Group items tagged

This website provides a comprehensive explaination of different time periods in art history. Content: This website has easy acess to different periods in the history of art. when you click on a time line, the site gives you a range of years, then different countries that you can click on to get what was happening in that particular country at that time in the history of art. The website is fairly easy to understand and navigate. The information is credible, it comes from a museum website. It also provides the veiwer with a detailed bibliography. This would be a great website for high school students to learn about where art has been, where it is today, and where it is going. The information found on this site will help students write papers with a credible source.

Bryana Wilson September 20, 2009 Website Review http://www.sonnets.org/early.htm "Sonnet Central" is a site dedicated to all different types of sonnets in many different time periods. The author of this site, Eric Blomquist, has done an excellent job of putting the site together in an interesting and organized way. The site serves as an archive of sonnets and does a good job in defining the histories and form of them as well. It is evident that he is passionate about this style of poetry, and in essence, catches the evolution of it quite nicely. CONTENT The content of this website is evident in the title. "Sonnet Central" is full of many different types of sonnets. It covers all different kinds of sonnets from differences in location, time, and style. It includes sonnets from all over the world and has sonnets set apart in different periods- from the 12th century to the early 20th century- most of which are English- but includes quite a few Petrarchan as well. There are also links to sections that you can use to search, view an alphabetical list of authors, listen to sonnets being read, and even read criticisms. It also includes a forum for modern poets to post their own poetry and discuss the information presented on the page. It is clear that Mr. Blomquist's site is aimed toward poets and those wanting to get acquainted with the sonnet- and the material on his site is easy to interpret and understand. There is an email link for contacting Mr. Blomquist if there are any questions or comments regarding his site and it is located on the site's homepage in the opening paragraph. It was last modified in 2007, but given the subject- the sonnet- I would trust the material is far from outdated. It loads quickly and works on several different browsers. DESIGN "Sonnet Central" is put together in an interesting way. The information is fairly easy to find and is set up in a rather organized manner, including a table of contents on the main page.

Olivia Mabie-January 24, 2010 Content: There are many links at the top of the page that have lesson plans, online degrees, teacher tools, worksheets, and much more. There are many other links for teachers to click on to get to more websites for other information to use in the classroom. However once I clicked on the links at the top of the page the information was limited and I had to click on the links more than once to get to the next page. This website many other links but they are limited to the information on the next page. There are links that can give teachers freebie things to use in the classroom, lesson plans, and lesson plan templates. This website has many good links but it takes a long time to get to the next page and there is not much information on the other pages. Design: There are many distracting things about this website, there are things that keep changing and catching my attention and they are not even related to what the website is about. The font is very small and someone would need glasses to read the information. This is a site that was not organized when it was made. This would be a very time consuming website trying to find information to use in the classroom. All of the information about when the website was last updated is not on the site which makes teachers unsure of how good the information is because they do not know when it was put onto the website. There are many colors used throughout the website which can make it hard to read because it is very distracting. Overview: One thing I disliked about this website was when I first went into it there was a pop-up asking me to join the newsletter. I would not use this website in the future because it takes too much time to find information and get ideas to use in the classroom. One link I found that would be helpful in the classroom was the craft link; this is a link that I would use in the future. The website as a whole though I would not use, it is hard to get ideas to put

Samantha Cook 10/11/12 The Renaissance website on philosophy of that time is very useful for someone either looking for some background information on this topic or also for research for a paper. The Renaissance was a time period where there was a great movement into many of the ideas that we have today, like philosophy and the idea of not a large empire but smaller countries. This site gives a good overview of the philosophy side of that change, and how these thoughts started coming around. The information provided is good and accurate and gives a broad range that allows someone to either get a brief or go deeper. The purpose of the sight is to provide information. The intended audience for this sight is either high school students learning about the Renaissance or College students doing the same thing. They use this sight and the quality information provided as more of a summary then a full out research area, to give them brief ideas of the subject but there is so much deeper. The information provided is from all current sources nothing more than 1970s but that is not necessarily a bad thing. This is where academics at universities have gone through and interpreted the older writings into what is needed to know. There is also a large amount of sources which helps weed out the biased sources and ideas you can have by having different opinions added together. My overall opinion of this sight is it is a good sight for basic information, if you want to go deeper then you need to go elsewhere but it is a good sight to give a brief introduction into the idea of philosophy. It is pleasing to the eyes even without pictures and looks academic in that sense, I personally think pictures could make it better but it is fine without them. Overall it is a good trust worthy site.

