Teachers
Elementary Resources: Professional Development
You will find games, links to hundreds of activities for kids,
descriptions of all the TV episodes, and book recommendations
for educators.
The Annenberg/CPB Channel is also simulcast on the Annenberg/CPB
Web site on a broadband stream. Visitors with broadband internet
access, anything faster than a dial-up connection, can click
on the "Watch it Now"link at www.learner.org and see
a continuous stream of Channel programming. This broadband simulcast
is free, and no log-in or registration is required.
The goal of this guide is to help children who are hearing and sighted become more aware of ways that children who are blind, visually impaired, deaf, or hard-of-hearing learn, play, and enjoy the same things they do. The curriculum was developed especially for students in grades 2-3, but activities can easily be adapted for younger or older audiences.
California-based Famundo LLC has started a service called Famundo for Organizations, a free web-based calendar tool that streamlines the scheduling and communications process for organizations and their members. The new tool is an event calendar planning system designed to help school leaders spend less time on administration and more time focusing on education. Famundo provides a central calendar hub with an easy-to-read, complete view of everything going on in a school or a specific classroom.
You'll find listings and information about books for children
and young adults that are categorized for easy searching.
This dynamic and evolving database includes materials describing
culturally and linguistically appropriate practices for early
childhood/early intervention services.
(En Español)
Original lesson plans that work in the classroom, with Web-based
activities.
Dr. David Thornburg is Director of the Thornburg Center and
Senior Fellow of the Congressional Institute for the Future.
Check back each month for new insight into technology and
how it affects education and your classroom!
What might digital broadcasting mean for learners of different
ages? Visit an elementary school class, a media specialist,
a homeschool family, a GED learner, special education students,
and a professional development trainer.
The Education Commission of the States (ECS) has released a new "Education Leadership Policy Toolkit," an online resource that provides information on effective education leadership policies and practices.
A fascinating study reported last week by Stanford University
compared the MRI brain scans and reading tests of 20 children
with dyslexia before and after they spent 100 minutes a day
for eight weeks with a computer program designed to develop
their phonological awareness. Reading scores went up and critical
areas of the children's brains were activated for the first
time. A video interview with one of the study's authors is
on the site.
Explore a comprehensive brain history timeline; travel
inside a 3-D brain; fool your brain – and discover the
science of illusion; and survey the technologies behind brain
scanning.
This interactive, online tutorial develops skill in designing
instruction that integrates instructional technology. Somewhat
unsettling because homepage opens up with a login screen and
no additional info; however, registration is free. When completed,
the user produces a professional instructional design. Tutorial
is divided into 6 categories. If you get lost, make use of
the "Go to Where I Left Off" button! Takes quite
a bit of time and commitment to complete; but allows you to
login whenever and go back to where you left off. Requires
Flash.
Dedicated to promoting appropriate uses of information technology
to support and improve learning, teaching, and administration
in K-12 education and professional development.
This six-week online course offers participants the opportunity
to explore and evaluate the use of the Internet for research,
electronic communication and collaboration, real-time data
tracking, Web publishing, and more. Study options include
graduate and professional development credit. We are now offering
discounted group rates for four or more teachers from the
same school. Check out the
course
preview. Or, if you have questions email
wong@thirteen.org
or call (212) 560-2909.
This is where students and teachers get guidance on essential reading strategies like evaluating, synthesizing, and inferring, through video clips and interactive web site components. The teacher's area of this site includes segments of classroom video for modeling effective instruction of the reading strategies, classroom activity ideas, and rubrics for evaluating student progress.
Get the latest surveys, reports and data on how technology
is changing the way we teach and learn.
The Principals' Partnership, sponsored by Union Pacific Railroad,
is a professional resource program for public high-school
principals dedicated to improving school leadership through
a number of opportunities, including research, networking,
and workshops. Its web site provides information and online
assistance for high-school reform efforts and a virtual community
of principals who share ideas, strategies, and stories of
improvement in their own schools. The site includes dozens
of research briefs covering a wide range of educational topics,
from the pros and cons of block scheduling to differentiated
instruction and staff development, among other issues. A public-relations
section includes resources to help principals better their
school's standing within the community and communicate more
effectively with parents. The program also includes excerpts
from leadership journals, a list of suggestions for school
improvement, and links to professional development and research
resources for improving the quality of education in the nation's
schools.
Learning Circuits was created to promote and aid the use of
e-learning, creating a body of knowledge about how to use
technology efficiently and effectively for learning. There
are nearly 500 articles on the website which cover e-learning,
design and development, management and implementation, tools
and technology, trends and research, and case studies. ASTD
(American Society for Training & Development) is a leading
association of workplace learning and performance professionals
including members from organizations, corporations, businesses,
government, academia, consulting firms, and product and service
suppliers.
