Group items tagged

Kids.gov Michelle Petty, January 22, 2011 Overview: This website is aimed at students, ages K-8, and educators. For educators, it offers a wide range of information on topics from science, math, social studies, and health. It then access sites that are relevant to the topic selected and gives links to other sites on a variety of topics within each broad category. For students, it offers them a similar experience. They can go to social studies, and then pick current events, maps, natural history, U.S. studies and world studies depending on what they're studying. This site is great because it offers a variety of information under every category. It is easy to navigate and has very reliable and dependable sources to back its information. Content: The site is very easy to navigate; the top has tabs for students' breaking it down for grades k-5, grades 6-8, and educators. At the bottom of the homepage there is a link to an about us which gives information on the site, who maintains it and who provides the information. The Federal Citizen Information Center (FCIC) out of Pueblo, Colorado, maintains this site and if that weren't enough information it gives a link to the Pueblo site. This site is mainly links to other educational pages, but it is easy to understand and use. It is aimed at all educational branches, and provides educational sites as well as fun game sites. I would use this site in a classroom setting, because it is educational and easy to use. Design: The design of this website is pretty straightforward. It is basic which makes it easy for all ages to use, and all of the links lead to the site promised without advertisements popping up. There isn't a table of content, but it is broken down into such specific categories, that a table of contents is not necessary. The date of last revision is found on the about us tab and is clearly labeled along with who maintains the site and how to contact them. A simple, yet effective site that

Overview: This site offers all kinds of learning for kids from reading.math,writing to health and fun games to help you learn. You learn about art, music and even money. It is a great learning tool for all kids to have access to. Content: The site has many different links that you can visit but organizes them in groups so it is easier to navigate. This site provides all kinds of useful information for kids and educators. Kids can play fun and interactive games for fun learning on all kinds of topics. They can also learn about everday matters like healthy habits. The author is well recognized on the site as well as sponsor. The information is shown in a way that kids can comphrend the material. Design: The homepage is colorful and has pictures. It keeps you interested in learning with its fun graphics. Every link was well laid out and could be found easily for kids. It is frequently revised so the information is up to date.

Emily Hastings Reviewed 2/5/12 Kids.gov Purpose: The purpose of this website is to provide students with links to other educational and governmental websites for kids. Intended Audience: This site is intended for Kindergarten through eighth grade. Available Resources: This site has many resources available. That is what the purpose of this site is, to link you to other useful and educational websites. Overall Review: This website is easy to use, making it worthwhile. The information is presented clearly and simply making it easy to navigate from one link to the other. It also includes a navigation bar and a site map which are both very useful. The links have great information and do not take long to get to. There are no dead ends, and they bring you to what they say they will. This website is a great resource for finding educational sites. Overview: This site has a link for k-5, 6-8, and teachers with endless links to educational sites. It is extremely organized and very helpful when looking for sites. Content: The content of this site is for students in need of educational websites. It is a great resource for that purpose. When clicked on, the link opens quickly and the information is accurate and educational. It has many links for websites of all different subjects. Design: The design of this website isn't very eye catching, but is welcoming because it is so simple to use. You don't need directions on how to use the site. It is very organized and makes looking for these links easy. It provides you with a site map which is a list of everything in the site, which is very useful as well.

DAR.org Michelle Petty, January 22, 2011 Overview: The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) website is aimed at educating others about the American Revolution, genealogy of members and scholarships for those who meet the criteria. It is not necessarily aimed at students or teachers, but it is a very informative and useful website for American Revolution projects. The site it set up with clear tabs leading to specific sites and searches. The most important link on this site is its online library catalog, which allows individuals to search for specific battles, commanders, cities and other items related to the American Revolution. Content: This website is aimed at informing the public about the DAR and the American Revolution. It is for an older audience, middle school and high school, and would be most helpful in research projects. It is a very nice, official looking site with a clearly identified author and copyright date along with contact information to the site. The site is organized in a very user friendly way with links on the left hand side of the page, and special featured items on the right and DAR related sites across the top of the page. All links lead to educational sites, or journals that are written by experts in the field. Design: The design of this website is very official, with clearly identified authors and easy to use links. It is easy to navigate, and has links to journals, pictures, and videos that are relevant to the American Revolution. All links work and take the viewer to the correct site, and the information provided at the site is educational and useful. This site is great for American Revolution information and is one that I would use as a teacher, however it is probably too complex and advanced for younger audiences.

