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Bridget Stein 9/14/11 Overview: This website is extremely helpful for ESL students looking to learn English in a fun and easy way. There are games on grammar, vocabulary, reading, and much more. There is also the option to play these games on an iPad or iPhone if you have one. Content: On this site, within each link you click, you find even more information and activities available to you for your free use. There are so many different options that are all fun and interactive ways to learn English. There are crossword puzzles, sentence patterns, jokes, songs, and quizzes. Design: The design of this site is put together very well, because it isn't overwhelming when you first get on the site, but there still is plenty of useful information. It is clear to see where things are and what the use is.

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.

Overview: The purpose of this site is to serve as a professional development aid for teachers as well as a classroom tool. It covers all grade levels and all subjects which makes it useful for the whole school or a whole school district. Design: The design is kind of all over the place. There doesn't seem to be any unifying theme or color scheme. The home page is boring to look at and has too much coming at the viewer all at once. It was also difficult to figure out what the primary purpose of the site was. Content: The content is actually pretty good but the site is really more of an educational catalog rather than a free aid for individual teachers. This site then only becomes truly useful if a school pays for it. The "interactive" history section was dreadfully disappointing as there was nothing interactive about it. Overall I would not use this site in the future but it still has uses for some school systems.

Overview: This site is mainly for teachers to help improve their skills and knowledge and by providing information that is useful for them to view for free or purchase. Although this site can be helpful, I think it needs some additional work. It provides videos and workshops for teachers which can be beneficial. Content: The content is clear and easy to navigate although I had a little trouble finding the lessons for students or teachers. One problem I noticed was I couldn't find other links to web sites. The authors weren't clearly identified and there was no information on them. This site is also for others to use. There are lessons that students can learn from on their own at home. It covers Arts, Foreign Language, Literature and Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies and History. Teachers and students of all ages can find lessons or material to learn from. Design: The design of the web site is good. The homepage is organized. Other than the homepage, I didn't notice many graphics; however, there are videos of workshops that teachers can view from their own home. The other pages could use more interesting graphics and this site needs to provide other links to other sites.

Overview: This is a free website that has a bunch of games and tutorials for kids on a variety of subjects. It seems like it is meant for kids in elementary school and it also has a separate preschool tab. Content: This site has a variety of different subjects that kids can practice with like US geography, animals, nutrition, and seasons. Each subject as sub-categories and then a list of games. There are cute pictures that go with each game as well as a summary of the game. The site is a little tough to figure out with a couple of similar tool bars and then a lot of steps to get to the game you want so children would need the help of a parent or teacher. Design: The website is fun and not too horribly hard to navigate. I think it's something that kids can use at home with their parents and at school with their teacher.

Overview: S.O.S Mathematics is a free resource for math help for high school, college and adult math students. The website reviews all different math subjects ranging from Algebra to Differential Equations. You can also get help regarding specific topics rather than the subject as a whole. The website has more than 2,500 math pages that are easy- to- understand and helpful. This website also helps with test preparation and offers 'Cyberboard', which is a help forum used to ask specific math questions. Content: The homepage loads quickly but there is an advertisement pop-up along with an advertisement on the top of the homepage. Above the advertisement is a toolbar with links to each subject of math. There is a wide variety of subjects that are available to the student for help. There is a current copyright date on the website and the content appears up-to-date. At the bottom of the homepage is the company's contact information. When clicking on a subject, lists of sub-topics are included under that subject, which makes navigation on the webpage easier for the student. Design: The content of this webpage may be very helpful to students, but the design of the website is a bit bland and boring. The design does not look very up to date. The design of this website could potentially turn away a student looking for help at first glance because it's not appealing to the student. 

Overview: This site is a good study tool and teacher resource. The audience ranges from kindergarten to eighth grade and is loaded with credible information in all its subjects. This site can be quickly identified and the age range for the site can be easily determined. The author is clearly identified and information on the author is available. The content is updated frequently and all pertains to the original purpose of the site. Content: The content is well organized and the information in the site is easy to understand. The content is free of bias and provides interactivity throughout the various subjects. The content is updated frequently and is accurate. Grammar and spelling are correct and the information is consistent with similar information found in other sources. Design: The homepage downloads effectively. The user can verify that the site is what it is, a study help site geared towards students. There is an index and a site map, as well as the copyright date established at the bottom of the home page. Each graphic and audio/video file serves its own purpose. The site is useable with more than one browser. Everything is clearly labeled and organized and is worth visiting.

Overview: This site is a free site that makes a lot of everyday teacher tasks easy. It can also help teachers generate games to play with their class. It is something that I would definitely use in my own classroom. Content: This site is easy to navigate and is generally aesthetically pleasing. Some things that the site can help teachers do is make seating charts, make groups, and randomly "draw" names. It also allows a teacher to enter content and generate a game like Jeopardy, Who wants to be a Millionaire, and others. Design: The overall look of the site doesn't really match the content, but it isn't ugly either. The site is easy to navigate and isn't complicated to operate.

