ITEC2360

Megan Switzer September 11, 2011 Overview: The cyber listening lab was a website that was quite intriguing. The main purpose of this website was for one to gain more knowledge about English through listening. Through listening one can grasp important concepts, build vocabulary etc. The targeted audience for this website is ESL speakers, although if one speaks English there is still interesting aspects to this website that may be beneficial for them. Links similarly created by the same author are available to aide in speaking, slang, accents etc. and could be beneficial for those interested in improving their language skills. Overall this web site has one main goal of using audio as a learning device and it does a great job of sticking with that one aspect of learning. Content: The content of this website was simple and easy to understand. It was well categorized/ organized and the author of the website was helpful in creating tutorials for first time users. All the information is clear and consistent seems to be quite accurate based off of the author's knowledge of the subject and although the currency was not easily found the information seems to be well up to date. All links are working and helpful. Overall I was quite impressed with what this website had to offer and the concepts that the author addressed. If auditory learners need a helpful web site, this would be the one for them. Design: Although it did not seem super visually appealing to me, the website was well organized easily navigable. The audio clips worked well which was the most important part of the website, and the purpose of the website is clearly defined. Overall the design is clear and concise not a whole lot of explanation is needed due to its simplicity, I was impressed with the materials involved with this website, the author did an exceptional job in making sure one fully understands what his web site is about and makes his other links available as well.

Overview: The intended audience for this site is individuals considering a career in special education. The purpose of the site is to outline expectations of jobs as well as bring to attention possible issues. Statistics are also present in the site. The website allows people to see earnings, projections, job outlook as well as other questions regarding figures and statistics. This website also outlines what can be expected of special education teachers and offer suggestions of similar jobs.

This website reviews the effects of play in early childhood education.

Kristin Gaines September 11, 2011 Overview- The purpose of this site is to inform its audience about play based learning in early childhood. The intended audience is both parents and teachers of young children. This site does not contain a list of available resources, but contains valuable information. In my opinion, this site is very useful if you want to learn about the teaching methods used in early childhood today. Content- Upon rating the content of this site, I found that it met the almost all the criteria for content. The site was only lacking in interactivity and links to other relevant sites. One problem I did find, was that the site was a bit biased, so that makes it not as relevant. Design- This site is not fancy in any way, nor does it catch your attention, but it contains the vital pieces that make up a working website. It is organized and clear, although there is not much content in the site. Either way, this site met most of the criteria for design and is a good and easy to use site.

Overview: This website is targeted for students and is proken up into categorys these category's are ages 4-11, 11-16, and 16+. This website offers educational tools for subjects such as: geography, literature, science, math, music, numeracy etc. Content: Since I am focusing on math once you click the math tab a list of activity comes up (depending on which grade level you chose) under some of the activities there are sections where parents or teachers can have lesson plans, worksheets in order to help your student or child. Design: The design is fairly easy, if you were going to allow your students to use it in class you might need a fast tutorial so they are comfortable but all in all it is very easy. The site uses fun and bright colors so its appealing to students. Each activity has a description so once the student has read through each description they can decide what activity is most appealing to them.

Megan Switzer September 11, 2011 Overview: Overall I was thoroughly impressed with the ESL lounge web site. The purpose of this website was to familiarize on with information about ESL through teacher's stories, guides, books etc. It also provided lesson plans as well as activities to do with students in your classroom depending on level whether beginner, intermediate and so on and so forth. The targeted audience of this website is mainly teachers, although there is a link which leads you to a site for students. ESL lounge for students provides children the opportunity to learn through activities, guides, exercises, anything that may be helpful in their learning of the English language. Multiple resources are available on this web site and are clearly labeled for easy accessibility. Overall this website is organized and clear with information that pertains not only to teachers, but also to students. This website seems like a good resource for those interested in learning about ESL. Content: The content of this website was extremely helpful as well as appealing. Not only did all of the links work, but the information was easy to navigate, understand and accurate. The date of when it was last revised seem to be current and although there did not seem to be any information providers such as an author, the information still seemed trustworthy, consistent and accurate. The way in which the information was organized was clear and easy to find the concepts one would most likely be looking for. Design: Overall the design of this web site was extremely satisfactory. It had an appeal to the eye, was easily understandable, it provided a helpful guide as well as was organized into sections. All links were up and working, the information was extremely helpful as well as relevant. Although I could not find a creator the information was up to date and helpful. Overall this was a site that was easy to navigate and the purpose of it shined through. If one has any que

