So, in my last post, I forgot to mention this really cool web 2.0 tool that I was introduced to over the summer. It's called Jimdo, and in a nutshell, it is a really simple way to create a website. This is a great tool for a number of reasons: for one, it is incredibly user friendly. The most amateur of web users could figure this out on their own. It also has a bunch of really neat features already built into it, such as options to add picture galleries, videos, blogs and rss feeds. It also allows for html editing, so you can customize it any way you want (if you know how to work with html). The school day is not long enough, so having a class website is a really great way to extend learning outside of the physical classroom, especially since most students have internet access. With Jimdo, you can post lessons, embed video clips, add attachments, such as Powerpoint notes, have news feeds which automatically update, create blogs and even add a contact section for students and parents to reach you at. For those of us who are not currently teaching and are looking for a job, it is also a great way to display your work in a neat and easily accessible format. I've taken the liberty to post a link to my Jimdo site, which consists of a section strictly dedicated to my professional profile and as well as a section dedicated to a sample course website that I designed. Feel free to make suggestions on how I might be able to improve it, and then make your own website. Also, see below, a video on how Jimdo works.
My Jimdo site
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Web Resources Galore! (Again)
Hello EME 5053!
Welcome to Steal This Blog. If you look, you'lI notice that there are posts which date back to February of this year. I created a blog for my Teaching and Learning in Urban Settings (EDF 6496) class and I thought I would just recycle it for this class. Most of the posts are in reference to my experience tutoring with the Adult Literacy League and AVID, but from here on out, they will be related to online resources.
To start things off, I want to update an old post, Web Resources Galore! While some of these are useful, strictly for purposes of professional development, most of them could be used in the classroom in one way or another. I hope you'll check some of these out. I've provided links to each resource in the top right corner of this page. Enjoy.
TED is like a youtube for intellectuals that also allows for social networking. There really are some brilliant speakers here. There is also a Podcast and iPod/iPhone Application that you can download for free. I noticed that someone has already referenced a "TEDtalk" on there blog, which is awesome, because TED rocks! Below, I posted a link to Taylor Mali's poem "What Teachers Make". I showed this to my EDF 6237 class in the Spring and it seemed to inspire. I also recommend watching Sir Ken Robinson's two talks on creativity and creating an education revolution and Hans Rosling's Gapminder presentations. I highly advise you kill some time browsing TED.
Rethinking Schools website was just revamped, and I think the've done a good job. I primarily listed Rethinking Schools, because I hope you explore the publications that they put out. I started subscribing to their quarterly magazine last Fall and I am very happy with my purchase (it wasn't too expensive and they are a nonprofit group, so that makes it easier too). The articles are very progressive and offer some really great ideas on how to reform the education system, simply by reforming your own classroom. Many of the books they publish are equally progressive.
The Zinn Education Project is a website that Rethinking Schools helped sponsor, and it is based on Howard Zinn's, A People's History of the United States. This website is geared primarily toward social studies teachers. It offers some really great resources and is incredibly user friendly. If you are a social studies teacher, you should definitely check this out.
Edutopia is George Lucas's education foundation. As you would imagine, this is a well funded project and the website is very interactive. The best thing is that many of the videos are available as Podcasts.
Glogster is a neat tool that I was just introduced to a week ago. I would describe it as an online poster-board. Rather than being limited to utilizing text and pictures, Glogster allows the user to infuse graphics, music, video and links into the poster, making it much more interactive than the typical poster-board.
The following interactive maps are great resources for studying world geography. It gives the state's name and capital when you place the cursor over it.
Last, but certainly not least...
Democracy Now! is what I would advocate as the best and possibly last source of legitimate comprehensive world news. SO MUCH of the mainstream media is filled with gossip and biased information, where their goal is to boost ratings. Democracy Now is an independent media outlet that seriously delivers compelling stories, that don't cater to any partisan agenda. If there is one website on this list that you explore, let it be Democracy Now (though TED is a very close second on my list). What I recommend to you iTunes users is Podcast it. I subscribe to it and it automatically downloads whenever there is an episode (every weekday). This is also a good source of information to bring into the classroom if you like doing current events.
I hope that this was helpful. Let me know what you think. Also, if there are any good web resources that you know of, please give me a heads up.
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