Group items tagged

David May 1/23/11 Good site for base knowledge. It has fun videos and animated activities. It needs more eye appeal. Overview: This website gives history a multimedia and fun twist. Within the simple design on the homepage it contains links to old educational videos, activities, and, movies based on historical events. The educational videos are from decades past such as the 1950s. The videos are accurate, but they leave out some facts such as Native Americans and women that are part of history. That is from the age of the videos. The activities are not really that entertaining at least the ones I used. They do capture one's attention because of the progressive story line and multimedia pictures and animations. These however do have some accurate information. I played around with the Boston tea party activity and the information included in the activity was accurate and explained it well. Overall the website is an okay way to spend some time getting base knowledge on history. The site shouldn't be used as a source though. Content: When first arriving at the homepage it is clear what the site contains. History can be seen with the various pictures and clickable items around the home page. Where the information came from is hard to determine there is so citing of material or authors listed. The site is not clearly marked with a sponsor, but there is clear evidence that it is connected to Amazon.com because in the store section it says powered by Amazon. The most recent update was made in November of 2010 which makes it seem active. The copyright at the bottom of the page is for 2009. The links section of the site send the user to not so credible sites and some links do not work. Informational is the main target of this site with a mix of business which is made clear by all the Amazon.com ads and links. Content seems to be good if base knowledge is already with the user making the information good for most uses except college level detail. Navigation is simple

Tyler Rogers February 4, 2012 Overview: The purpose of this website is to provide educators with activities and lessons for space science. This website is geared towards educators. Viewers will find classroom activities, a list of standards that the site address, and links to other educational space science sites. The site is very easy to navigate, and the lessons and activities provided are of high quality. I would recommend this site to educators because of the excellent lessons, and because of the simple, yet effective layout of the entire site.  Content:  From the first click, the content is clear. Information about the author, including contact information, can be difficult to find. Revision dates are found at the bottom of the home page. By picking one of the listed topics, users will find activities and experiments created by the author. These activities can be effective for many grade levels. They are free of bias, and all the links function properly. Most of the activities contain printer-friendly pages for both the educator and the students. Design: This site has a simple design. The home page is clean, and the table of contents is clear. Copyright information and recent revision dates are available near the bottom of the screen. The site is remarkably easy to navigate: any link in the table of contents will take users to a list of every activity or classroom experiment available for that topic. Selecting an activity will then take users straight to the printable lesson. The actual lessons are all in black and white so that they can be printed easily.  This website uses very little media, as pictures only contribute to the home page, and title the banner of any other page. This site is compatible with multiple web browsers. 

2-5-12 Overview This website was designed by the Okaloosa School District in FL. It has sections for the administrators, parents/community, students and teachers to be involved in fun learning. The student resources have many sections such as Brain teaser, Student games, Principal's Club (more games and activities) and Practice activities. The student games are organized by subject and by age level. Activities are easy to find and easy to use. Overall, this website is a good source for students and others in the community to find games, activities and other resources for learning. Content This site has a lot of information for a wide variety of audiences. In student games, there are sections that are then broken down further into different skills in the subject. Overall categories include math, language arts, science, social studies, technology, games for fun, research and homework resources, search engines and preschool games. Once you choose a topic within the subject then links to games in this subject come up. For example, when you choose Number Basics within Math there are 13 different links to games. Each link has a description of what the game teaches or practices. There are a lot of information and fun activities on this site. Design This website is very organized. The whole website is broken down by who will make the most out of the resources. Once in a section such as student's games, it is broken down further and further to really find a game or activity that fits what you want the students to practice. It is not too complicated to get to, it is simply systematized. This makes navigating the website very easy and allows you to spend more time doing the activity you were looking for instead of searching for it or sorting through games that don't fully match the topic. I really like the organization of this website and how easy it is to use.