10-11-12 Step up to Writing is a website designed to show students how to write a well-structured paragraph using the step up method.  The Step up method is simple and compares writing to an everyday concept. The intended audience is for all students but would be best used for students between 3rd and 5th grade. Other than the links to the different paragraph sections no other resources are presented. If you want a good website to teach writing methods this is one to use.  The content on this site is very well organized that you can maneuver is very easily. At first look it provides basic information, the method is simply put until further clicking on each link to further diverge in to the each section. The information is written in a way that children can understand the information.  The website design was good but not perfect. Everything downloads effectively. When looking for the developer you need to go to the link at the bottom; it isn't very easy to find but is still accessible. No other links are on this section of the webpage but on the main homepage many helpful links are presented.  Overall this website need to improve the design a little but presents good information worth investigating. 

Overview: The purpose for exploring this website is to obtain resources to help students look at U.S. history more objectively. The audience that this website is aiming at is teachers of middle/high school U.S. history courses. The available resources of this website are various historical subjects ranging from colonization to the 21st century; and a vast library of U.S. historical themes (e.g. slavery, civil rights movements, etc...). This website does a great job of supplying sufficient information while presenting itself in an appealing way. There numerous links and PDF documents that relate to the specific content area being looked at. Its design is very appealing and is also well organized. It is easy and quick to find information on the website as well. Content: One of the best things that this website accomplishes is its coverage of topics from colonization to the 21st century. Each section has numerous PDF's and/or websites that teachers can use to help teach that content area. Information about the authors/sponsors are readily available under the "About" section. The thing that this website lacks, however, is the revision history; there is only a copyright year. Overall, the website achieves its purpose of giving teachers the tools to help students learn about U.S. history more objectively. Design: This website has a very appealing design to it. Not only does it look nice, but visitors know exactly where they are once the home page loads. The site has an effective layout; the audience only has to click a couple times to get to the information that they need. The downside to the design of the website is the use of multimedia. There is little to no use of graphics, audio, and/or video. The overall design, though, makes this website worth visiting again in the future.

Melissa Mings 11/16/12 Audience: Educators Author: A Professional teacher, Mr. G Purpose: This article is to let educators know some advanced Elementary and Middle school students are using iPads as a tool to extend their normal math lessons into group work that may be beyond other students in their grade level.

Make Me Genius provides videos, projects, tests, educational powerpoints, and more all on the subject of science, for elementary and middle school aged kids.

Overview: This website is a time line. It is pretty easy to understand and should be fairly straight forward. There are not graphics to draw ones attention away from the subject matter, which is both a plus, and a bit of a draw back. Content: The content of this site is fairly straight forward. It is a timeline of the events of WW2. Each date is in bold font with a description underneath appropriate for middle school students. Design: The design of this website is very easy to use. There is not much to the site. It is a standard time line, there are no pictures. But all the relevant information is in chronological order.

Michelle Londe Overview: The United States National Archives website is one that middle and high school students, educators, and even those outside of the realm of education can easily use. This website provides many different purposes, including providing information on American history, exploring Veterans services and providing resources for teachers. A link to a gift shop is also provided within the site. Some links include resources to investigate genealogy, and DocsTeach. Overall, the site is very easy to maneuver and is easy to understand. It is aesthetically pleasing and worth investigating. Content: The content within the website is very useful for any person in the public realm. The main point of the site is to inform, and it does exactly that. The links to educational parts of the site, including the "Charters of Freedom" part provides basic, pertinent, and unbiased information. The information is solid and appears to be accurate. All pieces of information are easy to find and are clearly listed and labeled. The only regrettable part is the lack of authors for the more informational parts and the latest revision dates. But, despite that, there is still contact information for one to use if needed. Some additional links are included. Everything within the site is interactive and provides to the betterment of it. Design: The National Archives website is excellently designed. Everything is organized so the different parts of the website can be easily found and be taken to. The homepage was fun and interesting to look at, as was the rest of the site. The site provides a variety of rich resources regarding how to do research on the site and how to use what is given to the consumer of information. The user is able to move with ease among the site.