Amanda Larsen 1/23/11 Overview: This is a website designed to provide people with a vast library of images current and historic art pieces. It is especially useful to collegiate students and professors because a professor can set up a library with images that they are focusing on in class.  Content: At first glance it is obvious that the content includes images of art pieces. The featured images are constantly being updated with a clear description of foundations and sponsors for each group of images. There are announcements of new collections posted often. Images are categorized in a variety of ways including author, time period, collection, etc. Design: Navigation from the home page and throughout the website is user friendly. Images have fantastic quality with a quick loading time. The libraries of images are constantly being updated for the most current collection. Directions and help for optimal use of this website are provided with tabs at the top of the screen. 

Paige Hanewald 10/21/13 Overall: This site would be a great activity to high school students as an introduction of Shakespeare as it takes them in a "time machine" back to Elizabethan time period. It is very current and includes interesting language that is intended for the current high school audience. It gives links to Elizabethan-knowledgeable resources, assisting them through each step. If the activity could align with standards of your English curriculum, it would be a new, fun introduction of William Shakespeare. Content: Although the author of the site isn't clearly identified, it is assumed that he is a teacher. Assuming that, the teacher appears to be qualified to present this information and it seems to be accurate; all of the links work and provide thorough insight into the activity. The activity definitely goes in depth to the Elizabethan time period and lifestyle. Design: The design is similar to that of a Webquest activity. It is aesthetically impressive and flawless! It gains interest with its creative layout and features that Wix.com provides, including directions on little things that could be confusing. It is very easy to navigate from step-to-step of the activity and could be easily interpretable by the intended audience. However, there is neither a works cited page, nor a teacher's page like that of well-done Webquest pages.

Katya Larson February 2013 Overview: The purpose of this website is to visually map major events in history chronologically. There are brief descriptions of the events for each map. The audience is for educators and secondary level students. There are many map and picture resources under the "Maps & Modules" section including previous editions of the website. I think this website is well set up because it is easy to navigate to the time period of your choice to see the corresponding map. It is nice that there are brief descriptions so you can easily review what the map is about. I think it is a very easy to use and useful site.  Content: The content is accurate and easily accessible. The maps are interactive and user-friendly. There are many links within the site to access different content. The content is free of bias and informational.  A possible downside is that there are no dates of revision, but there is evidence that the content has been revised in the past because you can view past versions of the website.  Design: The website itself does not attract the eye readily. While the information is easy to find, there are few graphics or colors that are appealing (excepting the interactive maps). The information is clearly labeled and the maps have useful descriptions. It may not be "fun", but this is a very useful site. 

Ramon J. Sandoval September 1, 2010 Website Evaluation Site Title: Ask Kids URL: www.askkids.com Authors of website: Ask Kids Subject: Elementary Education Content Summary When I first went to the web site it was unclear what the website was intended to do. The website does not have easy access to the author identity. It never gives you a name of someone to contact. There is not any information about the author or when the site was last updated. This site is a search engine for children age's six to twelve and claims to be safe. The links to the website are easy to navigate through but unclear to me where to go next. Design Summary The home page downloads quickly and when clicking on the links there is not a waiting period. The home page is kind of bland but it does allow the user to dress it up with stamps and drawing on the front. I did not find a clear set of direction. I had to just click the links to see where and what was under the tabs. The same basic format is used throughout the website. There is a copyright date on the website but it is unclear how often the site is updated. This site does have games but the one I played did not give me an extra knowledge. Overview When the website first came up it was not very inviting. With the lack of computer experience I have it would not have enticed me to proceed. The subjects on the left side did not have me wanting to find out more about it. When I typed in a question the first thing to pop up was the advertisements. It does have some good aspects and content in it but I don't think it was easily accessible. This web site is designed for kids to ask common questions in the search engine. It is much like google but without the risk of finding something bad. I think with more time and experience on the computer the w

Korinne Thoren 14 September 2011 Art Project-Powered by Google Overview: The purpose of Art Project is to allow users exposure to some of the world's best works of art without ever having to leave their home or classroom. The website is geared to older students, I think this site would work well for anyone middle school aged or older. My overall impression of the site is a good, I particularly like the quality and quantity of artwork users have availability to and the virtual touring is fun; the only thing I did not like was that it took a while to get used to the virtual tour navigation tools, however there is a instructional video provided on the website for users. Content: This interactive, virtual touring website gives its users access to 17 of the most world renowned art museums, allowing users to view all works of art or tour the museum virtually. This makes for exposure to thousands of famous pieces of art over a very unique and fun experience. The site also allows users to view very high quality, detailed photos of the art that can be zoomed into, which would not be found through just a Google search. Each painting contains the title of the work and the artist, but no mediums or dimensions are provided. There is a "create an artwork collection" feature that allows users to compile their favorite works, which could be useful for studying a specific movement or time period. The website does not provide contact information for the site creators or links to the actual museums. Design: The overall design of Art Project is superb. Upon opening, the site really draws users in because of the changing and vivid, zoomed up view of artworks used as the background. The listing of museums and artworks on the left-hand side is very clean and simple, thus making for a very appealing website design overall.

