I was introduced to this video on the Learning 2.0 blog and thought I would share it here. So true and so funny, and very interesting.
Friday, December 17, 2010
10 Resources for Teaching Geography with Technology
I minored in geography in college, as my original goal was to be a meteorologist and chase tornadoes in Oklahoma. The geography resources available now, are nothing in comparison to what is available to students today. I have a passion for geography, always liked maps and learning about countries. Not sure where it came from, but it helped guide me towards teaching social studies. Here are some tips that I have for teaching Geography with technology.
1.) Google Earth is by far the best tool to explore the continents, countries, cities, and oceans. I am a huge fan of Google Earth and it is only getting better. One way to use Google Earth is to zoom into a location in the world. Zoom in really close. Then have students ask yes or no questions. Every question that gets a yes, you zoom out just a little bit. This is a great method to teach kids Absolute and Relative location. Google just released version 6, so I suggest downloading it. If your district blocks access to it, create a list of ways you plan to use it and submit it showing it as a powerful education tool. If you need help with Google Earth, check out the following resource. Other Resources include: How to Teach With Google Earth, and Google Earth Lessons,.and Google Earth for Educators: 50 Exciting Ideas for the Classroom. If you don't want to use Google Earth for the activity you might also be interested in using MapCrunch which is a random Google Street View location.
2.) Use Google Maps to "Trek" across places in the world. I wrote a post about this earlier, and I will just share it again. This is a great way to teach the movement and places themes.
3.) Climate is something that is part of geography at the high school level. One way to teach change in climate is have students set-up a webcam either at home or at school when a storm is supposed to be coming. Set the camera to take pictures at a certain interval of time. Use Time Lapse Creator to show change over time for climate in your hometown as the storm system comes through. The site has a great example. Students can then discuss local climate change. You could then take this into a discussion about Human-Environment Interaction.
4.) If It Were My Home is a great site for students to understand the themes of Place and Region. It allows you to compare sizes of several countries and natural disasters to your home town. Students have a hard time grasping the actual size of countries, so if you can put it over your home town, they will better understand is size.
5.) Maps are a great tool, and over the past five years, there has been a huge increase in map based resources. Coloring maps is so 2008. Students in geography should be studying the impact of humans on nature and the impact humans have on each other. TargetMap is a site that allows users to create their own maps with data sets they can determine based on research. When students are done with the maps, they can then submit them to the teacher to be graded. This site can help cover all 5 themes of Geography.
6.) Another Map tool is ShowWorld. As mentioned above, students have a hard time grasping size and data. ShowWorld helps compare countries based on certain data and then alters their physical size compared to the data selected. You can choose between 5 different categories, which then breaks down into sub-categories, which then provides options for different data sets. A great tool for teaching the five themes of Geography. Each map provides information as well in terms of ranking and numerical data.
7.) Atlas of the Biosphere is a site that presents maps from each continent based on 4 areas - Human Impacts, Land Use, Ecosystems, and Water Resources. Each of the 4 areas is then broken down into specific data (Infant Mortality Rate, Life Expectancy, etc). There are also schematics available that show processes in motion, like the Hydrologic cycle.
8.) Country Studies is a "website contains the on-line versions of books previously published in hard copy by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress as part of the Country Studies/Area Handbook Series sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Army between 1986 and 1998. Each study offers a comprehensive description and analysis of the country or region's historical setting, geography, society, economy, political system, and foreign policy." Another great option is Atlapedia. Students doing a country project? Maybe using Glogster or Prezi, or a Digital Story Telling Tool? This would be a great start.
9.) Scribble Maps is a site that allows you to digitally write on top of Google Maps. This would be a great site to use to teach about different countries or aspects of the earth (Longitude and Latitude, rivers, borders, etc) because you would be able to draw and highlight specific lines for students to see. Each STRAIGHT line you draw gives you a distance and latitude and longitude point. You also get all the regular features of Google Maps.
10.) A couple of tools to use in the classroom with your students is the Map Maker where students can decide what goes on a map in terms of borders, cities, and categories of data. This would be a great tool to use in the classroom as an introduction to a lesson. Another great website is Gapminder, which allows students to see data change over time in relation to statistics, like World Population. You can pause the interactive to discuss why the data changes (World events like WWII). To see it in action, watch the great video below.
In the coming weeks and month(s) I will be doing similar posts for Economics, Government, U.S. History, World History, Reading, Writing, Spelling, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Earth-Space Science, Algebra, Geometry, and Health and P.E. So Stay Tuned!