David D Castle 2/7/12 Overview: The site provides access to worksheets, lesson ideas, and other classroom activities, but requires yearly subscription. There are links to other educational websites (some free), Facebook, and Twitter. School subject pictures immediately grab your attention and provide links to worksheets, but without being a member it always brings up a "join now" page. Content: The content presented on TeachFuzz would be very useful for elementary teachers because it provides not just worksheets but lesson ideas, calendars, themes, and other miscellaneous activities. The links to other sites work well, but none of the links within the site are available without subscription. There is both a toolbar of subjects near the top of the page and a set of large graphics depicting the subjects. Design: The site seems well-designed and easy to navigate. The icons are large and clear, leaving little room for confusion. The site isn't cluttered with advertisements and links to tons of other sites which is nice. This site also has a custom search box in the middle of the screen provided by Google, which would be very convenient when looking for a specific worksheet or assignment.

Paige Hanewald 10/21/13 Overall: The purpose of this site is to expand the vocabulary for all ages between middle school students and adults. This site contains not only an accurate dictionary, but competitive and interactive assessments of vocabulary knowledge, specific vocabulary lists, and interesting blogs that pertain to the use of strange words, their origins, and other relating topics. Overall, I think this site could potentially be useful to anyone who wants to expand their vocabulary knowledge, especially students. Content: The content has several organized features that offer what I had mentioned before: dictionary definitions, vocabulary lists and blogs that are updated frequently, and "quizzes". The website adapts the words according to your increasing level of vocabulary proficiency so you are always challenged. Contributors of the blogs are employees of Thinkmap, the sponsor of the website, and usually include a short biography expressing their qualifications to the site. Design: The design of the website makes it easy to navigate. There are tabs for every feature, including contact information. The links to other pages are helpful and engaging and have no issues.

Overview The purpose of the Birmingham Grid for Learning site about Life Cycles is intended to provide an interactive introduction to the topic of life cycles. Life cycles are a key component in Biology and it is very important that each student understands them. The intended audience for the site is roughly middle school aged science students. My overall impression of the site is that it is very basic, and has a limited amount of information on it. It can be an ok resource at introducing the topic of life cycles, but should not be used in going into great detail of the topic itself. Content The content of this site would be good for younger students in the field of science. It is good for students to use to augment prior learning of life cycles as well as not going into great detail of life cycles. The website is good for younger secondary students due to the fact that it uses interactive lessons on the life cycles of frogs and butterflies. I would personally only use this site on a minimum basis, not more than half of a class period due to the limited information contained within. Design I thought that the design of the website was very useful, as well as easy to navigate. It had clear instructions as well as easy links to follow. It could be used very easily with little to no trouble learning how to navigate it.

WebQuest website

Chelsea Brunski 10-08-12 Overview The purpose of this site is to provide help to students with math. The website allows student or teachers to create worksheets. They also have an interactive game section and flashcards to help with math subjects. There is also a homework helper section. It is intended for students' k-12. There is a resource that is very helpful which breaks down the entire grade levels. My impression of this website is that it is an okay website but not the best. It has some very useful and neat components to it which I would use often. It doesn't look like much effort was put into making this site. Content This website says that it is intended for k-12 but there isn't ever different sections on this particular site that distinguishes that. The link that is provided is the only site that actually has different levels of content. I do think that the homework helper is a very useful tool for younger age kids. It can only help with basic math skills. If you need help with upper division math then this tool would not be useful to you. The worksheet section is one of the best things that this site has on it. This tool isn't just for students but can be used by teachers. It allows you to create your own worksheet dealing with different subjects in math. The only problem is that this is also for more basic level math. The game section is very small and limited. It only gives you games concerning addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. This wouldn't be for any of the upper grades only for lower grades. Design The website doesn't draw you in at all. You have to read the homepage to really understand what the website is even about. It doesn't look like much effort was put into designing this website. There are different tabs on the left hand side that allow you to navigate the site. These are easy to navigate to. It looks like the website really just wants you to go to the other link that is provided. This link is much more

