Timelines and other stuff; great videos!

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Timelines

Here are some tools to help you create timelines. I love using timelines to get children thinking about events in history. Timelines are useful tools which can be used as a graphic organiser. There are also some on our web 2.0 tools site







http://goo.gl/1D9Xi


Try dipity.com too

http://dipity.com/

A List of Apps from Richard Byrne

IOS Apps:  http://ipadapps4school.com/

A list of Android Apps:  http://android4schools.com/

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Videos…….

Videos are a great source of professional Learning for all learners.

This guy is great. Principal of a school in Harlem he is dealing with US educational problems, but some of what he talks about should resonate with us.

It's of Dr Geoffrey Canada, President of the Harlem Children's Zone in New York. Raised in poverty and the son of an alcoholic father, Canada introduces himself as black and mad. What he's mad about is the state of education, and the fact that few people seem to be bothered to do anything about it. He recognises that our traditional system caters well for the top achievers, who go on to be successful as leaders in our communities etc., but that it is hopelessly inadequate in dealing with a vast number of children who are then 'trapped' in the cycle of poverty and underachievement.

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A Video from Cyberwise presents a child oriented view on device usage:

http://virtualicteltpd.ning.com/profiles/blogs/what-are-kiwi-kids-are-really-doing-online-a-creative-challenge

 

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 I love the possibilities with creating stop-motion videos. Very easy to create with a tablet or camera and then a video editor.  I’d be happy to help you and your class create something. Have a look at this video. Very simple set up but lots of potential for creativity: (really like the cotton wool burnouts!!)



NASCAR Wizard from DIY on Vimeo.

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More videos for your activboard - Has a whole lot of videos from various sources which, as the title suggests are not made for kids, but are good to watch with kids.

http://thekidshouldseethis.com/

Some More Useful Links!

Just when you thought I wouldn’t bug you with any more blog emails, here’s another one! If you get a chance, have a look at some of these links – some are good to use with your Smartboard and some provide some thought provoking ICT/Learning stuff. 

I’m also writing this blog using Microsoft Live Writer which is looking to me like a very easy way to post blog entries – ie write them off line, then post them directly when you have them finished. Regular blog writers may want to try this tool.

I think I’ve posted this before but  I like videos and this is a great commercial!

 

The above site is worth a browse……..

1,000-year-old fishing trap found on Google Earth Britain's most ancient fishing trap has been discovered off the coastline of Wales after research carried out on Google Earth.

For The Smartboard:

Try this timezone map - Good smartboard tool??

Interactive science and engineering for 9 to 12 year olds. For interactive, read game!

Or try these byte sized activities from the BBC for Year 1 / 2. ps I think the narrator eats pork pies and drinks scrumpy!

Interesting:

Wow Science investigation! Teenagers armed with only a £56 camera and latex balloon have managed to take stunning pictures of space from 20-miles above Earth.

Are our kids Narcissistic??? The growing expectation placed on schools and parents to boost pupils' self-esteem is breeding a generation of narcissists, an expert has warned. A BBC article

Or try Don Trapscott’s view:

Video of the Week:

More next week!

Technology and Art

Is this Art?? This was created using a web based graphics editor ( http://fotoflexer.com/) by Vinay in 78T. He used the digital photo below as a base. Is this artistic? creative? or sneaky!? There are lots of ways of creatively altering digital photos. The darkroom of the past is What do you think Eve?

More for Smartboards

Great to see some of the maths basic facts games being used on smartboards around the place. I used the jetski race one with my maths class ( http://arcademicskillbuilders.com/games/jetski/jetski.html) -an excellent way to improve basic facts speed - Set up a hosted game and as well as competing against the computer, you could end up competing against some whizz kid from USA? China?

Try your smartboard with some of the activities below:

Geosense – pinpoint cities of the world. This is a challenging activity - good for able students

And from the same maker – a vocabulary game – try it in year 7 and 8 with able spellers. http://www.wordslide.net/

Or a simpler vocab game from Roy the Zebra:


Do you think you know the countries of the Middle East?? Try the map game from Rethinking Schools – fantastic for the Smartboard! It's harder than you would think.


Articles worth reading:

When Mum or Dad Asks To Be a Facebook 'Friend' Social networking and parents! A Washington Post article.

And the video selection for this week!
Some Brazilian Football Skills:

And the famous Bush Blair Duet:

Google, Digital Natives and more on Smartboards

Google are a major force in ICT and their influence is growing. I'm currently playing with igoogle, which partly points to the future direction of the web - a more personalised home page - IGoogle .


I believe Google earth have improved the resolution of imagery over New Zealand. Might be worth a look. Found your house yet??


More in Google Earth

• 2007 Tour de France route
• New 7 wonders of the World see the winners in Google Earth
  

There are a number of tools for educators available from Google. Here's a list: http://teachdigital.pbwiki.com/googletools

What you don't want to see when you've just run out of petrol:

And, I love signs which provide clear information:

Try this New Zealand Census at School - register your class to take part: http://www.censusatschool.org.nz/

Digital Native

Marc Prensky's suggestiuons for useing Cell Phones in the classroom: http://www.marcprensky.com/blog/archives/000043.html

This page has links to more of Marc Prensky's work: http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/

Smartboards.....

Some more sites with interactive whiteboard resources:

• http://www.waukesha.k12.wi.us/WIT/SmartBoard/specificapps.htm


• http://eduscapes.com/sessions/smartboard/


• http://www.clarion.edu/admin/computing/classrooms/resources.htm


• http://www.prometheanplanet.com/uk/server/show/nav.914

This is an interesting world clock with a lot more data besides. Watch the earth gradually warming up and CO2 emissions increasing.

Put it up on a Smartboard and stimulate a discussion. How many bicycles is that now???

Finally, Do you drink green tea? Concentrated chemicals derived from green tea dramatically boosted production of a group of key detoxification enzymes in people with low levels of these beneficial proteins, according to researchers at Arizona Cancer Center. See Biosingularity