Ross Lindstrom - September 21, 2009 Website Evaluation #2 - Teaching Comparative Government and Politics This website is a blog-based collective of information and resources for the purpose of aiding instruction of comparative government and politics. The audience is primarily secondary and postsecondary teachers of government and politics who are seeking resources about and/or specific examples of comparative government they can use for their class. The impression I had was that it was an interesting and at times very applicable for teachers, but the blog-style format and lack of information accessible on command makes the potential application of this website in a teaching environment limited. The website took a little while to load, which I believe can be attributed to the length of the continued thread of blogs/discussion. (Excuse my lack of correct internet jargon). The first thing I noticed was a cramped column of text, outside links, and pictures organized in a sequential, most recent blog entry- at top format. The website lacks a visible title. Even the purpose description is vague: "Teaching Comparative Government and Politics is a complex and demanding task. We can all use all the help we can get. This cyber place is somewhere to facilitate helpful interactions." The blog entries usually include relevant pictures and multimedia links. Despite the lack of outside sources, the blog is archived from 2006, so there is a large amount of articles to sift through. Even though I questioned the main author's legitimacy and authority in the area, all the articles contained something that had practical classroom application. The content is also constantly updated, with multiple meaningful posts coming within the period of one day. It is a bit difficult to determine the exact purpose of the website, as well as the main author. The name Ken Wedding is given as the author, but doesn't offer more information in the way of his legitimacy as an ed

Several interactive puzzles of states and countries throughout the world.

Monique Koller Jan. 24 2010 This is a site that is helpful when trying to learn maps and geography! Content: The content is very good. There's a list of places you can do. You are given a map and you fill it in. The maps seem pretty accurate. The maps can get harder so that you can make sure you are learning. Design: The site isn't overly interesting or colorful however it is easy to navigate and use! The maps are well done and they load quickly! I think periodically they make a new map of an area. I can now learn more about China. Overview: The purpose of this site is to teach anyone the locations and capitols of different parts of the world. The maps have different difficulty levels making you learn the locations better. I think this site has a lot of benefits and I would love to use this site more for my own knowledge. I like that the maps time you so you know how well you know them by the speed you finish.

Overview: This website is awesome! It makes me want to learn all about the Colonial Times. This website is designed specifically for 3rd graders, very entertaining and kid friendly. I would have my students use this site to gather accurate information about Colonial children, it is super fun but educational, and it is really easy to navigate around. The site is a little older (2000) just because it was made by a class and it was a one time thing. Luckily the information is accurate and the class that created the site actually won an award for it! I could easily contact the creators and there is a sponsor (top left hand corner), it is very clear and precise information. Content: The information in this site is easy to understand because it talks about home life, schools, and clothing of the children during this Colonial time period. The quality of this information is entertainingly informative. The site is very specific and stays focused throughout each page. There are different links in the site that lead you to explanations of different things (clothes, school, home) and then there are links that take you to different activities. All of the content is complete because it was made at one time. I know that the information is accurate because there is a citation page that takes me to different outside websites. If I were to do a project with my class that had to do with Colonial Times I would use this site. Design: The homepage downloads really quickly and it looks awesome and easy for any 3rd grader to use. There is a specific link that is called "Contact Us" so if I as a teacher, had any questions I could easily email them. The about site is an external link but it isn't posted on the home page so it might be a little tricky to find it at first. There are different sections of the web site that are focused and have very clear directions. The class that made the web site made their own videos to demonstrate a task, very cute! Web site is accessible by any

Allison Lindgren September 21, 2009 Website Review http://www.bestedsites.com/ "Best Educational Sites" is a collection of educational games for all areas of learning. Its fun layout with bright colors and bouncing graphics make it most appealing to young children. I think it would be very useful for teachers looking to integrate learning games into their curriculum. There is also basic information on everything from astronomy to engineering. Content Summary: This website has a lot of information in it, but there are no citations. Most of the links work well, but a few are dead ends. The website tells when it was last updated, which was recently, and who it was updated by. The purpose of the site is clear, though. The fun graphics and bright colors would appeal to children, and all the links are geared towards elementary to middle school aged children. There are no obvious spelling or grammatical errors. Design Summary: There are no problems downloading the pages except for the few broken links. The homepage is attractive to young children but the bright colors could be an eyesore if looked at for an extended period of time. The person who last updated the site gives a contact email. The information is well organized into several links provided on the home page and every page has a link to the home page, which makes this site very easy to navigate. The graphics and animations make the site fun and appealing for children, and each page displays a theme common to the information being presented.