Content: This website is also designed for all kinds of homework help in numerous subjects. They have different kinds of references, tutoring, and levels, although it looks mainly for upper level (high school and college) students, so for elementary children would find some difficulty using. I do feel like there is quite a bit of ad space taking up pages, so visually it becomes overwhelming. Design: The design of this website is good overall, because it looks organized and clear. It is easy for students to look up what they need research on, but any free space given is taken up by ads. I think that getting rid of all these advertisements would sure make this website more efficient in providing a positive and productive learning environment. Attributes: The purpose of this site is to help student's understand what they are bringing home for homework and research. It's a supplement to the textbooks they have and available information student's need. I don't think I would send my student's to this website because there are too many distractions, and it seems like they would get lost in the ample of available information. It's also hard to have online instruction because message boards and chat rooms become off topic without someone there regulating what goes on in those environments.

Posted by Kirsten McAlexander on 9/20/2009 abcteach provides a variety of printable materials for teachers from grade k-8th. The website provides activities and games that you can print for a variety of subjects. Content: This website is an excellent website for teachers because it allows you to print a variety of material. The website has everything from baseball bar graphs to sound flash cards. The website has many different topics including sports, seasons, art, writing, phonics and so on. It includes several different printable pages for every topic. Design: This website is very easy to navigate. It labels all subjects very clearly and does not take much time at all to find exactly what you are looking for. Attribution: This website does have a membership fee, but allows you to print many things for free. It does not ask for a sign in to print, or to navigate away from the homepage. The links work well and are very quick.

Sam Burns, 9/20/2009 "German Online Interactive Learning" is very similar to the last site I reviewed. It provides links to other sites for specific problems in the German language, both for learning and teaching German. Content: This site once again has hundreds of likes to hundreds of different German help sites. I clicked on many of the links and not one was the same as the links on the other site. This site has links for games and grammar once again but it also provides many useful PowerPoint's. The PowerPoint's are available to download to your computer and they actually provide accurate and helpful information. Once again I must say that I believe this site is aimed toward beginning German. There are not a lot of helpful links for advanced German studies. Design: This site is free and not hard at all to navigate. It provides a search engine as well as links for other sites. It is pretty well laid out and easy to find the information you are searching for, even if it is not of value. It is very colorful and is updated weekly. The current and new information is easy to interpret and to find. Overall this site is well organized and useful.

Clayton Christensen 9/20/2009 The purpose of the site is to inform new math teachers of some things that they should keep in mind when starting their new teaching career. The intended audience is both new and experienced teachers concentrating on math teachers. The site provides links to lesson plans, math calculator sites, and many different sites helpful for a math teacher. Content: The content of the site is geared towards teachers looking for interactive assignments with their students. The website provides many links that allow teachers to navigate to other sites for further information quickly. The website provides a link to free lesson plans that will help teachers get an idea of lessons they may want to use that day. The website has not been updated since November 2007, but I believe the content is very helpful. The website shows the many rewards that it has won since it was developed. Design: This website is very simple it is very easy to navigate as all of the links are in a very organized list that is easy to find. The website is not extremely attractive because there is not a lot of color but because of this the site makes it easy to navigate to the other links. All of the links worked effectively and took me to the described site. The website however not particularly attractive it is very easily navigated and useful.

Math.com This website is targeted toward students of all age, as well as teachers. The purpose is to give tutoring and lessons to teachers and students who need help with math, helping them to understand it. The website is easy to understand for the most part, and gives problems relevant to the math students need. Content: The website is fairly easy to understand, and gives math problems and ways to solve math problems. The authors are not clearly presented, and the date is hard to find, and not updated much. The content of the site is user-friendly and appropriate. Design: The website's design is fairly boring, and doesn't draw the audience's attention in. The site's information however, is useful and relevant to the teachers and students that may use the site. There is plenty of info available to make the site useful, but the site is kind of slow and you have to wait for it to load a lot.

Kathryn Slothower September 11, 2011 Overall: The purpose of this website is to help students with math. There is a lot of information on this website about math. Overall I think this is a good math website for students because it gives little mini lessons on each topic that the students can read. One downside of this website is the number of external links that are on the website. The external links are very distracting. This math website can help all different levels of math. Content: The purpose and content of this website can be a little hard to find. Although the purpose to help and guide students in math, because of the external links it makes it look like a math resource store. There are lots of resources on this website for students to use. The website has math lessons, math games, homework help, a calculator, and a math store. All of these tabs are very useful for students. One part of the website that is not the best is the section of math games. These games are not directly math games. I could consider them more math puzzles. The games would not help master a math skill. From the knowledge that I know on these math topics the information presented seems to be correct. The author of this website was hard to find so I am not sure what the author's credentials in math. I could see using this website for math in the future and students could get a lot of help by using this website. Design: The web design that was chosen for this website was very interesting. However, the indexes that the author put on the top of the homepage and on the side of the homepage works very well and makes it very easy to navigate throughout the website. This website has a lot of white spaces so the website is not very attractive and grabbing the viewer's attention. 