Megan Switzer September 11, 2011 Overview: ESL Lesson Plans and Resources is a website that does just that provides hyper-links to ESL lesson plans as well as other ESL resources which include activities for ESL learners. The targeted audience for this web site is mainly for teachers, although it could possibly be used by secondary education students in the completion of activities. The whole purpose of this web site is to provide links to web sites with available resources for web sites and pretty much anything else that teacher's may need for ESL. If one needs help with ideas for lesson plans or activities or even games for an ESL classroom, this web site is highly beneficial. Content: The overall content of this web site was helpful in the sense that it provided helpful links to ESL lesson plans, activities, ideas etc. However, the information provider was quite difficult to determine due to the fact that there was no one specific site, it was simply a web site full of other sites. The information currency was also a little difficult to determine as there was no date of when it was last revised. This may be an exception for the website, itself, did not have updates or an author but the links to the other websites may have contained the separate information. Overall the content of the site was well organized and easy to follow, all of the hyperlinks seemed to be in working order and beneficial to the search I had done. Design: The overall design of this website was not the greatest, yet it was still usable. The home page did not have an appeal to my eye upon first glance, however with each hyper link contained a description of what it was. The whole web site had the purpose of giving links to other useful websites which could possibly be why there was no currency information and or information in which to contact the web site developer. Although it is easy to navigate and headers clearly define what each link is used for, there is always room to improv

Overview: Its sponsored by NCTM, it is an easy website to use for students in K-8. There are powerpoints and videos to talk the user how to work the website. I would highly recommend this website to use in classrooms. Content: This website is targeted at the children but there are family as well as teacher activities. It is nice how they have print off worksheets for teachers to use in their classrooms. This site focuses on math, and covers algebra, geometry, measurements, numbers, and probability and statistsics. Design: This site is very easy to use, you can tell its targeted for the students due to the simplicity and kid friendly images that are on the homepage. The site is very appealing and if I was a (elementary) student I would be interested in playing around on this site.

Overview: This website is intended to help students, parents and educators with math. Though there is a lot of tools on this website that can help a student as well as educators the main website its too helpful, I'm sure if I bought the full membership it would be more helpful but there are several people who cannot afford to get memberships for websites. Content: For students this website offers discussions, problems of the weeks, a "Ask Dr. Math" feature, and other math tools to help with homework. For parents and teachers there is newsletters as well as teacher to teacher discussion group and a discussion page about the NCTM Standards. Design: The design is a little hard to follow, for a student I would have had a difficult time figuring out this website. Due to its mature design it seems like it is targeted more towards educators and how they can introduce math and NCTM standards into their classrooms.

Overview: This site is very fun and inviting for chiildren of all ages. It grabs your attention immediately with bright colors and pictures. It allows kids to learn new things and ideas from math to reading and writing with fun games and lessons. Content: The content for this site is very well organized. There are icons that are listed for all categories and it is easy to find what you are looking for. You can tell right away that this site is intended for the elementary school-aged child. The author is known on this site as well as the sponsor which is Pearson Learning. There is contact information and a place to ask questions as well. The website is updated yearly with 2011 being the most recent. The links for other pages on the site work correctly and takes you directly were you want to go. Design: The homepage is inviting for young children and has a very strong eye appeal. You can tell where you are immediately as the site is layed out very well with links to go to different sites. The information is organized and is understandable for kids.

