Overview: Art Education is a website for links to jobs and lessons for high school art teachers. Links are functioning properly and the website is inviting for students as well as teachers.
Nathan Wonnacott9/9/11
Overview: The Incredible Art Department is a source where art teachers can submit and share lesson plans. These lessons apply for all grade levels and are neatly organized, equipped with tools to better one's teaching methods. I find this site extremely helpful, and have not seen anything negative.
Content: It's distinguishable as an art site that teachers as well as students can use to learn about art in a non-traditional way. The author Ken Rohrer updates the site frequently, and has a long list of great reviews. The lessons are in-depth, filled with pictures, games, and rubrics to grade students' progress. Links are fully functional, and provide additional sources to their information
Design: Speedy, attractive, and available in the public domain; this site offers an efficient way to address teachers' lack of time. Graphics and the title bar at the top of the home page adds to its fluidity. Constantly updated and sponsored by Princeton Online, this website seems to be a worthwhile source inside and outside the classroom.
Scott Chanthongthip on January 23, 2010
Overview:
National Library of Virtual Manipulatives is a free website offered online to help teachers us visual aids to teach mathematics. The content is from the Utah State University and is edited by the university. Content is easy to navigate and understand because it focuses on students from K-12.
Content:
The National Teachers Council of Mathematics five content standards are listed vertically in a grid, while the grades for each of the standards are listed across the top of the grid. Navigation based on the content standard and grade level appropriateness is accessible because of this organization. Teachers just need to find the content standard and line it up with the appropriate grade level. Although the site has a version that it offers to schools many of the virtual manipulatives are easy to use as long as one's computer has JAVA capabilities. There are four different language options for the different virtual manipulatives, so it makes it easy to use in bilingual settings (English, Spanish, French, and Chinese). The main reason for this website is to offer teachers with computer technology to teach manipulation of different math areas when the physical manipulatives are not available. Teachers can also use the site to help explain concept clarity of hard to understand math functions.
Design:
The initial web page offers a grid of math standards and grade levels from K-12. Teachers can click on the appropriate link and it will lead them to more options on different subjects in the content areas. None of the links are broken for the virtual manipulatives. Design of the website is updated often by the USU. NLVM also allows users to select from four different languages.
Kaci Philpot
Overview: The purpose of this site is to provide teachers and students with fun, interactive Math manipulatives online, because manipulatives help students to see visual relationships in Math and help to actively engage students. The website has the following standards for math education; numbers and operations, algebra, geometry, measurement, and data analysis & probability. Each standard has four different age groups to choose from: pre-k through 2, 3 through 5, 6 through 8, and 9 through 12. This website is one of the very few educational websites I have found that is free and clear or useless information and clutter.
Content Summary: This website content quality is very high; it has an index chart on the homepage with grade levels and math standards. Each box on the chart is linked to a page of full of various virtual Math manipulatives. If you navigate to the credits page you can see who is in charge of creating what, however it does not provide information about or credibility of those individuals. It also does not have revision dates. But the site is well organized and has very rich content. The manipulatives are an excellent way to get students excited about learning math.
Total yeses: 19
Total no's: 2
Total N/A: 3
Design Summary: The homepage of this site is very easy to navigate and understand, but it does not have very strong eye appeal at all. But the manipulatives are very useful and all have clear directions if necessary and all internal and external links work properly. It does not appear to have any outdated content, if Mathematics can even be outdated. My favorite link on this website is the link to the Spanish page. This would be very useful for teachers with ESL students; it helps to ease the language barrier.
Total yeses: 22
Total no's: 2
Total N/A: 0
Chelsey Lynch
1/31/11
* Overview: This website is for the National Library of Virtual Manipulatives. The intended audience of this site is teachers, and students of all ages. The available resources are a wide array of virtual math manipulatives. This website is extremely useful to teachers because it provides children with a firm grasp on concepts by letting them learn directly through physical objects that enable students to visualize relationships and applications.
* Design: This website is attractive and very easy to navigate. The main page of the website contains a large grid system which serves as a menu for the math content area and grade level. All information to contact the sites provider is given, and all the information is current. The instructions for the manipulatives are very easy to follow and the site even provides examples when necessary. This site has adequate graphics, though the music and sounds in games is a little dated and sometimes annoying.
* Content: The authors of this site appear to be highly education and experts in this field. The purpose of this site is very clear and the content achieves the intended purpose effectively. This site is extremely interactive, well organized, and easy to navigate. I have personally used this site numerous times and love it. The only things I wish this site contained more of are links to websites that are similar to this or had further information.
