Education Blogs

Blogging or weblogging, internet sites is not only cutting-edge, but tech-savvy. What's neat about blogging is not only will you have a great collection of useful websites for you and your students, but your collection will be annotated with user-friendly comments. I encourage you to start your own blogs at http://new.blogger.com/. It's fast, easy, and fun. Plus, how cool is it to say "blog?"

If I could only join one professional association, hands-down, I would join the Association for Experiential Education or AEE. If you enjoy my teaching style, you'd enjoy being a member of AEE (and they offer student memberships, too!). Most of my "great" ideas come from AEE conferences, publications, and events. You can visit them at http://www.aee.org/ Just FYI, the upcoming regional conference is April 2-4, 2004 in Millersville, PA. If you have some extra spending money and want to get involved pre-April, you could attend the International Conference this November in Vancouver, Canada - yours truly is presenting. This association will change your life.

If you haven't visited my favorite charter school in the nation, please take a virtual field trip to CART http://www.cart.org./ CART, Center for Applied Research and Technology, is one of the most innovative, technology driven, charter schools in the country. This school wows me.

One of the neatest school reform programs currently underway comes from the adventure education organization Outward Bound. Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound (ELOB) combines traditional K-12 education with non-traditional Outward Bound practices. To learn more visit: http://outwardbound.com/explearning.html or visit ELOB directly at http://www.elob.org/

Lots of students have been asking about finding teaching jobs overseas. Although, there are many routes to finding teaching positions abroad, some educators find it beneficial to attend international teaching fairs. Generally, you have to be a certified teacher to attend the fairs and most fairs require a minimum of two years of teaching experience (a registration fee is also required).

Visit University of Northern Iowa's website to learn about one of the oldest international teaching fairs in the country: http://www.uni.edu/placemnt/overseas/osfair/fairoverview.html

International School Services also offers several job fairs annually: http://www.iss.edu/

From my experience, UNI's fair is well attended by Latin American schools and small schools throughout the Middle East and Asia. Whereas, ISS's fairs are well attended by the European schools.

If you are tired of creating your own rubrics or assessment tools, visit Rubistar. This is one of the most useful sites I frequent and it is partially sponsored by the US Department of Education.
http://rubistar.4teachers.org

I haven't visited this site in a while, but it used to be very helpful when I was in grad school. It is full of all sorts of great links on a huge variety of topics.
http://www.emtech.net

“A WebQuest is an inquiry-oriented activity in which most or all of the information used by learners is drawn from the Web.” Originally developed by Bernie Dodge and Tom March, WebQuests encourage students to think critically and use information efficiently. A good example of a WebQuest is
http://www.dmrtc.net/~embrys/aesindex.htm
To learn about WebQuests in general, visit
http://webquest.sdsu.edu/

You might want to infuse your instruction with a neat WebQuest assignment.

In the words of this award-winning, Blue Web’n website, “Filamentality is a fill-in-the-blank tool that guides you through picking a topic, searching the Web, gathering good Internet links, and turning them into learning activities. It combines the filament of the Web with a learner's mentality.” Though Filamentality showcases numerous tools and formats, three of the best tools to support reading in the content area include the Scrapbook, Hotlist, and Hunt features. Visit http://www.kn.pacbell.com/wired/fil/ to learn more.

Virtual Field Trips allow students to explore specific places or regions of the world while promoting reading and writing activities and skills. Examples of places include museums, laboratories, universities and libraries. Regions might include Southeast Asia, Washington, D.C., Paris, or Colorado. A good example of a virtual field trip combining both reading and writing skills is the Indian Peaks Virtual Field Trip at
http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/projects/virtdept/ipvft/start.html
Another example of a virtual field trip to the Beltsville Human Nutrition Research Center can be found at
http://www2.aacc.edu/nutrition/BHNRC%20feild%20trip.htm

Virtual Field Trips are a fabulous way to use the Internet instructionally.

Inspiration is a software program that supports visual learning for secondary students. Using Inspiration, students can diagram, web, map, and create graphical organizers to develop vocabulary skills, construct textual meaning, and/or assist the writing process. Inspiration offers free 30-day trials of this innovative and easy-to-use software package. Visit http://www.inspiration.com/index.cfm to download a free copy or call their 800 number to order a trial CD (1-800877-4292).

Students are typically asked to do research on the Internet using search engines and directories to find information. Often times, students use just one search engine or directory to find information on the topic. Most surprising is that the majority of students (and adults) do not understand the difference between search engines (like Google) and directories (like Yahooligans) – as both can give either extremely similar or different results. Just for fun: Run a search on yahoo.com for “best high schools.” Now, run the same search on dogpile.com for “best high schools.” What are the similarities and differences between Yahoo’s and Dogpile’s results? Do you prefer one result listing versus another? Try running the same topic in altavista.com. How do the three compare?

Article explaining the difference between search engines and directories
http://searchenginewatch.com/webmasters/article.php/2168031

Article detailing major search engines and directories
http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156221

Article detailing news search engines and directories
http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156261

Article highlighting search sites specifically for kids
http://searchenginewatch.com/links/article.php/2156191