Shea Mangold August 31, 2010 This website is used to connect you to different websites like a map or navigation page and it's great for that. This is also aimed for more of a elementary teacher audience it seems like. The owner is Janice Berthiaume, MEd and she has a MEd so I would guess she is qualified and the information is good, but she doesn't have any background information except there is a place with her email to contact her. There are also a bunch of different sponsors and even a place to make donations. It is very well updated, it was last updated August 26, 2010. All of the links worked pretty well except it took forever to load and some led me to a internet is not working page, and took along time loading after that. But when I got to the pages I was very pleased, there's so much information and lessons to choose from. The content was great but in saying that, the design is awful. On the hope page it looks as though someone just threw it together in a hurry, tried to be cute, and then added some cheesy clip art pictures and then threw in some very annoying bouncing books to distract you the entire time. Also, at the bottom of the page all of the sponsors, donations, author information is very bunched together; it does not look very professional. The other pages it links too are pretty simple, bright colored background with links in a different bright color. Everything is on it that needs to be just not great looking. I would have to give this an A for content but a C or D for design

Jacqueline Twiford Web Site Review September 20, 2009 http://www.abcya.com/first_grade_computers.htm This first grade website allows you to incorporate technology with your students by allowing them to do activities for learning. This webpage has activities for grade levels K-8 which is helpful for bringing technology to all grade levels. On this site it allows students to navigate the web with voice instruction, and has large navigation buttons for easy understanding. CONTENT On the "ABCya" website it allows students in the first grade to play interactive computer games to learn concepts such as the alphabet, drawing, lowercase and uppercase letter matching as well as mouse exploitation. This site has a list of activities that students can use in helping them learn some of the essential concepts they will need to know. DESIGN The design of "ABCya" is a very colorful and organized webpage. Having a large display for navigation buttons and voice instructions makes introducing technology to your young student very easy. The design of this game site is very easy to use and explains in voice as you go. The webpage's load very quickly and easily. Also, if there is something you do not understand, all you have to do is click on the icon for a description of what the icons meaning is. "ABCya" has a design that will allow you to use it in a short class period without having to run from student to student helping. This design is like having an assistant with each student explaining how to operate it. Wonderful for the introduction to technology in the classroom, without the time frame fear (not having enough time) that most teachers have with using technology in the classroom.

Whitney Lindt Purpose: I think that the purpose of this website is to provide parents and teachers a safe website to send their children to. There is so much that one has to worry about on the internet these days it is nice to know that there are safe websites for the younger children out there that they can learn from. Overview: I think that this site would be great for teachers and parents of young students to use. It seems that more often than not students are learning with technology and they think it is fun and it keeps their attention and this website is great for that too because it is so visually attractive. The main focus of this sight is numbers and the alphabet which is perfect for 1st graders because that is the main focus in the classroom. And this website provides links which would help the students not only learn the material but practice what they are being taught. Content: The content of this site is perfect for what 1st graders will be learning in school. As a teacher I would even recommend this website to the parents of my students so that they knew their children were going to safe websites. There are storybooks on this website which would just be fun for the students to go to or for teachers to use in the different subjects they are teaching if they can apply it. Also there are links that can have the students work with spelling and the alphabet and also numbers. This website might also work for younger students than 1st graders because there are some really easy ways of learning numbers and letters on this site. Design: This website is wonderful because as soon as it opens it would have the attention of 1st graders in school and it would keep them attracted to the website. This website is really easy to read even though it has a lot of colors. It is also easy to navigate instead of just a table of contents the different areas and links of the websites are split into different boxes with pictures on them so it makes it easy for a little kid to

Wonderful website for first grade learning games. There are games for letters and numbers

