edu_tech

online, face-to-face classes and workshops, tech information for Illinois teachers

"Discover Spanish is the award winning language learning system used by thousands of individuals of all ages, schools and organizations throughout the United States and many countries around the world."

Several typing games

Several websites!

Aviary probably won't replace Photoshop in commercial settings anytime soon, but for schools Aviary could be a great way to introduce students to the principles of image editing, markup, and vector editing. Aviary's sound recording and mixing tool that they offer is an excellent free alternative to Garage Band that I've used in my classroom.

The New York Times has good collection of videos and audio slideshows designed to take you "inside the action" of Winter Olympic events. The videos will take you down a luge run at 90mph, through a snowboard half pipe, and down the men's downhill ski course. Along the way athletes and coaches explain intricacies of each event and how the athletes maneuver through their events.

"Into the Book is a reading comprehension resource for K-4 students and teachers. We focus on eight research-based strategies: Using Prior Knowledge, Making Connections, Questioning, Visualizing, Inferring, Summarizing, Evaluating and Synthesizing. Try the online interactive activities, or click below to find out how to get our engaging 15-minute video programs."

Time for Time is a handy little website for anyone that teaches students how to tell time. The online games are easy for students to access. And if you don't have enough computers for all students to play the games at once, you can take advantage of the offline game suggestions in the teacher section of Time for Time.

eClips videos are arranged by grade level; K-5, 6-8, and 9-12. There is also a section labeled for the general public. The videos are short clips designed to show students the work NASA is doing and how that work impacts space science as well as its potential impact on everyday life. All of the videos can be viewed online or downloaded for use on your local computer.

Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzle Collection is a collection of thirty-two puzzles and logic games. The games and puzzles can be played online or downloaded to run on your Windows or Mac OS X computer. Most of the games and puzzles are simple to play, but difficult to master.

Learning and Teaching Scotland has a comprehensive guide for educators interested in creating and using podcasts in their classrooms. The guide is a series of videos covering everything from "what is a podcast?" to creating and publishing your podcasts. You can download all of the videos for viewing on your laptop or other portable device. Embedded below you will find What is a Podcast?

The Digital Storytelling Teacher Guide is a free twenty-eight page ebook produced by Microsoft. The guide outlines the basics of digital storytelling, offers ideas for digital storytelling projects for all grade levels, and provides examples of digital storytelling projects. Microsoft's Digital Storytelling Teacher Guide also offers instruction for using Windows Movie Maker and Photo Story in the classroom.

The Zimmer Twins is a neat site for introducing elementary school students to making simple animated video stories. On the Zimmer Twins site students can create a story from scratch or complete one of the "cliff hanger" story starters. Students do not need to have any drawing skills in order to create a story as all elements are added to the video through a simple drag and drop interface. Students select settings, characters, character actions, emotions, and text styles then drag those elements into the storyboard. Students then arrange those elements and type words into the conversation bubbles where appropriate