Trevor Santy Sept 14 2011 Overview: This site is most a game site for the elementary school level. With many different activities ranging from crosswords to other games this site would probably be used as a second hand activity (like when there is free time). The activities also cover a large variety of topics from science to math to English making it a good learning tool as well as a good place to practice the skills associated with that subject. It even says the grade level the activity was meant for making it a must have for a teacher's resources. Content: As stated in the overview, all of this sites content is varying games for varying levels. The crosswords come in varying difficulties and each activity has an age group suggestion underneath the description making it easier to organize a plan. Most games are straight forward in their descriptions and directions making the content in them easy for kids to understand. Design: This websites design is extremely simple and straightforward. The entire site is essentially just a list of activities/ games and links to play those games. This easy style of site makes it really easy for younger kids (1st - 3rd) able to navigate the site. However, once again I believe this site would be better used as an extra activity.

Scholastic.com Learning Activities (Grades K-5) Sara Scribner 1/23/10 Overview: I found this website to be very helpful. It has numerous resources for student activities and links to other sites with information and resources for teachers. Ads are present throughout this site, but they do not overwhelm you. Also, on the primary page with learning activities for students there aren't any ads at all. Not only would I use this source in my classroom, but I would recommend it to others. Content: Scholastic, a website for teachers is very credible. Information found on this site is current (updated and links work) and information to contact or learn about the sponsor/author is available. There does not seem to be any hidden agendas on this site. This site is organized according to grade level, K-2 or 3-5, and has activities for both age groups. Its information is consistent/accurate, easy to understand, and organized making it easy to navigate. Another positive aspect of this site is that it has activities for subjects like math, science, language arts, social studies, and Spanish. Design: This site is definitely worth visiting. It's content and links to other useful websites makes it a valuable resource. Content layout is organized and everything is clearly labeled. Graphics provide a glimpse of what each game entails and add appeal to the page/game description. Animations and sounds make one's experience as he plays the games enjoyable and exciting.

Caitlin Pilch 8/31/11 Content: At first look, I was unable to identify what the content is on this site. The author of this site is not clearly identified, and there is no obvious sponsor. The revision for the content on this site is not relevant. The information on this site is organized by grade level and also activity subject. There are games and activities for the different grade levels. There is not a large amount of resources/games/activities on this site. The content on this site is adequate but compared to other sites is lacking. The links on this site are unrelated to what the site's content is. Design: The design of the site is lacking. The site downloads quickly but there is no appeal to any of the pages. It is hard to tell what page you are on. There are two separate indexes-one for different grade levels, one for different activities which is confusing and it doesn't clearly indicate where you should navigate to. The content presentation is not sufficient compared to other children's websites. Overview: The purpose of this site is for entertainment and education. The recommended target audience is kindergarten to fifth grade. This site offers different games and activities like number games, word games and interesting facts. I am not impressed with this site. It does not offer very many activities and the ones it does offer do not seem to suffice for the target population. This site is not visually stimulating and I don't think a child would find this site entertaining.

Overview: Preschool Activity Box has many good, different ideas, tips, and activities. The intended audience is teachers or parents who are teaching pre-k children. The website is well organized and easy to navigate. As soon as you click on the link to the website, you know where you are at and can see the index of activities and worksheets. The website is up to date although many of the links are dead ends. I like this webpage, it has good ideas but since most of the links are dead I probably would not use it. Content: At first look I was able to distinguish the purpose and audience for this site. There were no authors listed for this site but the sponsors are listed at the bottom, the only thing they don't have is contact info for the sponsors. The information was updated in 2011, so it is very current. There are very good ideas, activities and tips. Design: The website is concise and has good organization. The homepage loads well and at a first glance you know exactly what webpage you are on. The copyright and date are clearly seen and there is a link to their sister site. The first links are live and lead you to some tips and activity ideas, but when you go any further, for printouts, the links go dead. This is very detrimental to the site. There is a huge mix of live and dead links, so it makes it a guessing game as to which link will work.

