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GREAT website for computer simulation of the inside of a typical cell, how mitochondria function,, and more! The Harvard team puts together great videos to show in class. I use these as a G.A. to show that although the 2D diagrams in the text book are static, in fact the cell is moving constantly. Great resource for the biology classroom.

This interactive site provides links to THE NROC Project, Phoenix college, KHAN Academy, PhET, and STEM bite. The resources use digital media that incorporates lessons for science and math. Students are able to learn concepts and apply the skills needed to show their understanding of these concepts. Students are given assessments on this site that check for understanding.

very cool that it is a "one stop shop"! :)

This is great. I always have trouble getting caught up on algebra in my classroom so I will have to use this.

Resources, links, legistative information

STEM defenders

I liked this so much, I was planning to post it, too.

This is one of the many awesome "app flows" that graphite has to offer for secondary math. graphite.org is a plethora of awesome lessons for educators of all core contents, but I especially like their math flows!

It's great that so many companies are making opportunities for students to try out STEM careers through internships. That way they can find out what STEM careers interest them before they graduate.

Connecting students and scientist

I am a big fan of the Wiley Online Library. Research articles are so important (and fun). I used this article as a platform for building my own spectrophotometer for under $100 (science fair project with my step-son). You would think that it would not be very effective in the classroom, but after analyzing gelatin solutions and plotting the data using Excel we got an r^2 value around .988, which is pretty good in my book.

Yeah! I love the reliance on empirical data and statistics (R2, yes!)

I don't have too many go to sites yet (I hope that improves in the near future) but I did run across this compilation of youtube videos related to science that I think will be helpful in the future. Given some of them are way too basic to use, but there used to be really cool look inside the cell type stuff. The original site shut down so I had to find where someone else posted the links on their blog so my apologizes if you can not access it at this time.

Hey Eric- Thanks for posting this website- I was looking through the videos and happen to come across some that I think might be useful for me when I start teaching very soon!

Innovation to me is the enhancement of education using customized tools. Recently, there has been great buzz about promoting SMART technologies- a collaborative leaning software that accommodates a variety of learning styles- promoting varied instruction. The SMART notebook collaborative learning software is the world's leading lesson creation software that opens options for interactive lessons that support student-centered learning. Of the vast technologies within this field I seemed to find SMART boards as a very innovative tool for classroom instruction. A SMART board is basically an interactive white board that allows teachers to project a website or image from the laptop to the white board. These SMART boards are capable of storing and saving lessons as well as turning simple lessons into more interactive and customized ones geared to enhance student learning. I think this application is more useful in disciplines such as Science because science changes all the time and has the ability to be much "active" using the web- this is not to say that it cannot be useful in the other disciples however.

One of the newest and greatest innovations continues to be video games. In the past, educational games have never quite met expectations, but with grants and contests such as this one, hopefully the games improve and students can learn something while playing video games.

This looks like a great tool for kids today- especially considering how attached some kids are to games. Children need to know how they get sick and what is going on inside of them when they are sick. One concern I have is that the game may be giving the message that all bacteria are bad and will make them sick. This is a common misconception that has led to the over use of antibiotics and hand sanitizer. Children should be taught that although some bacteria are pathogens, most are not, and they actually help other animals (ie. Humans) carry out every day functions. Bacteria ≠ Pathogen.

About four years ago, I went to a facility planners conference and they said the most improperly used space in the school is the library. It should not be filled with stacks of books, but it should look more like a media center where you have gaming centers, areas for public wi-fi access and a small section for books, but it would not be the dominant feature of the media center. It would also not close with the school, but be an area that would be open to the general public after hours. We will probably not build another school in Spotsylvania in the next decade, but it will be interesting to see if divisions will be starting to convert what we currently see as a library into something else.

A great overview of the solar system made by NASA. This uses an explorer type model.

Wolfram Alpha Demonstrations with Interaction

It looks like UVA has a rather large K-12 Engineering Outreach. Reading through the material it looks like the only stuff available outside of the adjacent counties is through virtual or their teaching kits. Either way it could be pretty cool. And maybe with enough persistence, you could get an outreach to your school from some of the undergrads at UVA.

There is also the project I worked on at the School of Ed: http://www.maketolearn.org/explore/

A useful way to illustrate how the three main types of rock are related to one another and how changes to rocks happen in a recurring sequence is the rock cycle. This is a great interactive feature that teachers can weave into their lesson plan or allow students to work on during home or class time. This same website www.learner.org has content for other Earth Science fields as well as other disciplines: math, science, history and literature.

Free educational simulations covering a diverse topics designed by the University of Colorado available in various languages.

The mission of the NEED Project is to promote an energy conscious and educated society by creating effective networks of students, educators, business, government and community leaders to design and deliver objective, multi-sided energy education programs. NEED works with energy companies, agenciesand organizations to bring balanced energy programs to the nation's schools with a focus on strong teacher professional development, timely and balanced curriculum materials, signature program capabilities and turn-key program management.NEED Quick Links Check out the photos, slideshow, and winners from the 32nd Annual Youth Awards Program on our Youth Awards page.

Starting from atoms, see how many molecules you can build. Collect your molecules and see them in 3D!