Primary Source Websites

The first website I chose was From Revolution to Reconstruction, which has primary source documents from the 1400's to present day in the United States. It is a great resource for students and teachers for research and projects.

The second website I chose was Eyewitness to History, which is a site that encompasses Ancient World to World War history. It has primary source documents embedded in it's kid-friendly text. This is another excellent research website for students and resource for teachers.

The third website I found was OurDocuments.gov, which is an amazing United States primary source, digital archive system containing documents like the Constitution and Declaration of Independence. It is wonderful for all ages and is very professional!!!

The last website I found was Archiving Early America, which is another great website for primary source documents from the 1400's to the World Wars. This is a great site for upper elementary students and teachers.

Science and Math Websites

Science:
First and foremost, my favorite science website of all time is Bill Nye the Science Guy! With little video clips and at-home science labs and experiments, this is a fun and interesting sites that kids will absolutely love!

The second website I chose was How Stuff Works. It is VERY thorough, including topics from the human body to volcanoes and vehicles! It is a great site for students because it has kid-friendly language and lots of pictures and graphs to help convey the data.

The third website is The Yuckiest Site on the Internet! It is a fun, interesting site for kids because it has a grossology approach to science, ranging from the body to experiments. It would be a great resource for kids for self-exploration!

The last science website I chose was ScienceWorld. It has programs that you can enroll students in for real life experiences in the classroom, however, it also has great resources online for students regarding science. It is a great place for teachers to share information with students as a guided assignment.

Math:
The first site I chose was Wolfram's MathWorld, which is a great place for virtual manipulatives and practice. This is an amazing resource for at-home and in-school practice, as well as for whole group math lessons!

The second site I chose was Primary Games. It is an excellent website for math games. Students will never know they are really learning from this website, since all the games are a BLAST!

The third website I chose was FunBrain.com. This is a great website for short and sweet lessons, but also has fun activities and games for students in the area of math. This is a great, kid-friendly site for all ages!

The last math website I chose was CoolMath. It has virtual flashcards, which would be great for small groups in school or for homework. It also has great games and activities for students of all ages.

PE/Health Technology Lesson

For my lesson, I would have students go to the www.kidshealth.com website and read about nutrition. The students can look at the food pyramid and would create their own version of the food pyramid on Kidspiration, by cutting and pasting pictures of different foods under different categories, like a picture of a loaf of bread under the bread and grains section. I then would have students go to the BAM! website and watch several of the nutrition videos about healthy eating and exercise. They can then create a meal plan on Excel to accompany their food pyramid and can share it with small groups.

Health/PE and Art/Music Websites

Health:
The first website, entitled kidshealth.com, I found months ago when I was finding websites for my students to use. It just so happened to be a part of our homework assignment for the book! It is an amazing resource because it has kid-friendly language, games and lessons around health. It is also a great resource for parents and educators, to learn how to teach and implement health, as well as teach about tough subjects like death and serious illness.

The second website is BAM (for Body and Mind), which is ran by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is a great resource because it is a fun website for kids to use on their own. It has a comic-style with cool videos and games that teach about health. I can't think of a kid who wouldn't like this site!

Physical Education:
The first website called Get Active Stay Active is an amazing resource for PE because it allows students to create a workout schedule and eating plan, as well as being able to record their progress. This is important because students can do this at home or during school, so long as the student has Internet access.

The second website, kidnetic.com, is an online exercise and nutrition site for students. It has a workout video creator, where students can make up moves and then play them and do them with the video, as well as recipes and guides to healthy eating. This is a fun, interactive site for movement!

Art:
The first website is Crayola.com, which is a great resource for kids, parents, and teachers. It has thousands of lesson plans, online resources for students and great for at home art without a mess!

The second website, the National Gallery of Art for Kids, is an amazing site for students to learn about art, galleries, and creativity. The students can view art done by professionals as well as students, as well as making their own art in the Art Zone!

Music:
The first website is KidsRock.org, which is a site that kids can write their own songs and music! It is a great resource for students to play and explore on, but also for teachers to teach about rhythm, song writing, and performance!

The second website, entitled Kaboose, which is a music game resource, teaching students about sound, instruments, rhythm and other music topics. It is tons of fun and very interactive. You might want headphones for students for this site!