This database offers over 200 lesson plans that will help
you integrate instructional video and Internet into your curriculum.
This site offers a balanced overview of a variety of learning
problems and gives parents and teachers a better understanding
of learning processes, insights into difficulties, and strategies
for responding.
Excellent links to learning units and assessments for various
levels and subjects.
NCTM has developed a set of standards for school mathematics
that address content, teaching and assessment. These standards
are guidelines for teachers, schools, districts, and states
to use in planning, implementing and evaluating high-quality
mathematics programs for kindergarten through 12th grade.
WHRO has created an online archive of video segments filmed at local schools, illustrating "best practices" in technology integration across subjects and grades. The videos are also designed to help increase community understanding of technology integration efforts funded through the No Child Left Behind EdTech Grant and its effect on student performance.
From the U.S. Department of Education (ED), "Innovative
Pathways to School Leadership, which provides examples
of successful strategies to prepare candidates for school leadership,
is the latest--and last--in a six-booklet series promoting best
practices in schools. Published by ED's Office of Innovation
and Improvement, these free online resources detail how school
systems across the country are working to implement the No Child
Left Behind Act (NCLB). Previously released titles include "Creating
Strong District School Choice Programs," a compilation
of real-life "lessons learned" in implementing NCLB's
school-choice provisions; "Creating Strong Supplemental
Educational Services Programs," a profile of how five school
districts provided low-income children with free tutoring and
academic assistance; "Successful Charter Schools,"
which highlights the successes of eight charter schools nationwide;
"Creating Successful Magnet Schools Programs," which
includes a guide for starting a magnet program and suggests
how to improve existing programs and evaluate their progress;
and "Alternative Routes to Teacher Certification,"
which looks at six programs that prepare people who already
have content knowledge, such as mid-career professionals, retired
military personnel, and other college graduates, to teach.
This is a new online content resource center that will make more than 8,000 classroom materials available to teachers, faculty, and learners worldwide at no cost. The site's teaching and learning materials can be browsed, searched, and most importantly, enhanced using web 2.0 social networking features, such as tagging, ratings, comments, and reviews.
This assessment module is meant for use either after completion
of the project-based learning module or with participants
who are familiar with project-based learning. The module is
designed for a two- to three-hour class or session, divided
into two parts.
- Guided Process: Designed to give participants
a brief introduction to assessment. Questions include, "Why
is Assessment Important?" "What are Some Types
of Assessment?" and "How Do Rubrics Help?"
The Guided Process includes an Assessment Resources section
and a PowerPoint® presentation, including presenter
notes. This presentation can be shown directly from the
Web site or can be downloaded for use as a stand-alone slide
show.
- Group Participation: Includes suggested
readings and activities for experiential, project-based
learning. Ideally, the activities will be accomplished using
group collaboration and with the use of technology.
The Partnership for Reading offers information about the effective
teaching of reading for children, adolescents, and adults,
based on the evidence from quality research. The Partnership
invites you to explore this site for information on the research,
principles about reading instruction suggested by the research,
and products for parents, teachers, administrators, and policy-makers.
PBS TeacherLine offers online, facilitated professional development
courses in mathematics, reading, instructional technology,
instructional strategies, science, and curriculum mapping.
Browse the course catalog and enroll online for courses.
This site includes instruction on how to use TV programs
in the classroom, thousands of classroom activities and lesson
plans, education and technology news, links to other Web resources
and discussion guides.
A Place of Our Own (and Los Niños en Su Casa
in Spanish) is a daily television series, a website, and an
extensive outreach program devoted to the unique needs of people
who care for children. Family, friends and neighbors –
everyone who takes care of young children – are child care
providers. Every interaction and every activity of these adults
with their charges provide valuable opportunities to help children
learn and grow.
A Place of Our Own shares ways for us all to help
children acquire cognitive, social, emotional and physical
skills, as well as nurture language and literacy development.
The series also responds to the needs and workplace realities
of people who spend their days caring for children by including
topics such as building partnerships with families, reducing
stress, and completing paperwork.
A Place of Our Own's
support for child care providers recognizes the importance of
their roles in the way children learn and develop. By supporting
these important people and providing them with the resources
they need, we better help our children prepare for school.
WGBH's award-winning educational outreach department has produced
a teacher's "Guide For English Language Learners,"
with a lesson plan to complement each episode of Postcards
from Buster. The Teacher's Guide supports and extends the
language learning opportunities in Postcards from Buster,
offering strategies to use before, during, and after viewing
each episode.
The Teacher's Guide is designed for students in grades 2-4.
Open-ended activities and multilevel teaching strategies make
the lesson plans ideal for classrooms in which some students
are in the process of learning English and others are native
English speakers.