Colter Huhn
1-24-10
The purpose of this site is to be a resource for science, specifically biology, teachers. The site contains quizzes, worksheets, lessons, labs, and information on biology. The intended audience is science teachers across the country. My overall impression is fairly strong with this website. The content is great and could be very helpful for a biology teacher. The design is simple, but well put together and easy to navigate.
As far as content goes, there are many strengths, and definitely some weaknesses. Upon first look the basic content and intended audience is clearly stated in the opening paragraph on the home page. Also, the information quality is excellent. It's well organized, easy to understand, seemingly accurate, and most importantly does a flawless job of fulfilling the sites purpose in helping science teachers. The major flaw I did find was the information providers and currency. There were no authors or references sited anywhere. Given, most of the links were to worksheets, labs, etc. but an author or creator should be listed somewhere. The only way of finding out who the author of the site is, was to email him/her.
Now to the web design itself which was nearly perfect. The site was fast and usable on at least Firefox and Internet Explorer. The homepage was attractive and well organized. The site itself was very easy to navigate with directions in the opening paragraph. There were clear categories to content and helpful links for further information. Finally the content presentation itself was perfect. It's easy to use, organized, same format throughout, and sufficient information. The flaws seem to be there was no date of last revision, and a copyright and site sponsor were nowhere to be found.
Justin Sanchez
Reviewed 10-21-13
www.biologycorner.com
Purpose: The purpose of this website is to provide biology related teaching material. There are quizzes, worksheets, and other teaching material tools.
Intended audience: The intended audience is teachers who are looking for education material.
Available resources: There are many links to other education material websites.
Overview: This is a really good website for teachers. There is a ton of different educational material. This website is also creative commons. The website seems to be well maintained and easy to download. Moving from link to link is very fast and easy.
Content: All of the content seems to high school biology related. The content is mostly targeted towards teachers through education material.
Design: The website downloads fast. The site is not too busy. The site seems to be well maintained, there is not broken links or under construction pages. All of the links are obvious as to where they will take you.
Sarah Kautzky
January 31, 2011
Overview: The purpose of this website is to provide basic statistics help to high school and college level students. This site is intended for students who are enrolled in a statistics course and are seeking additional help and information. This website may also be used by statistics teachers to create lesson plans or be used as a reference. The information is separated into chapter like grouping. My overall impression of this site is a very good one. This is something that I would surely use as a statistics teacher and I would encourage my students to look at it and reference it as needed.
Content: The creator of this website is an undergraduate professor who created it as a supplement to the textbook for his students. He is a credible source and contact information is available in the form of a drop box. Links to other sites and sources are in working condition and are very helpful. This website achieves its purpose in delivering the basic information taught in a statistics class. All of the information is current, relevant, and correct. The information is easy to understand as well. The site is very well organized and free of bias and spelling or grammatical errors.
Design: The design of this website is pretty good. There are no download errors or broken links. The homepage is very neat, clean, and organized which appeals to me, but others might be that it is plain looking. The site does not contain a table of contents because it is one in itself the way it is laid out. A copyright date is listed at the bottom of the page. Navigating the site is fairly easy and there are links that allow the user to jump to related pages. The graphics are only used when appropriate and when they add something to the material. The cleanliness and simplicity of it promotes learning and limits distraction.
From the website: a new and developing online journal and resource site for teachers of Creative Writing and those who are in the process of training to become teachers of Creative Writing.
Ryan Magrum Sept 15th, 2011
Overview: The purpose of this site is to provide information and updates in science in the form of news articles to the general educated public. There are links to scientific news magazines as well as links to other scientific web sites. My overall impression of this site is that it is easy to read and navigate and there is a plethora of knowledge available within the contents. It's great for students studying specific topics in science to read.
Content: PhysOrg, at first glance, is not flashy and aimed at consumers. The main goal of the site is general knowledge and entertainment in the form of scientific reading. The articles, with topics ranging from nano-science to medicine, are written with very few technical terms making the content easy to comprehend by the average educated individual including high school students with background instruction in the topic of interest. The articles are news updates on the emergence of new things in science sometimes with a brief explanation of the mechanism behind the new discovery complete with figures. Such articles would be a great starting point for a research paper. The articles also include hyperlinked citations to the primary sources. There are many links to other scientific news sites.