Overview: This website is very informative and easy to maneuver. For any student who is having difficulty with any subject concerning math, this site would be the most helpful, in my opinion. Tutoring, practice problems and free calculators are available to those who do not have the same resources available to them as anyone else. Content: This website is not over crowded which makes it easier to find the things they offer. The various games available cover the main points of math and to the best of my knowledge I believe they are accurate. The links that were advertised on the site were up to date and resourceful. Design: Contact information is displayed and easily noticed at the bottom of the web page, and the website has not been updated recently. Even though the site is dated, the sponsor is easily noticed and displayed on the web page.

This free applications provides presentation, word processing, and spreadsheet software and allows you to collaborate on your documents with others. It also provides a version history to show all the edits that you (or others) have made to the document. You can revert back to prior editions if needed.

A free office suite alternative (includes word processor, spreadsheet, presentation, math formula writer, graphics, and database) to Microsoft Office and other proprietary alternatives

Mike Wilson Site review September 18, 2009 Science Buddies Free Science Fair Project Ideas, Answers, & Tools for Serious Students Introduction This is a very detailed and comprehensive site to facilitate student science fair projects. It can be used by the casual science fair student though the stated target student is the serious science student. Detailed information is provided for students and teachers K-12. The site is supported by 30 major science and technology corporations and is run by a staff of 18 not including the Seagate IT people. Anything to do with a school science project, this is your stop. Google ranking is 6/10 with 321 backward links. Content Evaluation First Look The home page and site are by no means fancy. Simple and clear what the information is and where to go on the site. The depth of the site is extensive. As you start your information search you can easily select your target grade level. Information Providers The purpose of the site, sponsors and fact there are real scientists involved is clear. Information Currency Site is fully operational and current. No daily revision date is given but 2009 Copyright is in place. Extensive links to other sites from each specific science project page for additional information. Information Quality Content is extensive, selectable for grade level. Very well organized and effective science fair development and projects for students, teachers and parents. Massive resources on the site itself with additional links out as needed. Design Evaluation Speed Science Buddies is very well designed to be a quality information site. Fast loads. Very text oriented, limited and simple graphics with properly sized thumbnails to keep page loads quick. Home Page & Ease of Navigation 9 tabs across home page top or easily 9 home pages. Actual home page is 85% above the fold. Very easy and quick to move around the site. The 'Topic Selection Wizard' is very functional, grade, gender, subject

A free plugin for Firefox browsers on Mac, PC, and Linux that allows you to organize research articles for professional purposes

This is a free video hosting site that allows for 500 MB uploads without a time delay. Additionally you can tag videos and write comments or attach additional movies. They accept AVI, DV, MOV, QT, MPG2, MPEG2, MPEG4, MP4, 3GP, 3G2, ASF, WMV, and FLV. You can make your videos completely public, completely private, or select which viddler friends can view the files. It also allows you to determine who can comment on, tag, embed, or download videos on an individual basis.

This is an open source course management tool based on PHP. It functions similarly to eCompanion but is free to users that can serve it on their own systems

Natasha Tuft Web Site Review September 20, 2009 http://ilovethatteachingidea.com/ The purpose of this site is to allow teachers to share and find creative classroom management and teaching ideas. "Get inspired with creative ready-to-use teaching ideas!" I was very impressed by all of the very useful links, organized information, and abundance of different kinds of ideas for different age groups. CONTENT This is a site with a very clear purpose. At the very top it says "We inspire teachers with practical, teacher-created ideas and resources that you can use in your classroom immediately." In an easy-to -find place you can contact the information providers. Not only is there a "About Us" link, the site encourages you to join their free e-mail newsletter in a few different ways as you navigate the site. If there is a regular newsletter that tells me that the site is regularly updated, current, and active. The quality of the information is very good, of course remembering that any teacher (or anyone for that matter) can post teaching ideas. The usefulness of each idea is in the eye of the beholder. There is much access to further information on any given subject as there are topics and many links. DESIGN The page loads quickly and the homepage is appealing. The sponsor can be contacted easily and the organization of the links makes it easy to navigate the page. In trying to find "use of multimedia" I actually found a couple of downloads that didn't work, which doesn't mean there aren't other useful downloads or clips. The site was compatible with my browser, had excellent content presentation which was organized and eye-appealing. Things seemed current as mentioned above and there was a lot of availability to further information. The site made me excited to start planning my teaching curriculum and methods!

Posted by Kate Guerrieri 9/18/2009 Title of web page: Tips on Teaching Creative writing. This website has helpful hints for new creative writing teachers. Content is easy to understand. Content: The content of this website is just a list of things that a new creative writing teacher might consider doing for their class. It offers insight from an experienced creative writing teacher, who knows what to expect when teaching this course. It deals with issues that may arise when teaching a creative writing class and offers solutions. This website is short, precise, and just a singular view point about teaching creative writing. It doesn't offer much information but the information is does offer is useful. Most of the idea's can be used for teaching any class and any new teachers might find this website helpful. Design: The design of this website is pretty standard. It has a bulleted list that highlights the information of the text. Unfortunately, there are many advertisements on this website that are somewhat distracting. There are no links to additional information. It is just a one sided view point that may be opinionated and it may not be credible. Attribution: This website is friendly for everyone. It is copy righted. People are free to use this information as long as they cite the author when necessary.