Books of Hope is a wonderful nonprofit organization that assigns schools in the United States to schools in Uganda. US schools then create educational books for their sponsored schools overseas. There is a $200 participation fee per school. In the past, when my school district was able to cover the cost of the project, this was one of the most fulfilling projects that my students participated in all year. Books of Hope does a wonderful job of providing background information for multiple age levels, in order to provide a context for students to better understand their audience. Students will truly enjoy knowing that they are creating a valuable tools that will affect the lives of others.
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Bomomo is an unusual, and extremely addictive art tool. I could see this being very useful for creating backgrounds for slideshows, as well as abstract art for websites, blogs, wikis, e-portfolios, or other student pieces of work. It could also be interesting to have students use art generated by Bomomo as a creative writing prompt. Edmodo is, to put in simplest terms, Facebook for education. Students will find it easy to use because they are already familiar with the format. Post questions and let your students respond. Upload files, administer polls, share links, subscribe your learners to RSS feeds--there are TONS of possibilities! Organize with ease by grouping students by class. Let students respond to each other's posts as a wonderful way to brainstorm ideas and gather feedback. You can also create and maintain a class calendar. Edmodo is completely safe and secure, and students can even access it from their Smart phones. For more information on Edmodo, visit their FAQ page here. Sumo Paint is a free website that offers some pretty impressive features. In addition to mimicking the appearance of real art tools, such as paintbrush, ink and pencils, it also has some unusual features, including: smudge, blur, rotate, custom shape tool, and many more. The images below are from Sumo Paint's "Popular Artwork" section. With the right amount of time, patience and talent, Sumo Paint is capable of creating some truly inspiring artwork. ManyEyes brings va-va-voom to data visualization. Create your own visualization, or browse charts, graphs and tables that have already been created. This is your new blog post. Click here and start typing, or drag in elements from the top bar.
While Kelly Gallagher may not be a "Web 2.0 Tool," his website is a wonderful resource. I had the pleasure of attending one of his workshops on reading comprehension strategies, and I have been using his Article of the Week database ever since. Gallagher and his coworkers post PDF files of nonfiction articles on current event topics. I have students highlight main ideas, new words, and areas of confusion; they also annotate passages in the margins and then write a brief response to the articles. This is an excellent source for "beefing up" the nonfiction component in your curriculum. According to their website, "Voki is a free service that allows you to create personalized speaking avatars and use them on your blog, profile, and in email messages." This is a great option for student-created videos without compromising students' privacy. It can also be handy way to capture your students' attention while simultaneously introducing the day's agenda or directions for an activity. Voki could also be used to create a virtual substitute teacher for days when you know you will be absent. Simply embed your Voki on the classroom website and the sub can play the audio file to the class. Below is a sample Voki I created in about five minutes. Voki for Education FAQ http://www.voki.com/voki_faq.php#4 Voki Lesson Plans http://www.voki.com/lesson_plans.php Puzzlemaker is one tool that every teacher should have in their arsenal. This website quickly allows the user to create crossword puzzles, word searches, mazes, cryptograms, and many other types of puzzles. It's completely free and there is nothing to download. There are several printing options for easily creating handouts for students. Do You Buzz is a free online resume generator. Choose from multiple attractive templates to create your resume. When you are finished, you will have an online resume, and you can also download your finished product as a PDF or Word file. At first, I thought that this would be fantastic for helping Consumer Economics or Tech Prep students create their resumes; however, this would also be a great tool for creating fake resumes for fictional characters. I could see studen Juxio is a website that allows you to create custom posters. several templates are available, including a set aimed at educators. Juxio allows you to combine photos and text to make organized, eye-appealing collages. Create and share your "jux" with others for free, or buy printed versions of your creations. |
AuthorDr. Jessica Pilgreen, Ed.D. Archives
December 2020
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