Content:The look of the website is bright and colorful with great animations and graphics. The information for the website and for the activities is in part provided by partnerships with Ohio State University, and from professionals in different fields. The website is completely free, and is funded through corporate and private donations. There is provided information for contacting the website creators and sponsors. The information seems pretty current, but, I did not see a revision date on the site. All the links I clicked seemed to be working properly. The information and entertainment provided by the activities looks to be accurate and the grammar and spelling are correct. There are teacher resources, that are posted by user and shared, but, there are no specific links to more information. Design: Edheads was created in 2000. The website downloads efficiently and is attractive. The activities are clearly labeled, and there is a separate section for teacher resources. The navigation is pretty easy and the links within the site are useful and appropriate. The use of multi-media in the activities is great. I only tried this site with googlechrome but, in order to do the activities you need flash player and sound card. The content is great. Within each activity you will find vocabulary and graphics to describe what you are doing. Each activity is clearly labeled and organized. As I mentioned before, I do not see a revision date, but, it seems reasonably up to date and accurate. Purpose: To provide insightful and accurate activities that help explore and teach different aspects of careers related to math, science, engineering, and technology. Audience: Students up to 12th grade. Resources: There are no additional resources available, that I am aware of. Overall: I like the activities, they are engaging and fun to use. I wish the teacher resources was set up better to use for finding information posted by other users

K-5 Math Teaching Resources is a website for elementary teachers that provides example activities that are aligned with Common Core State Standards.  It is easy to determine the content of the site because of the navigation bar one the side of the page. Within this bar there are options to browse specific content areas, as well as the intended audience (grade level).  After you choose the content area you're interesting in planning a lesson for there are links that take you to site that provide information based on that content. The links with possible activities also provide you with information of which common core state standard the activity correlates with.  Another thing that I really liked about this website is that it gives you examples of outside resources you can use (titles of books, pattern block, etc.) that you can use to keep your students physically engaged in the activity and learning. No ads are present on this website, and all of the links provided work. There are also some resources that teachers can use for their school to incorporate special days for the students, like 100th day and states day, which keep the students engaged on special days of school.  This site is very easy to search through.  They also provide you with a link that states the terms of use at the bottom of the website page. It also clearly identifies that it was first published in 2010 and updated up through 2015, and is published through the K-5 Teaching Resources LLC.

Mandy Schumacher 1-24-10 Overview: Internet 4 Classrooms is a website with many components. The purpose of this website is to help teachers use the Internet effectively. On the "Home" menu the user can choose to visit any of the seven links posted. Those include: Grade Level Help, Links for K-12, Technology Tutorials, Assessment Assistance, Daily Dose of the Web, On-Site Training, or About Us. This is a free website that is designed to help teachers find free Internet Sources to use in the classroom setting. Content: This site is full of information and consists of many separate components. This site is mainly visited by teachers who are hoping to find a way to integrate the Internet into their classrooms. From the site the user can choose a specific grade level and subject. Once the user has selected a grade level and subject a list of sites that can be used for classroom instruction appear on the screen. For example, if the user chose Language Arts for Elementary Students, sites such as "American Literary Classics" or "Brain Food" would appear and the user would then choose one of those links to instruct their students. These links can take you to anything from a list of good books to read in the classroom, word puzzles to challenge your students, or anything else related to Language Arts for Elementary students. Design: The website is somewhat organized, however, it can be a little confusing to navigate since there are so many separate links on the Home page. There are also several ads which can become distracting. Overall this site provides good information for teacher and students about using the internet as a learning tool.

Trevor Santy Sept 14 2011 Overview: This site is mostly a teaching resource with activities for grades from preschool to 12th grade. With many different activities ranging through different class levels. The activities also cover a large variety of topics from science to math to English making it a good learning tool as well as a good place to practice the skills associated with that subject. It even says the grade level the activity was meant for making it a must have for a teacher's resources. Content: This site contains different activities for different subject matters such as history, math, science, and a few others. It also has a games tab that contains learning activities for all ages ranging from the easy to some that are very challenging. Also the activities make great lessons for aspiring teachers and the site has help sections in case you get lost or don't know what grade to do an activity for. Design: This websites design is extremely simple and straightforward. With tabs to take you to individual class levels and activities. On top of that it has a handy on site teacher training for using the activities that is pretty easily designed using a mix of videos and text.