Design: This site is not aimed at attracting a passerby web surfer. The target audience is attracted to the content within and already has a general idea of what they want to get out of PhysOrg. Therefore, the site is made easy to navigate and less flashy with few advertisements and the ads on the site are related to the scientific topics and links on the site. For example: an ad for paper that is really white for printing off the articles to read as a hard copy while making the articles easier to read. The links to the articles are strait forward not to bias clicking on any specific article if in the "spotlight stories" area. All the articles are arranged for the navigator to find specific arti
Brick Cegelski 9/5/11
Overview: AAG Center for Global Geography Education offers educational resources for teachers and students. It is very easy to access and is a useful tool for teachers. It provides teaching modules that relate to current events and issues. The website would be very useful to teachers trying to find a good way to teach one of the themes of Geography and to get a look at different geographical issues from a worldwide perspective.
Content: The basic content is easily accessible and easily found. The intended audience is stated on the main page. Its intended for higher education teachers, college students, and teachers of Advanced Placement in high school. The authors are clearly defined and information about them and how to contact them are also given. The sponsor of the site is clearly identified and displayed on the main page. The material was updated in the last year and is current enough to still be relevant for the information. The content is complete, well organized and accurate based on my knowledge of the information.
Design: The website is easy to follow and downloads quickly. The website isn't too flashy but everything is clear and concise. The contents of the site are clearly indicated along the left side of the main page of the website. Information for making contact with the sponsor and the authors is readily available under the about us tab. The copyright date is easy to determine. All of the links work properly and lead to good information. The graphics are helpful and contribute to the information on the site.
Ryan Magrum Sept 15th, 2011
Overview: The purpose of this site is to teach student about the frog system through a virtual dissection. The dissection lets the user display the organs of the frog in any combination with or without skin and skeleton without the mess of an actual dissection that many of us have done in high school biology class. The site is strait forward with a big frog picture to click on to start the dissection and various links to other information.
Content: The first page has all the bureaucratic business with the contact info, the site creators and developers. There is also a link or two to other pages with more sites like this one and pages with more information. The dissection is a little disappointing. When one highlights an organ or set of organs the organs are sitting there like a real frog on a dissection dish. For a virtual dissection I wanted to see clickable options with descriptions and information (click on the heart and a box with info on the heart of a frog pops up). For a dissection, the pictures accurately depict what an actual frog looks like without the mess of a real dissection. The only other criticism is one can't physically touch the parts of a frog which is one of the benefits of the real life thing that the internet may never have.
Design: The website is plain in nature. There are no fancy pictures or visual effect to draw a person into the site. I believe the site is there purely for educational purposes. The title page is white with black print and blue hyperlinks. There are no advertisements. The interactive frog brings the user to the page where the user can play around with the frog parts and view them and how the parts fit together. The art involved is somewhat primitive but the parts are colored and one can tell what they are. This interactive page is plain as well. There is no commercial aspect in this website - it is obviously for educational purposes.
Overview
This site has so many useful tools for both students and teachers. Current teachers are the authors of this site which is very unique and useful. Teachers that are currently in the classroom know from experience what works and what doesn't and this site helps them share useful resources for other teachers. Not only is this site great for teachers and students but also for parents who want to get my involved in their student's education.
Content
This site is phenomenal in the amount of useful tools it provides. It has a tab for classroom resources which has lesson plans, student interactive, calendar activities, and printouts. The student interactivities section has a lot of resources for students who need assistance in writing. All grades are available on this site which is useful for all teachers. There is also a search bar along the left side that helps to narrow done the content and grade level for fast and easy findings. The parent section also has many great things that parent's can use to help their students. It's great to have a site that allows the parents to get involved even with their high school students.
Design
The design of this site is very organized and neat. It's really easy to find what you are looking for especially with the help of the search bar. The grade levels are categorized for easy use also. The interactive section is really easy to use. The directions are very clear and use to understand which is great for younger children. It's just a very user-friendly site and it's very professional looking.
Aylin Márquez
14 September 2011
Overview:
Stattrek.com provides a variety of statistics tools designed for mainly middle and high school students. One of the most useful tools is the probability calculator. It can only calculate the three basic rules of probability. However, this online calculator can still be a very useful tool for students who do not own a scientific calculator. The site also provides the explanation of probability notations that are used to calculate the probability of one event.
Content:
The basic content of the site can be determined easily. The purpose of this site is to be able to help students calculate their basic probability problems. The online calculator is easy to operate. The site provides an explanation of the rules of probability under the summary report title. The site also includes links to other sites that are designed to improve students' learning. There is no revision date on the site. However, the information seems current, and the calculator works properly.
