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Google reading level feature. Allows users to limit search results to specific reading levels.

Thought this might be of interest to you.

This site was so cool. I created my own comic story. I was able to play brain buster games I read stories and had stories read to me, and watched videos about how to create a comic.. This site was created by Jim Davis, creator of the comic strip Garfield, in conjunction with Ball State University and PAWS, Inc. It give kids the opportunity to explore, create and connect safely with kids around the world. Jim Davis created this site because he felt there was a need to provide a high-quality, free, and engaging web site that could motivate children to achieve their full potential. The approach is kid-centric and tries to close the achievement gap between what kids seek to do on the Internet and standards-based educational activities. The mission of Professor Garfield.org is encourage children to explore academically sound literacy activities and provide them with tools to express themselves through creative writing prorams. It's an Internet destination that is safe, free and fun! The Professor Garfield and Sparktop sites (both found on this link) provide all kids of ways for kids to shine and showcase their talents and abilities! Students can record their own "talent" for Sparkstage (our American Idol-like competition), arrange music with the awesome music mixer tool, create their own comic strip in the Comis Lab, learn to sculpt, or be taught to draw by professional artists in the Art-Bot section. On Sparktop.org kids safely connect with other kids who knwow what they are going through. They find information about how their brain works and get tips on how to succeed in school and life. And they get to showcase their creativity and be recognized for their strengths. Millions of children from around the world visit the web site every month.

"For those of you asking about Educational Android apps to use with students in class the chart below is a great place to start with. This is a work we have published a few months ago and is meant to provide teachers and educators with a handy resource they can fall back on when they need to try out new educational apps in class.  We have categorized these apps into 17 major categories: note taking apps, portfolio creation apps, presentation apps, reference apps,  video editing apps, concept mapping apps, storytelling apps, apps for teaching kids coding, augmented reality apps, audio recording apps, comics creation apps, reading and literacy apps, apps for learning English grammar, apps for doing virtual trips, apps for learning a new language, apps to unleash students creativity."

"For those of you asking about Educational Android apps to use with students in class the chart below is a great place to start with. This is a work we have published a few months ago and is meant to provide teachers and educators with a handy resource they can fall back on when they need to try out new educational apps in class.  We have categorized these apps into 17 major categories: note taking apps, portfolio creation apps, presentation apps, reference apps,  video editing apps, concept mapping apps, storytelling apps, apps for teaching kids coding, augmented reality apps, audio recording apps, comics creation apps, reading and literacy apps, apps for learning English grammar, apps for doing virtual trips, apps for learning a new language, apps to unleash students creativity."

In the Kids Interactive-Whales, students board the Discovery where they can explore 5 different rooms including the science lab, the research center, the office, the library, and the bridge. Each room has an "expert" that will help the students as they explore the room. As students explore each room, they can take notes by saving text to a clipboard. In the research center, students learn about whale migration, the effects of whale hunting, watch video footage of whales, take an up close view of whale pictures, learn about whale sounds, and even report a whale sighting. On the bridge, students will learn about the rules for viewing whales from land, listen to sounds that different whales make, learn about sonar, steer the boat, learn about the whales that live in Australian waters, learn the rules about watching whales from a boat, and learn the best time to go whale watching. In the underwater library, students will use the database to look up facts about whales (they can take notes on their clipboard), use a dictionary to look up unfamiliar terms, learn about the history of whaling, see how whale populations have suffered, and see pictures of whales that can be used in a research project. In the office, students can watch whales through a portal, read about Australian whale preservation, read a brochure, and view a timeline of how whaling activities have changed throughout the years. The science lab is the last room on the Discovery. Here, students can learn about what whales eat, take a closer look at the anatomy of whales, play a game to practice identifying whales, find out how whales are important to the ecosystem, learn about the difference between whales and dolphins, learn about the research that scientists do, and take a closer look at whale statistics.

Neat site about whales.

This blog shares a variety of resources that can be used to do academic research. Tools include resources to researc, curate data, save and organize data, read and review data, synthesize and take notes, and cite data

Article about bringing the works of Shakespeare alive with performances on YouTube and rap. Inner city students can now understand the literary works of the most well known and read English author of all time. I remember when I was in high school most of us hated reading Shakespeare's plays, but if we were allowed to "remake" them with the plot untouched that would have been much better. Just shows and alternative assessment that gives students ownership over their learning.

Marc, I shared this with a teacher at the high school who teaches shakespear.

Most of the media in these collections are attached to generous copyright licensing. Though you may not need to ask permission to use them when publishing on the Web for educational purposes, you should cite or attribute these images to their creators unless otherwise notified! If you see any copyright notices on these pages, read them for further instructions. This is a wikispace. Another cool way that wikis can help keep information organized.