1.) Google Earth is by far the best tool to explore the continents, countries, cities, and oceans. I am a huge fan of Google Earth and it is only getting better. One way to use Google Earth is to zoom into a location in the world. Zoom in really close. Then have students ask yes or no questions. Every question that gets a yes, you zoom out just a little bit. This is a great method to teach kids Absolute and Relative location. Google just released version 6, so I suggest downloading it. If your district blocks access to it, create a list of ways you plan to use it and submit it showing it as a powerful education tool. If you need help with Google Earth, check out the following resource. Other Resources include: How to Teach With Google Earth, and Google Earth Lessons,.and Google Earth for Educators: 50 Exciting Ideas for the Classroom. If you don't want to use Google Earth for the activity you might also be interested in using MapCrunch which is a random Google Street View location.
2.) Use Google Maps to "Trek" across places in the world. I wrote a post about this earlier, and I will just share it again. This is a great way to teach the movement and places themes.
3.) Climate is something that is part of geography at the high school level. One way to teach change in climate is have students set-up a webcam either at home or at school when a storm is supposed to be coming. Set the camera to take pictures at a certain interval of time. Use Time Lapse Creator to show change over time for climate in your hometown as the storm system comes through. The site has a great example. Students can then discuss local climate change. You could then take this into a discussion about Human-Environment Interaction.
4.) If It Were My Home is a great site for students to understand the themes of Place and Region. It allows you to compare sizes of several countries and natural disasters to your home town. Students have a hard time grasping the actual size of countries, so if you can put it over your home town, they will better understand is size.
5.) Maps are a great tool, and over the past five years, there has been a huge increase in map based resources. Coloring maps is so 2008. Students in geography should be studying the impact of humans on nature and the impact humans have on each other. TargetMap is a site that allows users to create their own maps with data sets they can determine based on research. When students are done with the maps, they can then submit them to the teacher to be graded. This site can help cover all 5 themes of Geography.
6.) Another Map tool is ShowWorld. As mentioned above, students have a hard time grasping size and data. ShowWorld helps compare countries based on certain data and then alters their physical size compared to the data selected. You can choose between 5 different categories, which then breaks down into sub-categories, which then provides options for different data sets. A great tool for teaching the five themes of Geography. Each map provides information as well in terms of ranking and numerical data.
7.) Atlas of the Biosphere is a site that presents maps from each continent based on 4 areas - Human Impacts, Land Use, Ecosystems, and Water Resources. Each of the 4 areas is then broken down into specific data (Infant Mortality Rate, Life Expectancy, etc). There are also schematics available that show processes in motion, like the Hydrologic cycle.
8.) Country Studies is a "website contains the on-line versions of books previously published in hard copy by the Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress as part of the Country Studies/Area Handbook Series sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Army between 1986 and 1998. Each study offers a comprehensive description and analysis of the country or region's historical setting, geography, society, economy, political system, and foreign policy." Another great option is Atlapedia. Students doing a country project? Maybe using Glogster or Prezi, or a Digital Story Telling Tool? This would be a great start.
9.) Scribble Maps is a site that allows you to digitally write on top of Google Maps. This would be a great site to use to teach about different countries or aspects of the earth (Longitude and Latitude, rivers, borders, etc) because you would be able to draw and highlight specific lines for students to see. Each STRAIGHT line you draw gives you a distance and latitude and longitude point. You also get all the regular features of Google Maps.
10.) A couple of tools to use in the classroom with your students is the Map Maker where students can decide what goes on a map in terms of borders, cities, and categories of data. This would be a great tool to use in the classroom as an introduction to a lesson. Another great website is Gapminder, which allows students to see data change over time in relation to statistics, like World Population. You can pause the interactive to discuss why the data changes (World events like WWII). To see it in action, watch the great video below.
In the coming weeks and month(s) I will be doing similar posts for Economics, Government, U.S. History, World History, Reading, Writing, Spelling, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Earth-Space Science, Algebra, Geometry, and Health and P.E. So Stay Tuned!
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Who Says a Snow Day Means Not Having Class??
Just because the weather outside is frightful does not mean that education can't still be delightful. The age of 21st Century education and learning allows education to continue even when school is closed. How might you ask? Well, here are just some ideas to get your mind flowing...especially those teachers who have AP kids and are on a strict schedule.
With it being winter for the majority of the United States and talks of snow days and snow storms, I thought this would be an appropriate post for today.
1.) If you have a Facebook page, you can still "hand-out" assignments to your students via Facebook, and they could still "hand them in" by attaching in a message or providing a link.
2.) If you have a Classroom Twitter account, you could still share assignments and links to readings for students to complete over the snow day.
3.) Want to teach from your computer, use a site like Join.me and share your screen with your students. Be an easy way to explain math problems in a step by step process or share a document they don't have access to.
4.) Upload a PowerPoint to Slideshare or add the slides to a Prezi so that students have access to notes and a lesson if needed for a quiz or test when they get back to school.