Design:
The homepage downloads efficiently and is appealing. The user can navigate around the site easily. The directions on how to use the calculator are clear. If the user puts wrong data on the calculator and clicks on the calculate button, the site has an explanation to guide the user on how to correct his/her data input. The site has advertisements that appear to be appropriate and related to students' needs.
Overview: Spanish Dict is a great reference for any Spanish student. It serves as a translator, dictionary, and learning tool for aspiring Spanish students. It has tabs that help you learn Spanish, create your own flash cards, make direct translations, and use a dictionary. It also has a conjugation tool that allows you to conjugate verbs in any tense. This site is also available in Spanish using a button in the upper right hand corner.
Content: When you arrive at SpanishDict.com, it is pretty obvious what the site is for. It loads ready to be used. The author information is readily available at the bottom of the page and can be easily accessed. They are credible sources and seem to be qualified to create this site. Since this site mostly deals with word translation, it is not, nor should it ever be out of date. The purpose for the site is clear, it offers relevant information, it is easy to understand, and there is more than a sufficient amount of information for my purposes.
Design: Although Spanish Dict does not have the most appealing website, it is extremely well laid out. It is easy to move around the site and directions are provided where applicable. One of my favorite design features for this site is the ability to have it translated into Spanish. This could be used as an ESL tool for that reason. It works on almost any browser, and provides enough information to make it worth visiting on a daily basis
Ryan Magrum Sept. 15th, 2011
Overview: The site is an online game site known as Armorgames.com consisting mostly flash games aimed at wasting time. However, there is a game Armorgames offers called CellCraft. While CellCraft is fundamentally a game, there are many aspects of it that are very educational. The goal of the game is to command a cell to grow and function as an animal and/or plant cell would and utilize all the functions and organelles as would an actual cell. The game explains all of the functions of the organelles you control and gives some information on the different parts of the cell, how the cell utilizes energy, and reproduces and fights off attack. The instruction in the game is similar to a high school biology class.
Content: The game has multiple levels. Each level has a specific goal for the cell which the user controls. Each level also give some explanation of the new organelles available for use as well as the intentions of the antagonistic elements that an average cell has to deal with on a regular basis like infection and replication. The game has instruction for both plant and animal cells and all the included features of cells. It focuses on teaching the user how a cell operates and how to create a strategy to help the cell survive. The effects of the game are very close to reality - neglecting the very fine details.
Design: It's a game. It comes with instructions. The game goes chronologically, so to speak, beginning from a time where the user can only move the cell around, to growing and fighting off infection, then to exploring new worlds and avoiding extinction. Just like in a biology class room, the student is expected to learn the basics and then think critically about problems using the basic knowledge to solve the problem, so does CellCraft. The game takes the user, educates the user on how a cell works (and I mean just about everything one would learn in a general biology class), and sends the user off to ke
Overview: This site had many games involving addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. It could be used for all grade levels because you can adjust the level of difficulty on each game. There were daily puzzles, word games, math games, and printable activities. The site is meant to make math fun and it uses creative games to do that. The ability to adjust the difficulty level makes it great for a classroom because you can make the activities grow as the student's understanding grows.
Content: This website loads quickly and has an eye appealing front page. There are suggestions of popular math games but there is also a website index at the top of the page. The index was organized into understandable categories. The games uploaded and played without pause to load. The brain teasers and games were correct to the best of my knowledge. There were also links to math trick videos and other game ideas. This website could be used in the classroom as a fun reward for students who finish their in class homework early.
Design: The homepage downloads efficiently. The site sponsor, contact information, and date of last revision are not easily accessible. The website also does not run as well in other browsers. I was using Google Chrome. The list of links are very well organized and easy to use. Each link had a description of the game before you click on it to see what it is. The instructions for the games were easy to follow and very logical and concise.
Aylin Márquez
13 September 2011
Overview:
The Problem Site.com provides educational games, daily puzzles, word, and math games designed for teachers and Pre-K-12th grade students. Reference and printables tabs provide a free educational source for teachers. The site provides mathematical problems from previous years with their solutions included that influence students' analytical thinking. Interactive games are also designed to improve students' memorization.
Content:
Although the basic content of the site is easily determined, the user needs to check internal links to determine the intended audience of the site. If the audience is young children, they may need adult assistance to navigate within the site since the site has advertisements that can be considered inappropriate (games, dating sites, and etc.). The site has an overview that explains how the site was started and what it is about. A contact person and address are also available for users to ask questions. Both the site overview and contact information are located at the bottom of the site. Overall, the purpose of the site is clear, and the information appears to be accurate.