Randi McInerney September 15, 2011 Overview: Internet4Classrooms is an educational website primarily for teacher usage, but could be used by students. There is a good amount of information available on a variety of topics, but the site is not as organized or appealing as it could be. Helpful links, educational games for k-12, assistance and information for teachers, technology tutorials, and SAT/ ACT prep are available. Content: There is a lot of information available, but the SAT/ACT prep is only accessible if you become a member. Interactive games, tutorials, and information are available. The content could be easier to find and access. There is email information to contact the website developers. Design: The site does download, but is not that visually appealing or organized. The site provides tabs to find information, but then will just list a large amount of information that you are expected to look through in order to find what you need.

I found this to be a high quality educational website for elementary school students. It has online educational games as well as informations for hands on activities.  It provides many activities for students to do on their own or for teachers to do in the classroom. It also provides areas so you can submit the results of your experiments to you can compare to other groups of students.  Content: "The Lawrence Hall of Science: 24/7 Science" website  is up to date, and activities are current and appealing to today's students. Although the "Educator Information" link is not yet available, it provides many activities that would be appropriate to use in a classroom. It also explores a wide variety of scientific subjects that are explored in the classroom today.  Design: This website is very easy to navigate to find certain pages. It is very colorful and appealing to children in elementary school. The displays help to easily determine which games are online and which are activity guides provide for hands on science experiments. 

Trevor Santy Sept 14 2011 Overview: This site covers a multitude of subjects for varying grade levels. It is extremely user friendly and very easy to navigate. The main page has links going to each individual subject. An interesting feature about this site is that it can save a student's progress in their math activity with an interesting activity called the fun arcade. This site is also very presentable with almost no ads on it and nothing to really distract students while on the site. My overall opinion is that it would be great for teaching as it also gives you different age groups to organize it easier. Content: This site contains different activities for different age levels ranging from 6 to 17 and up. On top of that each activity is separated into specific subjects, such as math and science. Further still the sites age group areas make it easy to organize for your current class. With its easy to navigate frame this site is great for teachers. Design: This websites design is extremely user friendly. With tabs to each age group and then tabs to each subject within that this site makes it easy to get students to focus on a specific subject or activity. It also has links to the different subjects at the bottom of the page and the top making it easier to navigate.

Michelle Hill February 24, 2012 Overview: The purpose of this website is to serve as a resource for instruction for 1st grade internet activities. Therefore, the intended audience is teachers 1st graders and 1st grade teachers. Available on this website are English activities online involving skills such as story listening, letter recognition, literacy activities sight words, and sentence structure and grammar. Also included are Math activities such as number recognition, patterns/shapes, counting, adding/subtracting and much more! There is also unit themes available for teachers of all kinds. Content: The content of the website was rated as very useful for my information needs based on the fact that the total number of "yes" answers outnumbered the "no" answers. Some strengths of this website include the first look, how it was easy to determine the basic content of the site, the information quality, and the further information. The content of the site was well organized and easy to understand. Some weaknesses of this website are that information of the authors is not available, therefore I do not know if the authors are qualified to present information on the topic. Other weaknesses include that the content was not updated frequently, the last time being August 2007 and the fact that one link to another site was not working properly. Overall, there was an abundance of good content that will prove to be useful in 1st grade classrooms. Design: The design of the website was rated as very well designed and easy to use based on the fact that the total number of "yes" answers outnumbered the "no" answers. First, the homepage downloaded efficiently and the website was speedy, which was a good start to the design. Some strengths of the website include that it was well organized, the copyright date was easy to determine, the site is easy to move around, and the content was presented clearly. Some weaknesses include that there were no directions