5.) Use TitanPad or TodaysMeet and have a backchannel chat with your students over a topic you are discussing in class.
6.) Use the site JustPaste.it to share a Word document that you want students to use or answer questions. I always made any worksheets using Word, and with this site you have the ability to upload the Word Document and it will maintain the formatting. You can then create a URL to share with students.
7.) Use your email and send students a text message to their phones to let them know you have a new assignment/project posted to your website. See my blog post about sending text messages from email.
8.) Embed a video from YouTube or link to an article and have students use a site like Wallwisher to discuss the video. Or have them type a response in JustPaste.it and share the URL. Make sure to approve messages first before posting!
9.) Plan ahead, have students know that they will always have a free writing assignment to do. Provide them a list and tell them to choose a topic each snow day, or designate numerical order for each snow day.
10.) Math teachers, use Twiddla and plan a time to meet with students online to go over math assignments, problems, homework, etc.
I always hear teachers say that kids think because they have a snow day that work assigned before the snow days is not due when they come back to school. If you set the expectation that work is to continue over snow days, then the problem will take care of itself. If students know that they will still have work over snow days, then it will definitely take care of itself.
If you have students that don't have access to the Internet, then you can ignore these. This is just something for us all to think about. How is the landscape of education changing? Because this was never a possibility just FIVE years ago.
With it being winter for the majority of the United States and talks of snow days and snow storms, I thought this would be an appropriate post for today.
1.) If you have a Facebook page, you can still "hand-out" assignments to your students via Facebook, and they could still "hand them in" by attaching in a message or providing a link.
2.) If you have a Classroom Twitter account, you could still share assignments and links to readings for students to complete over the snow day.
3.) Want to teach from your computer, use a site like Join.me and share your screen with your students. Be an easy way to explain math problems in a step by step process or share a document they don't have access to.
4.) Upload a PowerPoint to Slideshare or add the slides to a Prezi so that students have access to notes and a lesson if needed for a quiz or test when they get back to school.
5.) Use TitanPad or TodaysMeet and have a backchannel chat with your students over a topic you are discussing in class.
6.) Use the site JustPaste.it to share a Word document that you want students to use or answer questions. I always made any worksheets using Word, and with this site you have the ability to upload the Word Document and it will maintain the formatting. You can then create a URL to share with students.
7.) Use your email and send students a text message to their phones to let them know you have a new assignment/project posted to your website. See my blog post about sending text messages from email.
8.) Embed a video from YouTube or link to an article and have students use a site like Wallwisher to discuss the video. Or have them type a response in JustPaste.it and share the URL. Make sure to approve messages first before posting!
9.) Plan ahead, have students know that they will always have a free writing assignment to do. Provide them a list and tell them to choose a topic each snow day, or designate numerical order for each snow day.
10.) Math teachers, use Twiddla and plan a time to meet with students online to go over math assignments, problems, homework, etc.
I always hear teachers say that kids think because they have a snow day that work assigned before the snow days is not due when they come back to school. If you set the expectation that work is to continue over snow days, then the problem will take care of itself. If students know that they will still have work over snow days, then it will definitely take care of itself.
If you have students that don't have access to the Internet, then you can ignore these. This is just something for us all to think about. How is the landscape of education changing? Because this was never a possibility just FIVE years ago.
10 Tips/Ways for Using Twitter in the Classroom
Twitter has become a valuable tool for educators who are wanting to network with other educators. Many other teachers have realized that Twitter can be a valuable education tool and communication tool to use with their students. Some teachers have been using it for a while and have a great handle on how to use it. Others are new to implementation and might want some further ideas for how to use it in the classroom. Hopefully these tips can help provide some guidance.
1.) The initial trouble is getting students and parents signed up. They are the Facebook Generation. Several teachers I work with have offered extra credit/bonus points on a test for creating an account and then contacting their teacher. This has been rather successful for those teachers. Create some kind of form to send home to parents explaining the procedures and purpose and have students bring it back in with their username and parents usernames.
2.) Create a classroom hashtag. Make it something simple like #mzush10 (Mr. Zimmer U.S. History 2010). Have students search and follow the hashtag and that is an easy way for students to follow what you share. You can search for hashtags using the following directory to make sure that you don't have any that conflict with other hashtags.
3.) Make your classroom Twitter account the only place that you provide extra credit. This way when a student needs some, they know that is where you will provide it. You can post assignments on an alternate website and have students visit it to complete the work. When students complete it, have them reply to you so that you can expect it.
4.) Organize students into list. If you have multiple classes, this is a great way to track students on Twitter. You can create lists of students organized by class period, grade level, etc. This way it is easy to track what they are doing, saying, and working on as it relates to their Twitter account.