Great site, that offers a Book of the Month. It offers sample questions, test, blogs, etc. For various ages. I shared this site with parents and have gotten terrific feed back!

National Geographic has a great collection called Forces of Nature. Here students can explore a natural forces lab where they learn about the extreme nature. Students can learn about tornadoes, volcanoes, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Students learn what the force of nature is, what causes them, their characteristics, the damage that they do, how they are forecasted, and then have the opportunity to actually create the force of nature virtually. Students can also view an interactive map that shows hot sites where the forces of nature occur, and read case studies of actual events.

I have used iKnow That: Alien Word Mine to practice the not contraction, but was looking for another opportunity for students to practice. I searched for some fun activities and came up blank. I decided to make an offline game that students could play as a class called "I have, who has?". In this card game, each student chooses a game card. Each game card starts with the separate words (for example: can not) and has a contraction (for example: aren't). Students stand in a circle holding there game card. Choose one student to begin by reading their card: "I have can not, who has aren't?" The student holding the card with "are not" responds: "I have are not, who has don't?". Play continues until all matches have been made

Looks like a cool site

Spelling City is a fabulous site for practicing spelling, I have written about its uses in the classroom before (here and here). Spelling City has just added a new feature that teachers are going to love, the ability to add your own sentences on Spelling City! Now you can customize your spelling lists to fit your needs. For example, if you are studying fish and one of your spelling words is "scales", the default sentence that Spelling City might offer is "The scales were not giving the weights accurately." Now as you create a list, you can click on "add" and type a new sentence to fit your classroom needs. The feature is also extremely useful for homonyms (our fifth graders are using this feature this week!). For the teacher created sentences, the audio read of the sentence will be done by a sophisticated voice synthesis. \n

In case you haven't seen this site. Love the capability for teachers to set up their own clas spelling lists that kids can access at home.

Lovely provides a hot-linked list organized into live journeys, "interactive environments," travelogues, e-museums, building and place tours, map-based visits, and read-along visits.

Here is a collection of virtual field trip sites.

Welcome to Historical Thinking Matters, a website focused on key topics in U.S. history, that is designed to teach students how to critically read primary sources and how to critique and construct historical narratives.

Looks like an interesting site. There are student investigations as well as teacher materials and strategies.

Create an online community of your classroom Share inspiration, ideas, reading, thoughts, Post discussions, deadlines, homework Instantly create surveys for students Keep parents informed of daily projects

This site is so cool. I went in and set up an account and added some people to a class. It was so easy. This will be a terrific site for educators. You can set up your students in a private class account. You can then post questions for them to comment to. You can post items on a calendar, bookmark sites you want them to review, hook up with other classes to collaborate and share, create surveys. I think teachers are going to love it. It is free. When you create your account, the information students need to get to your created class is generated by you and as long as you give them the class code and their password they should be able to get in.

" Calameo Calameo is a free platform where you can publish your magazine, presentations or documents and share them with the world. It also lets you embed rich-media content to your publications like videos and audios. 2- Docuter Docuter is a great tool to manage documents, projects, workflows, shared calendars and many more. You can also use it to store and share your documents online for easy access. 3- Wepapers Webpapers lets you store all your papers, exams, lecture notes and research work in one place, and get organized. You can also use it to share and make your documents available to the world. 4- Share Zoho Share Zoho allows you to browse files based on different file types ( ppt,pdf,doc ) and also collaborate in the form of : commenting. flagging, rating, bookmarking, and chatting. 5- Edocr This is another web tool that lets you lets you upload and share your documents with over 300 web services. You can also connect with other users through private messaging and many more. 6- Scribd Scribd is an awesome online library where you can search for, read, publish, upload and share documents and written words. 7- Eight Free Tools to Share your Slideshows and Presentations This is a post I have published earlier and where I have reviewed 8 awesome free websites where you can share and publish your docs and presentations. Check them out. "

news stories for all levels

MPT has great resources for students. Some are interactive. The 8th graders like these. I use these as an activating strategy.

Great article I found on social and emotional learning. I enjoyed reading it, because it relates well with a topic I researched for another Wilson course this year. It would have been a great resource for my research paper.

I was interested to read this article because it dicusses the growing interest in course styles similiar to ours. More and more students are finding success and taking interest in "hybrid" classes, a combination of online and face to face classes. They are becoming so popular because it allows students to not have to be on campus all the time, the freedom to work from home, and also keeps them motivated to keep up with their studies as they meet with their classmates every other week. I found myself relating to this article because it is exactly how our class operates and I see the same positives as the many others opting for hybird classess