A Google A Day

I came across this site while doing research on ways to enhance student research skills. The site provides users with a daily trivia question they must answer using the provided search window. The advantage of using this search window: A Google A Day automatically filters out published answers, forcing students to use strong keywords to find the answers.


Once the student believes he/she has an answer to the trivia question, they submit their answer in the provided box and the site provides feedback on ways to select proper keywords for the search. The higher level trivia questions require students to do multiple search steps before coming to the solution.

Nelly, the Ho-ele-zeb-torto-peacock



One of my better pictures!

You can channel your inner animal at BuiLDYouRWiLDSeLF.com! Users are able to create an avatar of themselves using body parts of animals found throughout the world. This Flash-based Web application is sponsored by the New York Zoos and Aquarium and the Wildlife Conservation Society.


When students enter the site, they begin by building an avatar which depicts their real features (gender, hair, eyes, mouth and clothes). Then the real fun begins! Students are provided with animal appendages to add to their original avatar - creating their wild self. The Web site even gives the students the choice of a dynamic background where he/she could be found.


Once the wild self has been created, the site offers users information about what is wild about the new version of their avatar. Information pertaining to the appendages is provided. With this information, students can now get their creative juices flowing as they write about becoming a new kind of super hero, adventures they would begin to take with their new attributes, or just how different every day life would be as their new self. Further scientific research will give students additional information and ties into the Life Science curriculum.

This is a fun Web site that is worth visiting!

There's an App for That! Wolfram Alpha

I cannot begin to impress upon teachers the power new devices have in education. My latest favorites are iPod touch apps. I have found several that are powerful tools benefiting all learners of all levels.


The first app I am going to share is Wolfram Alpha. Wolfram Alpha is a powerful online computational knowledge engine. It is different from standard Search engines as it's "goal is to make all systematic knowledge immediately computable and accessible to everyone." This site generates output by doing computations from its own internal knowledge base, instead of searching the Web and returning links. The Web site by itself is amazing, but to then make it available as a mobile app....empowering! When referencing anytime, anywhere learning, this is the resource to have at your fingertips.


Watch the following video to get a better idea of the power of this tool.

Under a Worn Torn Sky Google Map

A sixth grade Language Arts class was assigned the book Under a Worn Torn Sky to read during their Social Studies study of World War II.

The novel is about a young man who becomes a pilot during the war. His plane is shot down behind enemy lines and the story progresses as he attempts to escape back to his home.

The students worked together in groups of three to create a Google Map of the main character's journey. They placed markers on each of the cities Henry traveled through and wrote summaries of the events and people he encountered in each of the escape locations.

Duel Grade Level Blogging

During the month of March both the sixth grade and eighth grade students were learning about the Holocaust and World War II.

The eighth grade students were assigned to read the story Anne Frank: Life in Hiding. They learned through literature what it was like for the Jews to hide in Germany during World War II when Hitler and the Nazi's were trying to establish a New Order.

The sixth grade students were learning about what life was like in America during World War II. They learned about the sacrifices that had to be made by everyone, including what life was like for children during that time.

An eighth grade class and a sixth grade class began blogging with each other about what they learned throughout their units. The eighth grade students took on an assigned role of one of the characters from the story. They summarized events that occurred in the story and shared what life was like in Amsterdam during World War II. The sixth grade students took on the role of a child in America during World War II.

Each class was paired with a student from a different grade level and they carried on a dialogue over a few days asking each other questions and composing posts that depicted what daily life was like. It was amazing to see the progression of the posts and the engagement of all students throughout the project.

Check out our blog: http://byrdhusky.21classes.com/

March Madness

This is one of my favorite times of year! The time of year when college basketball is coming to an end and the NCAA tournament fans take on their second job: backetology. The fans analyze the teams, look at records, scan for important player stats and create a bracket of winners and losers. Each person has their own method for picking the winners and this lead me to think, what if students were able to create a bracket of famous Americans in US History? How would students rank these Americans' influence in history and how would each historical figure "compete" to win the coveted title of Most Influential Person in US History II?




I created a bracket for students to use in Excel. They have to choose their "winners" and write an explanation defending their choices. There is no right or wrong answer, however just like in competitive games, defense wins. Without a strong defending argument, students will not win the bracket competition. Below are some pictures of the document students used.

The following link will take you to a site where you can download the file:

US History II: March Madness Bracket

World Languages and Technology

World Language teachers frequently look for technology tools to integrate in their curriculum. In preparing for an in-service with the teachers, I found a few web tools that students can use to demonstrate their understanding of a new language.
Xtranormal is my new favorite web resource. It is a text to movie application that is easy, fun and free. Users choose sets, characters, sounds and animations as they create movies in minutes. The advantage for world language teachers is the option of international voices. Students can practice typing conversations and see it come to "life".



Voki is another web resource that features speaking avatars. Users can create avatars with the text to speech option or by recording their own voices. Recording students speaking a new language provides feedback on pronunciation and voice inflection. It allows students to hear, for themselves, what they sound like. There are several characters to choose from. Voki's can be embedded into blogs, wikis and email messages, just to name a few.




Make Beliefs Comix is a Web site I came across as I was searching out new resources to use in education. Users are able to create their own comic strips, choosing from several characters and adding dialogue. Comics can be printed or emailed. World Language students are able to demonstrate their knowledge of the language through printed text.


Finally, Wordle is a Web resource teachers and students can use to create word clouds. The words with greater prominence appear larger in the cloud. Users can modify the font, layout and color schemes. World Language teachers have used this Web site to create verb conjugating word clouds. Students have to conjugate the verbs with the subjects provided to create meaningful sentences.