Kara Mitchell 1 February 2011 This website is intended for a young audience. This is evident thru the colors, animations and links. The purpose of the site is to explore areas of science, math, spelling and history. Following each link is a list of options for what the student wants to study or look into. Further down the page is a list of games the student can choose from to apply the knowledge read prior. It is simple to navigate, however I feel there are too many options for students giving the students opportunities to get off task. Content and Design: Based on content there is a good deal of information for each section. It is essentially an online textbook with pictures on each page. The content is correct as is spelling and grammar. There is a copyright and year easily accessible at the end of each page as well, making documentation very simple. As for the design, the site has a clear title page and an index of options. The site loads efficiently, quickly and is easy to navigate, as it has the same format on each page. In my opinion there are too many ads directly on the content page. Out of four ads only one is about the subject the others have no relation, or a relation that should not be included in a child's website. Overview: Overall, this website could be more interactive and child friendly. It is a bit word intensive and contains ads that should not be made available to children. There is a good bit of information that can prove very useful and if guided, through a web quest could be led to find the right information and learn more about the subject in the process. I would like there to be more videos or maybe music from the time period to help history really come to life.

This site is a great site to use in conjunction with another search engine like wikipedia. Although this site is art based, it's a great starting point when reviewing or researching an artist. This site guides you to museums, archives, artists, book, articles and more relating to whatever you'd like to research in the arts. It is like the beginning of a maze so to speak that will guide you on your way toward more legitimate sites with more resent and filtered information relating to the topic of your choice. The design is much like that of wikipedia, tool bars on the left give more specific places within this search engine to do some researching but after clicking an artist you are given many picture of there work which is of course aethetically pleasings. Although unlike wikipedia, not just anyone can change information on the site and there are verification dates in the upper right letting the viewer know that the page they are on isn't giving false information.

Laura Rice 2/5/12 Overview: The purpose of this website is to expand knowledge about artists and their work. This website provides a large number of artists, articles, art news, and images. This websites audience is anyone who is interested in art, teacher, student, or buyer. Over all this website allows people to search by artist, work title, or art museum. One really cool feature about this website is that it allows viewers to see the top 30 artist searched. This feature is really helpful to art students because sometimes you don't know what artist you want to research and so on so this is a great way to start into things. The art cyclopedia is an awesome research engine if you're looking for a certain piece of art as well. When you click on an artist it brings you to a page with a short history of the artist, which museum the art is in, what pieces are on the market, image archives, articles, multimedia, books, and their galleries. This is a great website for information and overall knowledge. Content: As mentioned before this website excels in area of imagery and information about individual piece of art. The art search engine provides visitors the opportunity to search by artist, title of the work, art museum it is located. If the viewer didn't know any of these aspects of the certain piece of art they could browse by the medium or time period. This website has an incredible amount of artist's material. For each artist there is a short history of his or her life, a list of museums there art is in, and any type of multimedia that has been published about the artist. There is also access to different articles about art as well as art news. Viewers can also order posters or prints of their favorite art which is another beneficial aspect to the site. This website provides viewers with the access to thousands of artists work. Design: Overall the design is good. The website is organized neatly and clear

Cold War- YouTube Documentary Evaluated October 13, 2014

The purpose of this site is to give a 45 minute video tutorial of the Cold War. It is designed for upper level students, presumably high school and college. Based on the information in the video, it is a great overview and or complementary source for learning about the Cold War. The documentary was published on Oct 11, 2014. This overview begins with the United States' entry into Vietnam and goes through the fall of the Berlin Wall. Using interviews with historical experts and leaders from this period of time, the author put together an informative and engaging piece. The design of the video is put together as a standard documentary. Because we are looking at historical events, it is best to do so in chronological order. The author of the video puts it together so the students will understand how the chronological events take place and affect each other.

Tonya Searles This website clearly states on the first page that the audience is open to students or any person in the world who needs writing help. In this case, the website is being used by English students. The website provides assistance with all forms of writing including grammar, spelling, punctuation, and citing material. The user simply has to click on the topic they need help in and go from there. The website is currently maintained by the writing lab at Purdue University, and does provide copyright dates through 2014. The information is authoritative and accurate because it is developed by the aforementioned professionals at Purdue University. For an English student, or any student, the website is relevant because it can assist with basically any type of writing assignment. The purpose of the website is to help people check their work and get help with writing when they need it. The website clearly displays common mistakes people make and how to fix them, as well as allowing for people to search more in depth for rules of writing. The websites colors are very similar to that of citationmachine.net. They are subdued and not overly hard to look at for long periods of time. The website has a lot of content, but the front page is neatly categorized without being overwhelming. I like how the mission statement of the website is right on the home page. The content is categorized by topic and each link I clicked on worked. Each link will take you to a new page with subcategories and recommendations for further suggested resources. I think the site is very user friendly and informative.