Design:
The homepage is designed well and downloads efficiently. It is appealing for mainly high school students and teachers. The user is able to navigate easily. The internal links work properly and are helpful and appropriate. However, there are advertisements that may not be appropriate for young children. The graphics and animations serve a clear purpose. A list of links is well organized, clearly labeled, and easy to use. The site also includes a search area where users can look for other educational sources.
Amy Andreen
9-14-11
Overview: This site is based out of the UK but it has great historical content. The greater part of the emphasis is on European history which is very interesting to look into. It will obviously have a bias that leans toward the British, but I find that to be beneficial in researching topics and content for the classroom. It's a site that would be useful to both Social Studies teachers as well as High School Students.
Content: A wide variety of the site focuses on the historical events that took place on European soil. However, it is not limited to this. There are primary accounts from both World Wars as well as other events throughout history. There are podcasts that allow students and teachers alike to have a more interactive experience on the site. The list of topics within the site is almost endless. As far as content goes, this site is a great resource.
Design: The Historical Associations' site is beautiful when it comes to content; however, I found the site very boring to look at. It isn't hard to navigate which is great, but in my opinion it lacks in inviting colors that should add interest to the viewers. There are many different tabs that allow one to explore the site very easily and enjoy all of the content offered. Once the researcher or viewer makes it past the layout, this site has fabulous material that can be very useful to teachers and their students.
Overview: The target audience for this site was primarily for any student at the high school elvel or above because the subject involved writing reserach papers.
Content: Content is a little less informal and unorganized. The topic of the site is clear from the title but gets a little murky as you scroll down. The site goes from information about writing research papers to a blog about writing in general. There is no table of contents either. The info. about how to write a research paper seemed okay to me as far as I could tell. There were quite a few commercial ads and links to other sites that somewhat pertained to the website. The latest revision was not found
Design: Page downloaded efficiently, although the homepage was not that appealing. There was no multimedia on this site. I think that this would be a last resort stie if someon were truly tryign to fnd info. about writing research papers.
Ffa.org is one of the MOST important tools for when you are an ag educator. We use this sight to sign up for various national events and it is used for a resource for the various activities that take place in our program. It holds guidelines for the national competitions that take place and outlines for speeches that our students give. This website is what allows us to keep up to date also with the various changes that Ag Education are undergoing. As we learn and grow so does agriculture it is starting to focus more and more on the services that agriculturalist can provide since production agriculture is only ran by 3% of the American population. It offers us an opportunity to get more members in our chapter and allows us to help us offer those students a broader range of Supervised Agricultural Education Programs. Ag ed used a series of 3 rings to help us better our educational process; FFA, SAE and Agricultural Education, this sight is where all 3 are combined for us for easier access and information to help provide the public with in the future to help continue support for years to come.
Cassie Nelson
February 3, 2012
Overview
The purpose of this site is for FFA advisers, members, and alumni to get current information. The intended audience is advisers, members, and alumni. This site is very useful in getting members started in FFA and to learn what FFA is about. Overall, I like this website and will use it when I teach.
Content
At first glance the user is able to determine the content and audience of this site. The site has all of the information about the authors and who to contact for questions. The material is clearly identified. The site seems to be updated frequently. The downfall is there is no revision date provided. The information is accurate, organized and appropriate for the audience. The site itself worked properly, along with the links within the site.
Design
This website downloads efficiently and has strong eye appeal. This site is easy to navigate and you can tell where you are within the site. A downfall is that the site doesn't have a copyright date or date site was established. There is sufficient information and is clearly labeled and organized.
Randi McInerney
September 15, 2011
Overview:
The purpose of the Poetry Foundation website is to be a learning resource for anyone interested and to promote poetry in our culture. This site would be great for high school or college students, teachers, or other interested adults. The site offers full poems, biographical information on poets, articles and news relating to poetry, and a "learning lab" that allows you to access annotated poems, poem guides, writing ideas, discussion questions, and tips for teachers. The content and design are very appealing.
Content:
There is a great amount of information readily available on this site. It is very interactive with everything from places to listen to the poems to places that will direct you to downloadable poetry mobile "apps". The information is very extensive and reliable. If you have questions and comments, the foundation provides various ways to contact them.
Design:
The website downloads quickly and looks very appealing and organized. The bar across the top makes navigating easy. There are no directions for using or navigating the site, but it is so easy that instructions are really not necessary.