Sites for Teachers

"Sitesforteachers.com contains only links to sites that contain teacher's resource and educational material and the sites are ranked by popularity. No more surfing countless pages to find the occasional "good" site. Also, sitesforteachers.com doesn't just allow any site on the list. Sitesforteachers.com has strict rules for the listed webmasters."

Timesavers for Teachers

Here's what they say: "World's largest and most complete collection of printable, interactive, often-used teacher forms, report card comments, checklists, worksheets, award certificates, passes, masters, units, and other downloadable timesaving ideas for busy teachers."

iPods and Podcasting in Education

From wwwTools for Education, a feature page full of information, links, resources. Headings include The Hardware; Definitions, Descriptions, Educational Values; Serious Reading for Educators - and Some Listening Too; Podcasts at Work in Education; Listings of Podcasts and Related Resources

podictionary - book resources

A long page illustrating all sorts of resources about WORDS -- dictionaries, books about words, electronic resources and other "entymological connections".

podictionary: the podcast for word lovers

"Podictionary is the audio word-a-day. For a couple of minutes Charles Hodgson discusses the unexpected history of words you thought you already knew."

There's a cute thing in the top right corner that says, "Wait a minute, I don't want to know about podcasts: An email alternative."

SMARTBoard Lessons Podcast

"Delivering fresh and engaging lesson ideas at least weekly! ... The purpose of this site is to accompany a podcast that focuses on using SMART Boards in the classroom. Each episode will feature a lesson, a podcast, and user comments. ... The goal of this podcast to share lesson ideas that use technology to engage students in learning with a focus on SMARTBoard Interactive Whiteboards between educators. It will be a maximum of 20 minutes so that teachers can listen on lunch breaks or recesses as they mark papers or on their way to school in the morning via their iPod."

ELGG Learning Landscape

This system was mentioned by Kevin Reeve as one way of including a blogging tool in a course; Elgg is one of the WebCT powerlinks.

"Elgg is a hybrid of weblogging, e-portfolios and social networking. It is hoped this combination of features will provide an engaging environment for learners to create their own learning space and then connect to others, forming online communities of learning. ... There are two options to get an Elgg account. You can register for an individual account hosted by Elgg or you can take the system and install it on your own server. Elgg is an open source application. ... Elgg has been developed to serve as a stand alone personal learning landscape or as a complimentary addition to existing learning environments. Elgg has been developed to serve as a stand alone personal learning landscape or as a complimentary addition to existing learning environments. The emphasis with Elgg is very much on the learner."

Google Page Creator

You need a GMail account to use it.

"Google Page Creator is a free tool that lets you create web pages right in your browser and publish them to the web with one click. There's no software to download and no web designer to hire. The pages you create are hosted on Google servers and are available at http://yourgmailusername.googlepages.com for the world to see."

Podcast Station

"Podcast Station is Win 2k and XP compatible software. It is built on the professional, award winning VoxPro platform, a product sold worldwide and used in radio broadcasting news and control rooms to record and edit phone calls and other stereo audio on the fly for quick turn around to air. VoxPro Podcast Station is a single screen program that will record, mix, edit and publish your podcasts. It provides an easy to use production solution taking you from the start of a podcast to publishing on the net on one screen. It’s like having a broadcast console on your computer. No need for mixers, amplifiers, compressor-limiters, it's all built in and easy to use. On screen buttons can be assigned music, sound effects and interviews from MP3, WAV, WMA,AIFF, whatever, with the ability to play them back while recording your podcast."

Engagement with Electronic Portfolios: Challenges from the Student Perspective

"While it is generally agreed that e-portfolios have great potential to engage students and promote deep learning, the research that has been conducted to date focuses very little on student perceptions of value of the e-portfolio for their learning. If students do not accept the e-portfolio as a holistic means with which to document their learning in different contexts and more importantly, agree or wish to use the e-portfolio as an integral part of their educational experience, then the potential impact the e-portfolio will have on learning will not be realised. This paper highlights four themes arising out of research that is underway within an international framework of collaboration between the University of Edinburgh, the University of British Columbia and the University of Waterloo. "

The Hitchhiker's Guide to Course Development

Topics include Planning Courses (for both Online and Classroom Based), Content Development, Assessment & Evaluation.

"The Hitchhiker's Guide to Course Development is designed as a resource for individuals with varying levels of course design experience.

• Individuals new to higher education can use this site to help design their
  first classroom based course integrating technology where appropriate.
• Experienced instructors, being encouraged to place materials within a
  learning management system, can use this site to decipher the differences
  between Web-Presence, Web-Enhanced, Web-Centric and Online courses and how to
  plan courses for online delivery.
• Instructors of online courses, looking for new ideas and ways to improve
  their course, can use the site to improve content development by finding sources
  for pre-developed content and ideas to improve student centered learning.
• Instructional Designers and Instructional Support Staff can use this site as
  a reference for themselves or as a resource for the faculty they
  support."

Educational Freeware (K-12)

"This site is dedicated to listings, descriptions and reviews of the best free educational software for Windows, both web based and downloadable. "

Addressing Gender & Learning Style in Course Design

"Do Gender and Learning Style Play a Role in How Online Courses Should Be Designed?"