Jessica Lee 10/21/2013 Overview: The purpose of this site is to help students (elementary and middle school aged) improve their math skills by offering flashcards, online games, a homework helper, and worksheets. However, the overuse of internal links within the introduction makes navigating through the website confusing and distracting. In addition, because it requires Java (which I don't have), it is useless and inoperable. The only decent thing about this website is that it provides an external link to Mathway.com - a website that answers basic math problems. Content: They have decent material as far as helping students improve their math skills; however, because the website is inoperable without the Java, the content is basically nonexistent. Their ideas include having the students work on flashcards, playing content-rich games, providing worksheets, and a basic homework helper that answers their problems. Design: The design of this website is so displeasing, that I knew that I would never use it after first glance. The color scheme is distracting and the layout is unorganized. Some positive points about this site, however, is that the table of contents on the side is useful and tells the viewer what to expect. In my opinion, they should have concealed the internal links in the introduction so that it does not take away from everything else. It's very choppy to the eye rather than being smooth and connected.

This Web site is great because it allows you to create custom worksheets for several different subjects including math, science, social studies, foreign languages, and handwriting. You can also choose the grade level you wish to customize for--everything from pre-K through middle school.

Softschools.com provides free math worksheets and games and phonics worksheets and phonics games which includes counting, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division algebra, science, social studies, phonics, grammar for 1st grade, second grade, 3rd grade, 4th grade, 5th grade and 6th grade.

Solve basic probability problems.

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.

Kathryn Slothower September 11, 2011 Overview: The purpose of this website is to provide the knowledge and practice to students in math. The website breaks the skills into different sections which is very helpful however the information that they provide within each topic is not very detailed. The website is more designed for a brush up on the skill rather than learning the math skill. The website has numerous topics in math that students can use. The website has also broke the math subjects into the grade levels for students to explore the website through the grade that they choose. My overall impression of the website was okay. Content: At first look of this website the purpose and content are very obvious. There is information right away that tells what the viewer will find within this website. There was no information on the authors so although the information seems correct from my pervious knowledge I do not know if the author is credited. The content on the website is organized fairly well. The content is easy to find. The topics in math are separated however the website also separated the topics by grade level. It felt like this website was very helpful however it would be a website that was used for a brush up of knowledge because the information on the topics does not explain it very well. One of the better parts of the website is the practice that is available to use on each topic. Design: The design of this website is very interesting. On the homepage there is a paragraph about the purpose of the website and instructions on how to navigate through the website. Although this information is very useful it is the first thing that the viewer sees so the website is not very attractive. There are not a lot of other things on the homepage, which makes the homepage not very busy. There is an index on the left hand side of the page along with the top of the page. Even though there are aspects of the design that I do not like, I think that overall the

AAA Math features a comprehensive set of interactive arithmetic lessons. Unlimited practice is available on each topic which allows thorough mastery of the concepts.

This site is intended for Kindergarten through eighth grade, but is useful for both students and teachers. There is unlimited amounts of practice for various content for the students, but there is also lessons for the teachers. This website is very well designed. It's appealing to the eye and very easy to navigate for yourself. There is also a clear table of contents on the side which makes it easy to switch back and forth from different grade level or curriculum. This website offers a variety of tools for example games, practice problems, quizzes etc. There was also a clear author and sponsor for the site. The only thing I wasn't able to find was a revision date, but the type of math that was covered shouldn't have to be constantly revised. I think this website is very useful and if I end up teaching at the middle school level I will definitely introduce this website to my students and have them use it for practice.

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