Meghan Snell September 11, 2011 Overview: This website is mainly for kids and for fun learning. There are useful purposes for parents and teachers as well. At the bottom of the website, links are available to other sites more useful for teachers. It is well organized with links to grade levels as well as links to different subjects. There are 100's of different games which are all mostly educational and help improve children's skills. It's an extremely fun appealing looking site to catch kid's attentiong and easy to navigate. Content: The authors and sponsors were a little difficult to find although there was a nice section about the site itself and its purposes. The content of the site is mainly for children but teachers and parents can find uses out of it as well. I was not able to find information on how often or when it was last updated but the copyright of the site itself was clearly given. All of the links work fine and the site does serve its purpose. Design: The graphics of the site are very appealing, fun and contribute to the site. Everything loaded easily and now unecessary downloads had to be made to go through the games and activities. It was easy to find what activities were desired becuase of the headers being organized neatly.

Meghan Snell September 11, 2011 Overview: This website is a great site for teachers and students. The website offers many different things such as printable worksheets, interactive games, study tools, stories and more. For someone who is looking for math related work, it offers all kinds of different assignments and tutorials that can be very helpful. It's very simple to use. Everything is just within a few clicks and there is no extra downloading necessary. Content: Everything onthis site seems reliable and easy to use. There is a header at the top that seperates everything into age groups and subjects. There are also tabs that take you to information about the authors of the site as well as how to get a hold of them. The site is updated weekly which keeps all of the information from being outdated. All of the content on the site is easy to get to and hassle free. It is an educationl website mainly for teachers as well as kids. I believe most people using this site would find it quite helpful. Design: The design of the website is done very well. It downloads efficiently and everything is clearly labeled and all the links seem to work very well. There is plenty of information that makes the site worth visiting and it is attractive to all of its audience. The graphics aren't too out of hand or overwhelming either.

This has a sample of a start sheet to use for the detailed schedule of the trip. It also has good drop down menus for Questions to Students and Teacher Reflection.

Billie Slyman, 9/11/11 Purpose The purpose of this site is to give students a resource to learn about weather and how it affects people. There is enough information to be useful, but it's not overwhelming. There aren't any links to outside sites, which is a drawback. However, I still think this is a valuable site because it has good information, interactive content, and is well designed for students to navigate. Content This site does a good job of achieving its purpose of providing information for students. While there is a good amount of information, it is put in simple language and organized in a way to make it easy for students to understand. Many of the sections have interactive multiple choice questions, where students can click on a button and a text box will pop up and tell them if they are correct. The content seems accurate to me, and the developers (the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, for example) seem qualified to present this information. Design This website has a very nice design. Everything looks interesting for students but is still well organized and not cluttered. It is easy to find the information you want and navigate around the site. Also, the information on each page is split up into sections and has lots of pictures interspersed, so it isn't a huge block of text that could be intimidating to students. The pictures and charts are all relevant and aid in understanding the information given.

Ben's Guide to US Government Overview: The purpose of this site is to either help students k-12 learn about our government and its history or help a teacher use it as a learning tool. The obvious intended audience is parents, teachers or students. The site has links to the government's web pages because it is sponsored by the government itself, those links and pages have thorough information as well. Overall my impression was positive, I think the way it is set up and targeting a more vast audience is efficient. Content: From first glance it is obvious what the site is about and who it is intended for. There isn't a direct author, but a page sponsor who put it together and revised it, the Government printing office themselves. They provide a link to contact them as well. The site was updated in 2009 which is pretty current, not much has changed if at all with the government and its history in the past two years. The quality of all the information is outstanding, providing links to each grade level for information for them as well as teaching tools for teacher and parents. In order to learn a few different things it takes interacting by clicking through pages which enhances the use. Further information outside of the site is shared through links on a separate page. Design: The basic design of this site is directed towards kids with a cartoon image of Ben Franklin displaying the page for viewers. The page is clear and easy to navigate; everything seems to work correctly. This guide to US government is presented in a well organized way with plenty of information making it worth visiting again.