Early Warning, Timely Response: A Guide to Safe Schools offers
research-based practices designed to assist school communities
identify warning signs early and develop prevention, intervention
and crisis response plans.
SchoolMatters is the largest searchable collection of testing,
demographic and financial data ever assembled from schools
across the nation. The site, funded by $45 million from The
Broad Foundation and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation,
allows users to search and compare individual schools and
school districts anywhere in the U.S.
A series of five posters (in both English and Spanish) that
present preschool teachers and parents with questions to activate
childrens' science and mathematics conceptual thinking.
SurfYourWork.com allows teachers to assign homework to individual
students. Teachers can even attach files, such as PDFs or
Microsoft Word documents to each homework assignment providing
students with continuous access to resources online and saving
schools unnecessary printing costs. When the deadline passes,
teachers can collect the homework turned for a specific assignment
with one click.
"Helping Preschool and School-Age Children to Develop
Resilience and Coping Skills The Sesame Street Way!"
will be conducted by Dr. Jeanette Betancourt. The workshop
will take place on Saturday, November 8, 2003 in Chicago,
Illinois at the McCormick Place, Lakeside Center, Room E351
from 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. Each attendee will receive a "You
Can Ask" kit.
Do you have software in your classroom, library, or computer
lab that you'd like to use but don't know how? Do you hear
colleagues talk about a particular software application you
wish you had?
This site, a disabilities resource from the producers of
Misunderstood
Minds, puts learning disabilities into perspective by
profiling a variety of learning problems, treatments, expert
opinions and resources. It is designed to give parents and
teachers a better understanding of learning processes and
potential reading, writing, math and attention difficulties,
specific strategies and resources for responding, as well
as the opportunity to hear from a range of learning disability
experts.
A comprehensive, online “how-to” kit developed
to empower K-12 students to be part of local decision-making
on the use of technology in education. SVRC reinforces the
critical importance of adding the voices of students to the
national dialogue around technology in education called for
in the recently released National Education Technology Plan,
Towards a New Golden Age in Education.
A 14-day free trial is allowed after registration for the
site, which is enough time to evaluate whether or not to subscribe.
A special rate is offered if a school or a school district
subscribes.
TeacherLine is a comprehensive, professional development Web
site designed for college instructors, K-12 teachers, and
future teachers. TeacherLine is designed as a source for content,
community and collaboration.
Get ideas for Web-based lessons for integrating technology
in each curriculum area and use our tutorials for fast help
for common applications.
The Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) were developed
to make clear what all students should know and be able to
do in all subject areas in K-12th grade. This section describes
the what, why, who, and when for the TEKS.
Check out this comprehensive list of Texas school districts,
educational organizations, service centers, technology journals,
Web sites and conferences related to educational technology!
Intended to serve as an official compilation of Texas Education
Agency (TEA) electronic resources and services and to provide
a means of communication between TEA and the public. The site
is organized around four audiences: school administrators,
teachers, families and communities, and students.
The Learning Disabilities Project for Teachers (LDPT) is a
cooperative effort between Southwest Texas State University
(SWT) and Education Service Center Regions III (Victoria),
XIII (Austin) and XX (San Antonio) to address the shortage
of teachers for student with Learning Disabilities. LDPT is
an intensive program designed to prepare currently certified
general education teachers to teach students labeled Learning
Disabled in inclusive general education classrooms.
LDPT is currently looking for teachers who would like training
in working with students with learning disabilities. A grant
provides free college classes and credit that can be applied
towards a masters and another teaching certification. For more
information contact Andrea Estrada, Grant Coordinator at (512)
245-7723.
Looking for good WebQuests? Try TeacherWeb's extensive collection -- TeacherWeb Inc., a provider of web site templates for
educators, recently announced that it has collected its ten thousandth WebQuest from contributing educators.
The WHOLE CHILD site extends the information presented in
the 13-part child development video series and telecourse
of the same name. (En Español)
Our Internet Primer is designed especially for K-12 teachers.
You'll find tips, interactive templates, and other resources
that will put your knowledge to practice!
Teachers who use instructional video report that their students
retain more information, understand concepts more rapidly
and are more enthusiastic about what they are learning.
Given the enormous popularity of YouTube, it's not surprising that an education-specific version of this video-sharing web site should emerge -- and on March 6, that's just what happened. TeacherTube, the brainchild of 14-year education veteran Jason Smith, gives teachers a more educationally focused, safe venue to watch and upload videos that help demonstrate a new concept or skill, address specific learning objectives, or provide professional development for their fellow educators.
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KLRU Contact Information
Mary Alice Appleman
Assistant Director
Educational Services Dept.
E-mail: maappleman@klru.org
Voice: (512) 475-9051