Social Studies and Reading Websites

Social Studies:
The first website I selected for students is Kidport.com, which is a site that has resources for all subjects, but has excellent resources for students in Social Studies. The nice thing about this website is that it breaks down resources by grade level for easy access to what you are looking for.
The second website is the White House website. It is a good site for any age, providing kid-friendly information about presidency and the White House.
The third website is "Explore the States" by the America's Library. It is an AMAZING resource for all ages to learn about the United States as a whole and as individual states.
The fourth website is World Almanac for Kids, which is a comprehensive website looking at many facets of the world, like US presidents, population, geography, and other things. I would use this for teaching about presidents and many other social studies topics. A GREAT SITE!

Reading:
Starfall.com is an awesome student, teacher and parent website to learn, teach and support reading. It has printable resources for teachers with lesson plans, e-books for students, and activities for literacy for at home learning and support.
The second website is PBS.org, which is a website with all kinds of resources themed around popular PBS television shows for kids. It is very motivating for our television-watching kids and has great activities.
The third website is Scholastic for Kids, which has awesome resources for students, teachers and parents around reading. It is a great site for students to use on their own or for teachers to teach with.
The fourth website is ReadWriteThink.org, which focuses on language arts in general, but has excellent reading resources for students and teachers.

A Math Lesson: Incorporating Technology for Kindergarten

I actually did this lesson in my kindergarten classroom with kids around patterns and shapes. I first used the "color patterns" game at the National Library of Virtual Manipulatives website on our SMARTboard, teaching it as a whole class. First kids learned how to pattern using familiar colors using A B A B and A B B A B B patterns, continuing to get more and more difficult as the pages progressed. After using this site for a few days, we switched to allowing them to create patterns of their own using the pattern block virtual manipulatives at the arcytech.org website. This was a "blank slate" for kids to work independently to create patterns on their laptops. They then could print one of their favorite patterns to take home to show mom and dad. Overall, it was an AWESOME lesson and worked very well for kindergarteners since it was very hands-on, visually stimulating, and interactive. To see the websites I used, go to the Math Lesson section along the left side of this page.

Internet Safety Websites

Website one is entitled Safe Kids, which is a family-oriented website focused on teaching children and parents about online safety. This site provides up-to-date articles and topics for parents to educate themselves and their children about how to use the Internet safely.

Website two, Net Smartz, is a site that has resources for all ages, from elementary students to adults and professionals. The nice thing about this site is it has bilingual resources and information. It also is extremely organized and friendly for students to use on their own.

Website three is entitled Wired Kids, which is an organization focused at younger students to teach about online safety, as well as ethical and moral usage of the Internet. This site would be excellent for students to use on their own, as well as a resource for parents to explain proper use of the Internet to their kids in kid-friendly words.

Website four, from the I Keep Safe Coalition, is a fun, organized and informational website for students, parents, and educators to keep on top of current Internet issues to keep themselves safe online. It is a great resource for students as well as for parents to keep educated on current issues. It has great video clips and songs for kids to remember safety tips too...

Websites for Students in Constructivist Classrooms

All four of these websites were featured in Moving Towards Constructivist Classrooms, created in 2001 from a graduate student, Themla Cey, at University of Saskatchewan. This website entailed what Constructivism is and how to teach and learn in this way.

Website one is entitled Kid's Web, which is a digital K-12 library, is a site where students can do their own reading and research. I found it a great resource for all students looking to do research OR to read on their own all kinds of books.

Website two is entitled Exploratorium, which is an exploratory website for students to do research and ponder all kinds of questions and topics. It is almost blog-like, since kids can contribute to topics. It seems like a great resource for students in secondary elementary and above looking to do open-ended projects and research.

Website three is entitled BrainPop, which is an online resource for students in multiple areas of study, such as social studies or science, for example. Students can do all sorts of activities from this site ALL ON THEIR OWN. Very fun, interactive and attractive to the eyes!

Website four is entitled National Geographic for Kids, which is an online magazine resource for students to explore about the world and what inhabits it. It is an AMAZING resource for kids of all ages.

Digital Books for Children

I found four websites that have online, digital books for students and teachers.

Website one: The International Children's Digital Library is an amazing resource for teachers and students to listen to, read or watch thousands of different books from their home or school computer. The neat thing about this site is that it has books from all over the world, meaning there are many books in many other languages.

Website two: The Digital Librarian is a site that has links for about 50 external websites that offer digital books and literature for children. Ranging from fables to poetry, it has a wide array of options for any teacher in the classroom.

Website three: Tumblebook.com is an online e-book library for children, with a large number of very popular children books titles. The site is easy to navigate and even students with a low level of skills could listen to a book on this site!

Website four: This website from the Online Learning Centre explains how to create an e-book with your young students. I thought this would be a good addition to my 4 websites because it gives steps and great ideas on how to use it.