Overview Paragraph: The purpose of this site is to provide different kinds of activities to use when teaching math. The audience is mostly teachers but parents would benefit as well. There is all kinds of math worksheets and games and such that are available for grades preschool through high school. Overall this site looks very useful and helpful if you're in a pinch for an activity for a lesson plan. Content Paragraph: The content of this webpage is up to date and current according to the copyright. Also, the authors of the site are all listed and described and have degrees in the content that they are discussing. The sponsors are clearly displayed. All of the links that are displayed are working and fully functional. The content is well organized and easy to use. Design Paragraph: It was very clear as to where I was when I clicked on the link as to where I was on the internet and what the content of the website was. There is a decent amount of viable information to make this site worth visiting. The graphics are very useful and aid in the navigation of the website. There is a link that is available to click on to contact a person for more information and other websites are available to for use.

Overview Paragraph: The purpose of this site is to provide different kinds of activities to use when teaching math. The audience is mostly teachers but parents would benefit as well. There is all kinds of math worksheets and games and such that are available for grades preschool through high school. Overall this site looks very useful and helpful if you're in a pinch for an activity for a lesson plan. Content Paragraph: The content of this webpage is up to date and current according to the copyright. Also, the authors of the site are all listed and described and have degrees in the content that they are discussing. The sponsors are clearly displayed. All of the links that are displayed are working and fully functional. The content is well organized and easy to use. Design Paragraph: It was very clear as to where I was when I clicked on the link as to where I was on the internet and what the content of the website was. There is a decent amount of viable information to make this site worth visiting. The graphics are very useful and aid in the navigation of the website. There is a link that is available to click on to contact a person for more information and other websites are available to for use.

Overview: The overall purpose for this website is to have lessons and activity examples that teachers can use for different grades in science. As a teacher this is a great website to seek activities to use in your classroom for different science terms and lessons. This website has activities for science grades varying from kindergarten to 12th grade. This website also has workbooks that teachers can order to give their students to work out of. Overall, this website is very helpful.  Content:  The content of this website is for teachers and there are many activities to do with students that explain science terms and lessons such as science biology of animals, weather, and volcanoes. There are many more lessons available to teachers on this website as well. There is also a way to find certain standards for science that teachers need to meet, which is nice to have so that they can teach the appropriate material. The content on this website is a helpful and fun way for teachers to teach.  Design:The design of this website is pretty simple to navigate through. There are tabs on the top to click on to lead to the other pages. There are quite a few advertisements on this page for different businesses. The color scheme is pretty simple just white and some greens and blues. There are no obnoxious links all over the page or spelling errors either. The design of this website is professional and accurate. 

Olivia Mabie-January 24, 2010 Content: This website has suggestions for games, activities, and lesson plans used to encourage team building among elementary school students. There is a description of the website located near the top of the page, therefore if it does not match what the teacher is looking for then they do not have to waste their time on the website. There are hands on activities for parents and students and for teachers to use in the classroom to get the students to start working together. Once the links are clicked on there are many other interactive activities on those websites also. These links have many subjects incorporated within them, which is nice that the students get to work together and learn about the subjects at the same time. Design: There are no pop-ups or ads on this website which makes it very easy to navigate. One nice thing about this website is under each of the links there is a description about what will be on the website. If a teacher is in a hurry to find a link they are not wasting their time trying to figure out what is on the website. The layout of the website is very neat and organized. Who published the site, when it was published and last updated are all located at the bottom of the page and helps knowing they go through and get rid of the old information and websites which are located on the home page. Overview: This is a great site for teachers to use in order to get their students working together. I liked how this website stated at the bottom of the page that there have not been standard assigned for this source. This site has all the information that needs to be posted on the website such as, who the publisher is, who you can contact if you have any questions, and when it was revised, which means that they have gotten rid of any old information and sites.