5.) Once you have developed a PLN, I recommend using them to your advantage. I highly suggest using them for taking polls, teaching geography, or getting opinions. If other students from other schools are on Twitter, you could have a Twitter Chat and create a hashtag for them to all participate. Use Tweetdeck to track the conversation. The Teach Paperless Blog has a GREAT example of this.
6.) Posting reminders and homework assignments to the Twitter account is a great way to get students to create an account and use it beneficially. You might even make Twitter the only time you will share the homework assignment. This way they have to check it in order to know their homework, and it is something that you can do at the end of the class period or day. It is such a simple task because it is only 140 characters long!
7.) Have a 140 Character reflection with your students. Provide a link to a video, article, or news story. Have kids provide their thoughts in 140 characters. You might even create a separate hashtag for such an assignment. This can provide students with an easy way to follow the assignment. The next day in class you can then display the discussion and talk further about it, possibly even highlight specific student repsonses.
8.) Exit Slips are a a growing method of assessment. Twitter would be a valuable asset to asses student learning by using it as a form of an exit slip. When students leave, you can delete the previous classes responses, or ask a different question. This way you have a log of the exit slips responses, and they can even be your bell ringers for the following morning.
9.) Connecting with professionals is a great way to utilize the power of Twitter. Have students connect with NASA scientists, authors (100 Best Authors on Twitter and Directory of Authors on Twitter), politicians, the President, companies (Google, History Channel, etc), and Mathematicians.
10.) Backchannel is another valuable way to use Twitter. Whether you are using it in class with students, or at home while watching the news, documentary, television show, or movie, you can create a backchannel for students to have a discussion. Once again, you can create a hashtag for that specific discussion. I like this as an option because it is easier to track specific students unlike other backchannel sites where students can make up any name.
There are several lists out there for ways to use Twitter. These are some of my personal favorites. What are some of yours?
1.) The initial trouble is getting students and parents signed up. They are the Facebook Generation. Several teachers I work with have offered extra credit/bonus points on a test for creating an account and then contacting their teacher. This has been rather successful for those teachers. Create some kind of form to send home to parents explaining the procedures and purpose and have students bring it back in with their username and parents usernames.
2.) Create a classroom hashtag. Make it something simple like #mzush10 (Mr. Zimmer U.S. History 2010). Have students search and follow the hashtag and that is an easy way for students to follow what you share. You can search for hashtags using the following directory to make sure that you don't have any that conflict with other hashtags.
3.) Make your classroom Twitter account the only place that you provide extra credit. This way when a student needs some, they know that is where you will provide it. You can post assignments on an alternate website and have students visit it to complete the work. When students complete it, have them reply to you so that you can expect it.
4.) Organize students into list. If you have multiple classes, this is a great way to track students on Twitter. You can create lists of students organized by class period, grade level, etc. This way it is easy to track what they are doing, saying, and working on as it relates to their Twitter account.
5.) Once you have developed a PLN, I recommend using them to your advantage. I highly suggest using them for taking polls, teaching geography, or getting opinions. If other students from other schools are on Twitter, you could have a Twitter Chat and create a hashtag for them to all participate. Use Tweetdeck to track the conversation. The Teach Paperless Blog has a GREAT example of this.
6.) Posting reminders and homework assignments to the Twitter account is a great way to get students to create an account and use it beneficially. You might even make Twitter the only time you will share the homework assignment. This way they have to check it in order to know their homework, and it is something that you can do at the end of the class period or day. It is such a simple task because it is only 140 characters long!
7.) Have a 140 Character reflection with your students. Provide a link to a video, article, or news story. Have kids provide their thoughts in 140 characters. You might even create a separate hashtag for such an assignment. This can provide students with an easy way to follow the assignment. The next day in class you can then display the discussion and talk further about it, possibly even highlight specific student repsonses.
8.) Exit Slips are a a growing method of assessment. Twitter would be a valuable asset to asses student learning by using it as a form of an exit slip. When students leave, you can delete the previous classes responses, or ask a different question. This way you have a log of the exit slips responses, and they can even be your bell ringers for the following morning.
9.) Connecting with professionals is a great way to utilize the power of Twitter. Have students connect with NASA scientists, authors (100 Best Authors on Twitter and Directory of Authors on Twitter), politicians, the President, companies (Google, History Channel, etc), and Mathematicians.
10.) Backchannel is another valuable way to use Twitter. Whether you are using it in class with students, or at home while watching the news, documentary, television show, or movie, you can create a backchannel for students to have a discussion. Once again, you can create a hashtag for that specific discussion. I like this as an option because it is easier to track specific students unlike other backchannel sites where students can make up any name.
There are several lists out there for ways to use Twitter. These are some of my personal favorites. What are some of yours?
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