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You can select any pictures in Flickr and add dialogue bubbles to them. Good for projects where students upload their own pictures or select them from a search at Flickr. You can also blog the archived set of pictures. (See Russell Stannard's video on how to encourage students to use Bubblr for writing: http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/newBubblr/index.html.)

Online version of the ETF, long a favorite of EFL teachers overseas. You can search by topic or year. Some articles are more pedagogically oriented, while others are very practical, hands-on descriptions of how to teach. PDf files.

"Upload an image from your computer and choose how many sheets wide you would like your poster to be once printed. "Once you're happy with your selection, you can download the PDF file containing your newly created images and print each one massively blown up, resulting in a huge pixel poster to stick on your wall ..." A very useful tool for display of your students' work, or to make a giant jigsaw puzzle. T/H to R. Byrne

These lessons include Scholastic's Interactive Weather Maker, showing how humidity and temperature levels relate to rain and snow storms; Bytesize Science on the chemistry of snowflake making; and why the full moon gives more light in winter. Video explanations are embedded in R. Byrne's site.

Did you shape your image of Christmas according to Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol and Louisa M. Alcott's Little Women? Everyone loves Christmas stories; they are the perfect mixture of sweet and sour that reminds us how shallow our daily worries are.

"These videos give you an up to date outline of using the program Blogger. They start off with how to create your first blog all the way through to adding more pages and authors to your blogs" R.Stannard takes you through the updated Blogger program. I have used Blogger for years, but now tend to just use Diggo and Scoop.It, the latter for the more reflective, pedagogically oriented discussions. Blogs are very helpful as a place for student portfolios, and are easy to tag and search.

"The U.S. Library of Congress offers a wealth of fantastic online resources for teachers and students. A quick jump into the teachers resource page will lead you to things like these primary source analysis guides that I have used with students in the past. The LOC also offers a couple of good iOS apps that are worth noting." Shows how various apps can be used with the teachers' resource pages at the U.S. Library of Congress. Great authentic materials for research papers and projects. H/T to R. Byrne

"Direct instruction of vocabulary can help students learn enough words to become better readers, and becoming a better reader can in turn help students learn even more vocabulary. So how do we teach students to learn or acquire new vocabulary? Research suggests that vocabulary instruction should include the following components: definitional and contextual information about a word; multiple exposures to a word in different contexts; and encouragement of students' active participation in their own learning of the new words.1 Here are 15 vocabulary activities that you can integrate into your classroom starting tomorrow!" Includes a number of visual/drawing activities. Should make vocabulary building more fun. Could be adapted to younger children. Some activities have a downloadable worksheet.

"Cyberbullying is something most families hope they never have to deal with. But if your kids are texting, sharing photos, and posting comments, it's important to talk to them about how to deal with online harassment. Learn 5 ways to stop cyberbullies. "

A video demonstrating some of the things Google Classroom might do for your classes, and how to use it.

"Providing your students with a public audience is not only a critical part of the project-based learning process, but it's also a great strategy for building authenticity into assignments to create work that matters. We often leverage our students' parents and guardians in this process because 1) they are easily accessible, and 2) they are our partners in their children's learning plans. Why not then continue and build this partnership in PBL? John Larmer wrote a great blog about how to build parent support for PBL, and one of the best ways he mentions is to keep them involved in the PBL project you launch in your classroom. Here are some strategies to consider as you leverage parents for your next PBL project."

timely, helpful reminders for us all as EVOs begin! Holly

Another superb teacher-training video from R. Stannard on using Goggle Forms to create questionnaires, surveys, and quizzes.