Content: This site is a monster. I was looking for a site to explain landmark cases in the Supreme Court. What I found is a site that not only explains but also gives political reactions and the aftermath of the decision. For instance, I clicked on Marbury v. Madison. This is the case that allowed Judicial Review. The site divides the case in two sections Resources and Activities. In the Resources section you can read about the case etc. The Activities students can read logistical information about the case for further understanding. Design: The design is geared to educate. The visual make you think of the Constitution a crinkly brown. I like how the homepage lists the cases on the left side and concepts that came from some of those cases on the right. When you click on a case there is a wealth of information that can further understanding of a case. Many of these cases are a little complicated and I feel that this site can tie up loose ends. It is even geared toward high schools, the sub title reads "one-stop shopping for activities related to key Supreme Court cases and concepts as mandated by State standards. Overview: This site is put on by the Supreme Court Historical Society, meaning it is rather legitimate. I would love to use this site in an activity for class. The site is rather bland but I believe that students would love to be directed to find info and be able to present that info to the class. I could even make them use technology in their presentation. This site is not a baby sitter in the least it is a way for students to use technology and not listen to a boring lecture.

Overview: The Teaching Treasures website is a site created mainly for teachers. If you really wanted to, you could direct your students to this website and have them find an activity to do but the way the website is set up, I think it is targeting the teachers instead of the students. Content: On this website, you can find things such as educational games, broken up into age groups, teaching tools, as well as resources for teachers. They do provide a lot of information and activities for your classroom and seem to know the facts. There are several categories for activities, each broken up into age groups. There seems to be an activity for just about any subject and age group combination you can think of. Design: While this website provides tons of information, the way it is organized and laid out, it can prove to be quite tedious to navigate. There is so much information and categories to browse through; it seems pretty overwhelming at times. While it is difficult to navigate, I think that the layout is pretty basic and typical of a website, which isn't necessarily a good thing. I think that this website could do with a more welcoming and enticing layout to draw it's visitors in.

Overview: The Literary Center Education Network is a website created to help children with basic literacy needs in elementary school. There is tons of helpful information for parents and teachers as well as activities for students. This website has several categories of learning that focus on all aspects of elementary level literacy. Content: On this website, you will find a tab titled 'Play and Learn'. In this tab there are several categories that the student is able to choose from including uppercase and lowercase letters, shapes, writing, words, numbers, colors, and keyboard. Once the student enters each category, there is an activity that includes a woman's voice that narrates what the student is to be doing. There is also a 'Parents and Teachers' tab which includes things several additional activities that can be implemented to correspond with the activities the children have already done in the Play and Learn tab. Design: I believe that the design of this website is very user-friendly once the child has entered the Play and Learn tab. There may be some difficulty in getting to this tab, as it is not especially distinctive from the other sections of the website but once they are in the Play and Learn tab, there are several links accompanied by pictures that are easy to navigate even for a child.

Overview: There is a lot of information as well as links that contain many good ideas, printouts, and activities. This site is not well organized though. It is way too busy. There are so many pictures and words that it is hard to tell where you are at and where you want to go. The intended audience is adults, whether that is a teacher or parent. I do not like this site all that much. Although there is a lot of good information and ideas, it is hard to navigate and it takes more time than I would be willing to spend. Content: The content of this site is of good quality and there is a lot of it. There are numerous ideas for activities, food, and printouts for children. There are many links that parents could use. The last update for this website is 2011, so it is extremely recent. The sponsor is clearly labeled and there is contact information if you ever have any questions and comments. Although this website contains a lot of good stuff it was extremely had a first glance to tell what the website was about. Design: This site easily downloaded as well as had many links to navigate through. It is also current and has other information and links available. But the overall of design of this site was poor. There are so many different ads, link, pictures, and words that it is too busy and hard to understand what exactly are the links that are desired for Preschool activities and ideas. The title is not easily noticeable either. The site had a very confusing layout