Learning Math: Geometry Overview: The purpose of this site is to help an individual create a lesson plan or simply learn geometry themselves. It provides step by step process to learn geometry. The intended audience is probably a teacher. Any teacher who needs help designing a lesson in geometry can go to this site and learn what to do and in what order, it has a list of each session and what should be covered to move on. The site itself, learner.org, has many options in different lesson plans from geometry to trig to English. This site appears to be free, and contains legit information which is a pretty good deal. Overall, my impression on this site was that is has good information but it all seems boring which is why the audience must be a teacher, its not flattering to the eye. Content: First glance tells you the site is about how to learn geometry or better yet, teach it. About the site including the authors is a click away on a separate page than the home page. The group seems credible and they provide contact information for any further questions. The way this page is laid out makes it very easy to maneuver around, the quality of the information is fulfilling to any math teacher, there is not only basic information for teaching geometry but extra tid bits one could choose to look in to, to teach. Every page you click onto contains links to other lesson plans or different subjects making it very useful for any teacher. In general the content is sufficient to not only a math teacher but any teacher. Design: The homepage and the other pages load up quickly and efficiently. This website doesn't necessarily have strong eye appeal but when targeting teachers as an audience, and giving basic information it isn't a necessity. Everything needed for the page to be legit is included, from the copyright date to site sponsors, etc. It is easy to navigate, with links to each lesson session and to other pages. I would definitely recommend this site to a teacher; it

Overview: This website has a little information such as flags and mottos, competition, and medals. However, there is not a whole lot of information, and nothing that teacher's can use if they are looking for activities for the classroom. The information given is about a paragraph long and seems to be information you can find anywhere. The content can be used if needed, but if you are looking for more information there really isn't a whole lot to offer. The resources are other websites that give information on the Olympics and are good websites to use and better than this website. The design is poor, the site title is nice and big, but everything else is just text and there isn't any huge design within the website. Overall, if your needing some quick information on competition, medals, and flags and mottos, then this would be an easy website to use, but not one that I would recommend if a teacher is needing good information. Content: The copyright for this site is 1999-2011 so the information is up to date, but when it comes to seeing the actual information on the site, there isn't much to offer unless you need only information on medal, flags, and about the competition of the Olympics. The resources are reliable and up to date and are better resources than this website is. Reader's can quickly determine the content of this site and it easily loads, this site is also for teachers and students, but there is not a whole lot of information on a broad range of topic. All of the links to the other resources are reliable and provide much more information than this website. This website would not be something that I would ever use if I needed information and not something that I would ever return to either. Design: There is not a whole lot of design to this website. The websites site title, eHow, is nice and big in bright colors, but that is the only design to the website. Everything else is text and there is a lot of advertisement within the website as well. Th

The Dynamic Earth Overview: This website is set up in a very operative way. The purpose is to inform its viewers about the earth and its components, the solar system, and how the earth came to be here today. The intended audience seems to be teachers for grades 4th through 12th; the teacher could design a lesson plan and incorporate this site into a class activity. Outside of the classroom this site could be targeting anyone interested in earth sciences. My impression of this site was positive; it has tons of information about the earth, solar system, gems/minerals and plate tectonics. Overall this is a well put together site for teachers to incorporate it into a lesson. Content: The overall layout of this website is adequate for any teacher to obtain information or use the site as a teaching tool. Right off the bat it gives you an option of multimedia or printable version, which could please a variety of people. When going through multimedia it provides four opportunities to discover what you want to know about the earth. The quality and abundance of information is set up in an organized fashion. From my knowledge the information is all up to date, but it can't really be outdated when it's about how the earth developed, the solar system etc. The only flaw about this site would be that nowhere to be found directly on the site is an author; it only refers to a National Museum that put the site together. There is also no revision dates. Design: Right from the start, the site loads up and provides the viewer with two options, one being multimedia. At every new screen there is a ton of information regarding earth sciences. The content is designed with a lot of pictures that look very real, allowing it to be interesting and engaging. The way the site is laid out makes it easy to navigate and find what you want, everything is just a click away. At the bottom it has the sponsor and creator, the creator being a National Museum, the link goes to the museum website