"The Kolb Learning Style Inventory was used to identify differences between the learning styles of 168 students in traditional face-to-face courses and students in matched courses taught online. Additionally, the data for the online courses were divided by gender to determine if gender was a factor. Results of the analysis found that there was a difference in the learning style of the online student and the student in the face-to-face course and that gender was a factor in the relationship between learning style and student engagement. The implications for online course designers are significant. When designing online courses the learning style and gender of all students must be considered."

Open Source Project: An LCMS Alternative -- Moodle

My link above is to EdTechPost's description of a funded research project wherein "6 institutions have done pioneering working to investigate the viability of Moodle as an alternative, and have made the resulting reports available for all to see. The project was funded by ... BCcampus." What grabbed my attention was that one of the several offerings by the research group is documentation about how to migrate WebCT 4.1 courses to Moodle.

Podcast: Learning Management System Selection

This site links to a 51 minute recording that provides coverage of the 2005 EDUCAUSE Annual Conference Session entitled The Matrix Transformed: Achieving Better Focus and Insight in Learning Management System Selection.

Teachers' Perceptions of Video Games

MMOGs and the Future of Preservice Teacher Education:

"P.G. Schrader, Dongping Zheng, and Michael Young examine how preservice teachers' personal experiences with video games inform their views of gaming in the classroom. They link the results of their study to current literature and conclude that preservice teachers' experiences steer them away from game genres such as massively multiplayer online games and toward using games as rewards. The solution, the authors conclude, is to provide preservice teachers with new experiences in their training programs that make them aware of the educational potential of games in the classroom."

Award-Winning Professors Offer Ten Teaching Tips

A group of Duke faculty and staff are promoting excellence in teaching with public talks, weekly meetings and research projects.

"The Consortium for Scholarship on Teaching and Learning (CoSTL) has been meeting for two years, drawing participants from longer-running informal discussion groups within departments. CoSTL participants, about 25 each week, are mostly math and science faculty with “professor of the practice” titles, who are responsible for teaching but not research. Their research, they say, is on how best to teach undergraduates."

Bitty Browser

They call it a "Picture-in-Picture for the Web". This is SO kewl! I can think of many applications for this "Bitty Browser", from in-course links/feeds to using multiple browser boxes as a website organizing method. Check it out as you think creatively (click on the title of this post).

Here's an example -- I used a Bitty Browser to post my list of subscribed feeds on my Resource Site's Acknowledgement page.

The Illustrated History of the Roman Empire

An full site that calls itself the "leading web resource on Rome". Includes empire maps from various dates, reenactors (photos/descriptions of people re-enacting various battles and events), categorized chapters, FAQs, a bulletin board, resource links, and an online quiz.

SyncToy for Windows XP

SyncToy is a FREE "PowerToy" from Microsoft.

"...easy to use, highly customizable application helps you copy, move, synchronize, rename, and delete files between folders and computers.... digital cameras, e-mail, cell phones, portable media players, camcorders, PDAs, and laptops.

Most common operations can be performed with just a few clicks of the mouse, and additional customization is available without added complexity. SyncToy can manage multiple sets of folders at the same time; it can combine files from two folders in one case, and mimic renames and deletes in another. Unlike other applications, SyncToy actually keeps track of renames to files and will make sure those changes get carried over to the synchronized folder."

Sharing Photographs and Other Still Imagery

From wwwTools For Education (one of my subscription newsletters), here's a full page of information and links on this one topic. LOTS of useful leads here, so I'll leave you with this page link rather than pointing out individual items. Headings include Why Share Pictures?, Pedagogical considerations, Sharing Pictures in Educational Practice, Hardware, Software, Software for Sharing, Albums, Mixing the Media, Tools & Toys, Resources, Books.

Librarians' Internet

Frances Long at Knowplace.ca says, "The invisible internet is the name given to specialty areas that are available but not generally well-known. When I want a trusted, reviewed site for research etc. the first place I stop is The Librarians Internet." Check the details in their extensive "about us" section/pages and you will see that they do have strict guidelines and review processes before including sites in their database.

I especially like using their Reference section.

The Graduation Portfolio Workbook (BC, Canada)

"The Graduation Portfolio Workbook focuses on the mandatory core aspects of the six prescribed Portfolio Organizers as well as the student presentation that must be completed by all students planning to graduate. This Workbook was developed for teachers of students with learning challenges to clarify the required core aspects and presentation components. The Graduation Portfolio process encourages students to gather and present evidence of skills, knowledge and competencies that will support a successful transition beyond Grade 12. The authors felt that once students clearly understood the process and became engaged in it, they could confidently proceed to explore choice aspects that best reflect their talents, interests, and abilities.

"This Workbook has been designed as an electronic workbook. ...All the files related to the Graduation portfolio are available for download. To download, click on item in list on the left."

ViewletACE, Qarbon's Survey and Quiz Software

ACE: (Ask, Collect, Evaluate) This new Qarbon offering has a sizeable price tag attached, but is certainly worth looking at. Check out their demo.

"Forget those dull HTML-based quizzes and surveys. Get the power of Flash to captivate your audience with stunning graphical quizzes and surveys. ViewletACE is the most efficient way to create dynamic, customizable Flash-based surveys and assessments without the need for extensive training and development time."