Monday

Web links: Educational Resources

It's become very clear to me on looking through the page upon page of weblinks that I've collected over time that I need a way of keeping them together, available and accessible. Some are built into the school website and into the curriculum. Others... float around... and we either forget about them - which is a problem, or one individual uses them - which means that the potential of the resource may not be being fully exploited.

One of the problems with collecting weblinks is having time to do the research on them.
Christmas 2009 research: websites to check-up on/take a look at.
Here goes...

http://etherpad.com

only web-based word processor that allows people to work together in realtime. When multiple people edit the same document simultaneously, any changes are instantly reflected on everyone's screen. Looks interesting... good potential for collaborative writing projects.

http://www.edutubeplus.info/content/videos
Just following this one at the moment... not well developed yet, but has outstanding potential. The EduTubePlus project aims to develop a European hybrid, multilingual video-based service for schools. This service will integrate thousands of multi-lingual curriculum-related video-clips by major European educational TV & video providers.

http://storybird.com
Already established as a favourite and being used by a number of Year Groups in school. We've ref'd it on the 'We Like' page of the school website http://www.robinhood.leeds.sch.uk/pupils/welike.php Site is a beta. Storybirds are short, visual stories that you make with others and share (and soon print).

Another site ref'd there is
http://www.yfaonline.com/yfapublic/
Now loads of online content. Not just relevant to Yorkshire and links to lots of potential topics/themes....

We Like section of RH School website again...
http://www.robinhood.leeds.sch.uk/pupils/welike.php

http://www.arts4lifeshowcase.blogspot.com/
Arts 4 Life.
Underdeveloped at the moment. A group working with Young People in Leeds. Some good ideas for arts curriculum development here...

Click - The BBC's flagship technology programme.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/click_online/8333949.stm
Lots of useful resources here and referrals to education-linked websites/content/resources

http://www.1minutetosavetheworld.com/
A great website containing a wealth of independently made videos that are full of innovative ways of getting a message across. I came across the site via The Guardian.

http://www.blurb.com/make/booksmart
Make professional-looking books from pupils' photographs, direct onto your computer - simple as that.

http://www.geni.com/
Another look at history.... Connecting with our own personal history opens a great many doors. This simple tool presents an interesting way to present a personalised approach to learning about history, yourself, your family and your locality.

http://www.wallwisher.com
This is a truly great resource that allows you to custom-build interactive 'walls' with your class - like a pin-board, perhaps, or a mood board, thought board, a board that preceeds a topic, full of ideas that pupils want to explore.. a post-topic discussion board, a storyboard, praiseboard. The possibilities are.......
I've begun a mock-up. It's set up so that I moderate the board. Nobody's post goes live unless I moderate it. Wallwisher sends me a message when there's a post added.

http://www.instituteofplay.org/
Creative learning, play-based approaches, using digital video games as a learning tool and lots of interesting photographs on Flickr...... Well worth spending a bit of research time on.
See also:
http://q2l.org/
and
http://www.theplayethic.com/ ...which moves the context to Scotland.

http://emergingtechnologies.becta.org.uk/
Bringing together news, articles, research, views and opinions on emerging technologies for learning

http://www.createascape.org.uk/
This looks remarkable. I haven't had enough time to fully get my head around it yet and work out the detail or, indeed, try it out with children. But..... I have seen it in action at an event... done with pupils of Primary School age. Again, offers an incredible opportunity to enrich the learning and the experience of a Local History study. Clearly enormous potential for Geography studies... and for Internet Safety awareness.

http://www.teachertube.com/videoList.php?pg=videomostviewed
Mainly populated by videos from US teachers. There are pearls here... Take a look at 'Mrs. Burk Perimeter Rap' at http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=157&title=Mrs__Burk_Perimeter_Rap

http://www.comicbrush.com/
A comic book making tool that can export out onto ipod... which makes it a potentially interesting tool. A very limited range of characters and backgrounds to choose from, very few of which are actually FREE.
There are quite a few comic maker tools out there.
We've used the Doctor Who Comic Maker and Trailer Maker very successfully.....
http://www.bbc.co.uk/doctorwho/s4/create/
We used this one with our Reception pupils for their Superhero topic........
http://www.artisancam.org.uk/flashapps/superactioncomicmaker/comicmaker.php
We're also using
http://myths.e2bn.org/
for the Myths and Legends topic.

http://www.exploratree.org.uk/

An online planning tool from Futurelab.

www.jamstudio.com
'The online music factory'. Free online music creation tool. Sister product, JamRecorder.

That's probably enough to be going on with for now.

4 comments:

  1. http://www.benettonplay.com/toys/flipbookdeluxe/
    I have found when doing recounts or trying animation for the first time using flipbooks fantastic. You can post your animation on the website, I recently used this for a grwoing topic it really helped the children see how the seed grew into a plant very realistically as well... great for Key stage one.

    http://www.bbcmotiongallery.com/Customer/index.aspx

    I also use bbc motion gallery it is a super resource for short clips about nature, food topics, wildlife and geography issues. The archive section is great for history clips and well worth a look.

    Hope you find something useful.

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  2. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  3. http://www.videojug.com/
    I have just stumbled accross this website. It is a rich resource for topic clips and allows you to post them to your inbox (email) or keep them in your favourites box. You will need to set-up an account whihc took minutes!! I have already saved six clips for our pets topic this half term. What a time saver!!

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