Volume 5, No.4
16 September, 2005
[To view this newsletter on line:
http://www.emck.net/eline/05_09_16.htm]
|
 The
E-Line welcomes its latest subscribers from...
- Union County High School (Union Co.)
- Education Department, Georgetown
College
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|
Elementary Math Contest:
Here's an update from the last edition of
The
 E-Line,
"Students compete, they win!" We'd passed over First in Math (http://www.firstinmath.com/)
due to its commercial nature, but, apparently, local McDonald's
Restaurants have been sponsoring school participation for several
years. According to Fayette County's Natalee Feese, "...Kids compete [with]themselves;...It
is a secure website and no one tries to sell students anything..."
Check with a McDonald's near you! (Thanks, Natalee!) |
Katrina
We would be sorely negligent if we were to avoid this incredible cataclysm.
For extremely current events such as this, check into the
New York Times Learning Network
(reviewed in our June 27,
2003 edition) and other periodicals, for instructional support materials.
The embattled Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA -
http://www.fema.gov) has a variety of
resources aimed at young people - see our review below.
 Many
schools have already implemented fundraising events for the victims of the
storm, and we have not attempted to add anything further to that. We provide only this resource -
FBI warns about fake Katrina charity Web sites - a
 story
published on-line by Reuters on what to look for, and what to
avoid, in
locating appropriate charities for this sort of thing. As is frequently the
case, giving money to the banner relief organizations - in particular, the
American Red Cross (http://www.redcross.org/)
- is usually the best. |
| On-line
Resources |
 Teachers
Domain
http://www.teachersdomain.org/
This offering from public television station WBSH/Boston
is a collection of online-delivered videos and other media, in a
browseable and searchable format. The content is mostly short
QuickTime movies, though there is interactive Flash content, and other
formats as well. They are not downloadable, but the file sizes are
small enough to be useable in "real time" in your classroom.
Registration is required, but is free, and you can be confident that WBSH will not sell its mailing lists! |
| Content Area
Resources |
|
Health/ Practical Living, Science |
 FEMA
for Kids
http://www.fema.gov/kids/
Not surprisingly, this part
of the FEMA site hasn't been updated to reflect the latest events.
However, there are resources and activities aimed at a young
audience (elementary, mostly) on a variety of related topics.
There's a listing of all the hurricane names selected through 2007,
plus how they're chosen. The site has lesson plans, and links to
external resources written with kids and disasters in mind.
|
| Mathematics |
 Absurd
Math
http://www.learningwave.com/abmath/ This
site is a series of problem-solving games, embedded in pre-algebra
content It's designed by Tower23's
Michael Cain, and offered by Human
Relations Media's
LearningWave as a free come-on to the site's more extensive middle
school content cluster. Unfortunately, the site does not include any
specific teaching resources connected to the games, so you'll have to
take a stroll through them to see where they fit. It also includes a
game aimed at algebra and geometry called
Challenge
of the 7 Cups [suggested by Leanna Prater]. |
| Reading |
 The
Partnership for Reading
http://www.nifl.gov/partnershipforreading/
There aren't any lesson plans, or obvious collections of
materials here. This site, a collaboration between the National
Institute for Literacy, National Institute of Child Health and Human
Development, and the US Department of Education, is an attempt to give a
survey of current research on early reading programs, strategies, and
theories. The site is aimed at teachers, and there is a searchable and
browseable database of article reviews. Start with the excellent article
by Paula and Keith Stanovich entitled
Using Research and Reason in Education. The only downside is an
annoying request for participation in a survey after each return to the
site's home page. |
| Social
Studies |
 National
Underground Railroad Freedom Center
http://www.freedomcenter.org/
This Cincinnati museum offers a lot of resources, but
most of them are in print form and not offered online. There are
a few lesson plans offered for several grade levels as simple
webpage resources, including the excellent 7-12
Contemporary Slavery, a Global Crisis. The center also offers
several interactive Freedom Quests online, for grades 5-12.
|
|
Writing |
The Laws of Life
http://www.lawsoflife.org/
This website supports community-based writing contests
with an ethical objective: "...You are only as good as your word.
Honesty is the best policy. To have a friend, be one. The Laws of
Life are the core values that we take with us wherever we go and
whatever we do. The Laws of Life Essay Contest challenges young
people of all ages to discover for themselves the values that will
guide them throughout life..." Sponsored by The John Templeton
Foundation, the site provides a wide range of materials in support
of local contests (there is no national one), and the site enjoys
the endorsement of the national School Board Association, and the
National Association of Secondary School Principals. |
|
|
Grants |
 Lemelson-MIT
InvenTeams
http://web.mit.edu/inventeams/
This initiative of the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, in partnership with the Lemelson foundation, provides up to
$10,000 grants to teams of students, teachers, and community partners in
support of new inventions. The initiative is not a competition,
though the grant application process is. Applications are taken in the
spring, with awards announced in the fall. Application materials are
avaible for 2006 on the website. |
| Professional
Resources |
 Bare
Bones 101 - A Basic Tutorial and Searching the Web
http://www.sc.edu/beaufort/library/pages/bones/bones.shtml
"...So, you're still getting those 1,670,000+ responses
to your search queries on the Web, and you're still too busy to do
anything about it, like reading the lengthy, and sometimes confusing,
"help" screens to find out how to improve your searching techniques.
Look no further! Real help is here, in the USCB Library's BARE BONES
Tutorial..." This short, sweet, to-the-point tutorial on using Google or
other search engines effectively is provided by the University of South
Carolina/Beaufort Library [suggested by Denise Jones]. |
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