Let's face it, it's the 21st century and textbooks are annoying. They're heavy, expensive, and it can take forever to find what you're looking for. For the student in a hurry, online research is the fastest and easiest way to fill up that research paper. Here are 5 of the most useful (and fun) subject-oriented online research Web sites.

A great list of free and powerful tools you cause in your classroom

Easy website creator

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Everybody needs a stopwatch at some point -- and there's never one around! Well... Now there is! Online Stopwatch! A Simple, Fast Flash Online Stopwatch and Online Countdown timer always available when you need it.

Create your own comics without having to draw. Share and remix with your friends. For all ages. Over 150 countries, 30 languages, and growing every day. Sign up now, it's free!

Here at Good Widgets we follow a strict bad widget non-proliferation policy. Our widgets are nurtured and given the proper care to ensure maximum goodness. Made from only the finest of technologies, our widgets exceed even our high expectations. If you have a website, blog, social network page or heck even email you can share your customized widgets with the world. We have Good Widgets standing by, so Sign Up now!

Smilebox® makes it easy to connect with friends and family in a more creative and compelling way. Unlike other solutions that focus on organizing, editing, and sharing photos or sending pre-packaged ecards, the Smilebox service enables users to create something truly powerful by: 1. Choosing from hundreds of unique multimedia designs 2. Easily personalizing them with photos, video, music, words, and style 3. Sharing them via email, blog, or print Smilebox creates a new category of service called "creative messaging," which draws elements from photo services, scrapbooking, and ecards to deliver a new medium for communication unparalleled in its ability to convey mood, thought, and emotion.

Tired of long and annoying URLs? Simply enter your URL and hit SHRINK!

Link directly to quotes in Web pages. Paste a chunk of text and the URL of the page containing the text and in return get a link that opens directly to your selection and highlights it.

Welcome to the first shocked science lab on the WWW (growing since December 1995). This site will let both students and teachers interact with material on the web, rather than just reading text. In order to use this site you must have the Macromedia Shockwave Plug-in (used with Netscape 2.0+ or greater).

Browse through slideshows and related videos from Slideshare.net and Youtube at one place.

Mathway solves your math problems with step-by-step explanations. Mathway is for students, parents, and teachers, and covers the following math subjects: Basic Math | Pre-Algebra | Algebra | Linear Algebra | Trigonometry | Precalculus | Calculus

# a place for sharing plans and guides # helps you achieve your goals; learn and discover # is ideal for technologists, bloggers, business professionals, students and professors or anyone who wants to discover and share guides and plans

send audio postcards to your friends