Great Finds for January

There is no Tech Tuesday this week but you are not forgotten. I have published a very simple quick sheet to help you hook up a SMARTboard to a laptop cart. Some of the basic trouble shooting is included and helps walk you through the the steps.

Resources:

Reading (and more): Research and online text is daunting for students in the middle grades. They are usually overwhelmed by the reading level more than anything else. Just think how often they use Wikipedia as a source and are stumped by the expert language. Here comes Twurdy. Twurdy is a search engine from Google, however all the "hits" are categorized by their reading level. According the site, "Twurdy uses custom designed readability software that includes information about the number of words on the page, the average number of syllables in each word, the average sentence length and more to determine a pages readability level." There are 3 options for searching, Simple Twurdy (fast but less accurate on the readability) up to Twurdy with Pop (slower but the algorithms are better.) What should you do with this? Direct students to use Twurdy for research and instruct them that only websites that are light pink or white should be used as sources. These are age appropriate reading levels.

Science: Energy conservation is a big topic around the globe so it is great when our Canadian neighbors design a site with multiple lessons. EarthCare is a wonderful source for lesson plans about alternative energy, waste management and clean water. In these 54 lesson plans and 19 activities you might find one that fits your curriculum or is a great enhancement. I particular like the Lights Off/Computers Off activity.

Learning Types: This is one of my favorites. When trying to understand all the different types of learners in the class and how to adjust your teaching, the Visual-Spatial Learner is very well suited to technology integration. But why? At this website, the visual-spatial learner is explained and there are ways you can identify this student in your classroom.

History: Now that you know how to save videos (see previous blog), make the most of primary source videos from CriticalPast.com. This site offers over 57,000 historical film clips and they are categorized easily by decade. Start every class with a short social video and students that are visual (see site above) will learn it.

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