Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

Give students a taste of the Victorian celebration with this site showing greeting cards from the Victorian era, and explaining the Victorian origins of many of today's Christmas traditions. We wish the images were bigger, but this is a nicely designed introduction to Victorian celebrations.

What is social media? This video takes you on a journey to "Scoopville," a fictitious town used to demonstrate the many "flavors" of social media. The video is short (3:25-minutes) and very easy to follow. Highlighted are blogs, podcasts, and videos. This site requires you to be a paying member to embed or download the video. However, you can still see the transcript for the video. Despite a paid membership model, Common Craft still offers this video for free. If you wish to share this with a group, they will need to view it on individual/partner computers (or IOS devices) or on a projector that has a zoom function to enlarge a selected area of the screen.
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tag(s): blogs (65), podcasts (110), social media (48), video (266)

National Geographic's travel guides for most major cities.

tag(s): cities (17), virtual field trips (129)

This site offers suggestions and examples of different types of questions to include in classrooms. Each type of question is explained and sample questions are included. For a visual explanation of how questions work together, choose the Essential Questions link and scroll down to the diagram showing that this is center of all questions, then all other types of question serve to illuminating the Essential Questions. Links are included to additional information on each of the topics.

tag(s): critical thinking (128), questioning (36)

Select and Speak (formerly (Speakit) is an easy to install, free program that converts written text on web pages into spoken words within the Chrome web browser. At the time of this review, it works exclusively on Google Chrome. You can use this extension in many different languages. All you do is highlight the text, and it reads it aloud. The tool works only on website text, not documents, etc. This extension uses text to speech service and might not be accessible to those whose computers prevent download/installation of software. There are some errors in the program they are still fixing.
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tag(s): listening (93), text to speech (20)

The primary purpose of this site is to offer information and techniques for quilters; however, they also offer 3 lesson plans that can be used in elementary, middle, or high school classrooms. The elementary lesson focuses on learning fractions through dividing up quilt squares including basic and advanced activities. The middle school lesson focuses on proportions. The high school activity is based upon polynomials. These would be fun activities for students to apply these math concepts through hands-on activities.

tag(s): angles (52), fractions (160), polynomials (20), symmetry (26)

Created with input from the National Council on Economics Education, this site offers an eclectic set of lessons, most of which require some web access. They range from the introduction of simple concepts for elementary students to studies of economic forecasting for older students.

tag(s): consumers (14)

The Census Bureau offers lots of Thanksgiving statistics, from the total weight of all the turkeys raised in the US to the total amount of food consumed on Thanksgiving. You can plan a huge party with this one!

tag(s): holidays (187), thanksgiving (24)

Suitable for Halloween, Valentine's, or any chocolate-covered holiday, All About Chocolate offers basics about how chocolate is made and an excellent collection of lessons in the "Educator's Resources" area (click at the right). Lessons delve into the South American cultures and environments in which the cacao bean grows. Students can explore chocolate's impact on the economies and environment of these countries, and can also examine chocolate's ancient cultural connections. Sweet!

tag(s): chocolate (4), halloween (32), south america (49)

Here's every parent or teacher's dream: a site that helps you make your own puzzles, word games, and math puzzlers. There is a selection of almost a dozen different formats, each of which can be customized to meet your specific needs. Choose the puzzle type you want from the drop-down menu. Both adults and learners can create games!

tag(s): crosswords (19), puzzles (149)

Students discuss the process of storytelling and listening to stories. Then, they create a listening doll from clay in the tradition of the Native American storyteller dolls. The lesson is in 2 45-minute segments. The students will learn about Native American storyteller dolls, create their own image of a person listening to a story, discuss and assess the various listening dolls created by the class.

tag(s): crafts (64), native americans (109), stories and storytelling (58)

The National Baseball Hall of Fame offers lots of information on famous players and the history of the game. It's a great starting point for students interested in baseball's impact on American culture, especially in the early 20th century. Visit the Sights and Sounds, link to view videos, hear authentic news clips and interviews, and more.

tag(s): baseball (32)

This site provides sample student activities and "how to" instructions for students to create timelines, museums, pattern makers, and more. Explore the tools to give students ownership over their learning. Create your own activities or use the sample activities given with each tool. Use the Timeline Builder to easily create a simple but customizable timeline. Examine text for better understanding with the Annotate It! tool. Build spatial sense with the Pattern Builder that combines art and geometry in a fun to use tool. Create your own Museum is a great learning tool to decide what to showcase in any type of museum. Besure to check out the Learning Resources tab at the top for great digital activities for all ages!

tag(s): museums (53), patterns (61), reading comprehension (149), timelines (56), writing (324)

Looking for an easy to use free jeopardy game? Look no further than this site. Download the application for free or create the activity to be played online. View and try activities already created online. If you like your project you can save it to a folder on your computer. There is a short video in the "How To" section that will walk you through the process of making, saving, and playing a Flash Jeopardy game. Those of you who have used the PowerPoint Jeopardy will find this flash version much less time consuming to create and to recreate new Jeopardy games.
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tag(s): grammar review (31), matching (8)

This site is a resource for those interested in building Spanish resources in libraries and helping Hispanics discover and use libraries. REFORMA contains listings of Hispanic sources and information, and was developed at UCLA. From the top menu under Resources and Publications click Information for libraries and librarians serving Latinos & Spanish - speaking communities to find many useful resources for your school library and your classroom.

tag(s): communities (35), hispanic (36), service projects (17), spanish (109)

Write your own original books, add images and artwork as illustrations, and read your published books in interactive, online form. There is no fee for the online publication and sharing. This is the ultimate in "digital storytelling." Take advantage of the free apps that make Bookemon even easier to use with any device! Use Bookemon Reader to READ books you created in Bookemon or Bookemon edCenter (available for both iOS and Android). BookPress for iOS devices only allows you to CREATE books from scratch, including using photos from your iPad/iPhone. InstaPress (for iOS only) offers options to make books from documents, pdfs, etc. to be shared on mobile devices as eBooks. Here is an example of a book created by the TeachersFirst Edge editors. Once you set up free membership on this site, students (or teachers) can select to create from a blank start or to use the templates provided. You can also create a book starter of your own as an example so students can follow the prompts you have created. The book creator allows you to upload your own images and to create books from a Word document or PowerPoint file you have already made. EdCenter users can collaborate on books.

After you save and publish the work, share the URL so people can read the entire book online, either among an audience of "just my friends" or publicly. They also offer the embed code to place your books on a class or school web page, wiki, or blog. The easiest option is to copy the address of the new window displaying the interactive book. There is an option to have the book printed for a fee, but this is not required. You can also read books created by others (if they make them public). Use the fully-public option to create learning materials for classes to access year to year for at-home review or reading practice.

This site requires a simple registration. Teachers can set up an edCenter for their school or class in accordance with school policies. See more detailed suggestions "In the Classroom" below and in our sample book! Newer mobile device options include players to view your books on iPads and more.
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tag(s): creative writing (124), digital storytelling (154), writing (324)

This VERY simple tool lets you or your students make simple, folded small booklets that fit in a pocket. You choose what will appear on each page: from blank space to lines to calendars or checklists. Then print the single sheet (and run copies!) for a student "organizer" useful for homework assignments, long-term project deadlines, checklists, even student-made study guides. Students use the booklets the old fashioned way: by WRITING in them; but the clever, customizable format lets you teach organizational skills in a way that works.

See a sample PocketMod checklist, notes, and calendar booklet (with a separate page of folding directions) and one made from a PDF of the Pennsylvania Science and Technology Standards, converted using the free downloadable software.
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tag(s): organizational skills (88)