Grammar Practice Park Overview: The purpose of this site is to help whoever visits the site to practice and perfect their grammar skills. The intended audience seems to be student's grades 3-8. A teacher could direct his or her students to this site during a lesson to help practice and bring in some excitement to the classroom. The site sponsor provides a link to their homepage which has adequate information regarding language arts as well. The site gave me a good impression, contained good grammar games and information. Content: First look at the site it looks like options and a paragraph the site states in the paragraph that is meant for grammar practice making it unclear what it is all about. Once you figure out what the site is the links to grammar practice seem clear and interesting. The information providers are a publishing house making the info legitimate. There wasn't a copyright or revision date which brings down the site a little bit. Overall the quality of information is put together well; it provides students with games to play that ultimately improve their grammar skills. When going through the links you can go to the publishing company's page which contains even more abundant information for teachers more so than students. Design: The homepage of this site is inviting to students with the different grammar games available by one click. There isn't much to the site other than games to improve grammar skills making it only appropriate on occasion. Overall the design isn't too thoughtful simply because it doesn't include any lessons or anything jus practice games. One can always learn through practice though, so based off my knowledge it may not be necessary.

Overview: I think this website could offer a lot of opportunity for teacher's when it comes to subjects and unit ideas. It seems to offer a lot of ideas for many units and themes, and also provides opportunities such as providing coloring questionnaires, and other activities easily accessed. This website is membership only to have access to everything, and it does cost money as well. However, navigating through the site I feel it would be a beneficial resource if a teacher was in need of lesson plans or activities for a unit. The design is okay, nothing too grabbing, but the website is easily navigated and a quick resource for opportunities when it comes to ideas for a unit. Content: The content is not so easily accessible, most likely to me not becoming a member for the site. The things that I do have access to seem like fun activities that can be included within a unit however; there are limited items to have access to. The items located underneath the membership field seem to offer a wider range of ideas and lesson plans, so it would seem that becoming a member would be beneficial if you needed ideas for a lot of units over time. For quick access, however, there is little to offer if a teacher needs resources quickly without having to pay a huge fee. What little links there are offered without becoming a member appears up to date and reliable, and there doesn't appear to be a bias with the website, unless having to pay a membership fee counts as being bias. Overall I feel this website would be a great resource as a teacher, the only hassle apparent is paying in order to receive all of the benefits. Design: The direction for this site are very clear, there are tabs at the top to help direct onlookers to different themes and units if Olympics is not a unit needed. There is an area for non members to access and an area that you are able to see what members are able to access. There is color added to the design which helps catch the eye, but this website is d

Overview: TeacherVision is a website that allows you to pick themes and units that you would like to teach to a class and offers printable's such as games and other activities easy accessed to give to the student's. It also provides links to lesson plans related to social studies and language arts. This website is for links related to the Olympics, which includes history and ideas to provide for students. The overall design is a bit lacking, but it is easily navigated and offers references and slideshows to help understand the Olympics. Definitely something that would be useful when looking for activities and ideas on a unit concerning the Olympics. Content: You are easily able to determine what is on this website due to its easy navigations and layup where everything is labeled and links are provided for each label. The audience is intended for teacher's who are needing ideas, lesson plans, quizzes, and activities when it comes to a unit; in this case the Olympics. The authors for the links are located once you click on the link, and most are teachers or other educators who have used these ideas in their own classrooms. The copyright is located at the bottom of the page which is an accumulation of all links located in the site from 2000-2011. All links currently work and provide a good source of ideas and interactivity that a teacher may use in their classroom. It is very easy to understand, and if Olympics are not a topic that is needed, then there are themes provided for other units if there is something else needed. I would use this site if I was doing a unit on the Olympics. Design: The homepage is easily downloadable, but does not have a strong eye appeal. It is a site for teacher's use only, not one that I going to interest student's. The site is easily navigated with descriptive links for activities and lesson plans needed for an Olympics unit. Everything is details within the links, and there are resources available for extra information and