listen to a different audio track within the original video. When you click a tag in the original video the video pauses and the tagged item is displayed. wireWax allows you to add tags to any YouTube video that is publicly viewable and has not had embedding disabled. I tried wireWax with this five minute video. It took a while (15-20 minutes) for the video to process for tagging, but once it was processed it was easy to create a tag. To create my tag I just advanced the video to the spot I wanted to tag, drew a box around the person I was tagging, then selected the wireWax YouTube app to put a video within the original video. Check it out below by advancing to about the 1.5 minute mark. Applications for Education wireWax could be a great tool for adding new layers of information to educational videos. If you're creating videos for your students or your students are creating videos to share with others consider tagging key points at which viewers might have questions. At those points insert tags that reveal clarifying information in the form of a video, an image, or an audio recording. 

"User Generated Education The Flipped Classroom: Professional Development Workshop"

"Breaking News English An EFL / ESL Lesson Plan by Sean Banville - Speaking English"

Great collection of ELT lessons created by George Chilton and Neil McMillan, English teachers based in Barcelona, Spain. Lessons are divided into categories and include the Level, Aim, Topic, Preparation, Stages, Pictures, and Videos.

"Free fonts have met their match. We know how hard it is to find quality freeware that is licensed for commercial work. We've done the hard work, hand-selecting these typefaces and presenting them in an easy-to-use format. "

Phillip Martin offers a site with FREE art for your classroom, newsletters, or wherever you can find a non-profit use.

This great blog created by Gareth H. Jones provides Spanish language speakers with clear explanations of some grammar points, concepts. expressions, and vocabulary.