8.++3+Helpful+Websites

== Submit your THREE examples of helpful websites here. ==

So, each of you should have THREE total postings.
Steve Cavaligos - PBS Teachers http://www.pbs.org/teachers/ The Public Broadcasting Service is an organization at the fore front of education. Their website is no exception. The “teachers” section of the PBS website offers many resources for teachers in all subject matters and ranging from grades K-12. The main focus of PBS is obviously for teachers who want to integrate more technology and media into their classroom by providing a database of educational videos organized by specific subjects and events. They also offer sample lesson plans in the same database and publish recent news in their PBS teacher’s newsletter. If you sign join PBS teachers you can also customize your resource webpage according to subject matter, areas of interest and the grade levels you teach. For enrichment outside of your classroom there are also Professional Development Courses offered through the website.

Steve Cavaligos – Teacher Vision http://www.teachervision.fen.com/ Teacher Vision is simply a world of resources available for K-12 teachers online. It does however cost roughly $40 for an annual subscription but you can use a free 7 day trial to see if it is something you would be interested in or just sign up to receive their free newsletter. Some of the resources offered at this Family Education Network website include printable lesson plans, quizzes, organizers, and classroom management advice. However, there are also fire prevention and school safety tips. Resources for outside of the classroom include listing for online courses even though they aren’t hosted by this website like PBS and other quirky articles like money saving tips for teachers who need to stretch their salaries during the summer. Again I don’t recommend printing off the quizzes and handing them to your classes or using their lesson plans exactly as they come but instead using their printable material as a tool to help you while making the necessary adjustments to fit your school’s curriculum requirements.

Bonnie Breckenridge- Illinois State Board of Education [|Illinois State Board of Education] [|www.isbe.state.il.us] The Illinois State Board of Education is a great website of resources that anyone can access. This website gives teachers opportunities to find jobs, read about state requirements, blog with other educators, read announcements, and even information about standardized tests. This website is designed to be your one stop shop for information in Illinois about our school districts, mission statements requirements, and standards. . If you have questions, concerns, or even comments you may do so at this website. Every state has different requirements so this informs the out of state/country our state policies on education.

Laurie Peterson - The Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling [|http://digitalstorytelling.coe.uh.edu] University  of Houston ’s, The Educational Uses of Digital Storytelling website, provides educators with proof positive that digital storytelling is useful across all disciplines. Questions about how to create digital stories, digital storytelling software applications,, how and where to post stories, tutorials, articles detailing the latest research on the educational uses of digital storytelling media and provides rubrics for the proper evaluation of student projects. This website is highly recommended for educators who are not yet sold on the educational usefulness of digital storytelling. All of the example digital stories are ready for use as examples of how students can utilize the media or, examples can be used to help teach and supplement current lesson plans.

Laurie Peterson - School Change and Block Scheduling Models http://www.middleweb.com/Fritsche1.html School Change and Block Scheduling at Fritsche Middle School is an extremely helpful website for those teachers who are looking to introduce a unique educational delivery system to their administrative boards. This website offers an in-depth look at Fritsche Middle School, a Milwaukee Public School, where school changes like block scheduling have been in use for over ten years. The site offers statistics illustrating how block scheduling produced reduction in disciplinary actions, fewer suspensions, fewer fights, increased GPAs, increased numbers of honor role students among other productive changes. Step by step tips for how schools can create their own block schedule models are clear and concise.

Laurie Peterson - ERIC Digest and Culturally Responsive Instruction [|http://www.ericdigests.org/2005-1/teaching.htm] This site offers teachers, and the broad educational community, a way to search the ERIC Digest, which are short reports of current and critical interest. Teachers can conduct a search on any educational topic, read an overview of the topic and view reference items for more detailed information. The link above links teachers to information on Cultural Responsive Teaching for American Indian students. Resources for library instruction are provided to the left of every digest report, which will aid teachers in communicating with school librarians more effectively and definitely assist those teachers who do not have a full-time school librarian.

Ness Garland-Teachers Continuing Education Units http://www.teacherscontinuingeducationunits.com/ I feel like the learning process is one that never ends, because of the constant growing of technology and changes within our economy. As teachers keeping up on our learning process is something that is critical to our career and the future of our students. So this web site is one that will guide and supple teachers with available work shops and other resources needed in order to future their education. On this wed site you will fine educational resources, certification resources, online class that can be taken, available conferences, and you can even look at the latest news in education.

Ness Garlands- TeachAde the online community for teachers http://www.teachade.com/HelpfulTeacherSites.do As we have learned a important key to remember in helping teachers make it through their career’s is being able to communicate with other teachers. On this web site your able to share your experiences ask for advice, and just are able to relate with other teachers from across the country. In order to access all the benefits of the web site you do have to be a member which is a quick process. I think this is a web site that can be a very good tool to use through out a teaching career because you can reach out to so many teachers and administrators. It is also a great place to build relationships that can lead to future employment.

Ness Garland- School World http://www.schoolworld.com/ The goal of the web site is to provide all the resources and the tools that any educator would need to in order to help within the school or specifically the classroom. This web site dose anything from helping a school or individual teachers set up web sites to giving ideas for classroom management. When going to the site it seemed to be over whelming because it provides so much of everything a teacher can use, but the web site is so user friendly that it is easy to navigate and find what your may be looking for. Another cool thing that I found about the web site is that you are able to purchase tools and products that you need for lesson plans that you plan ahead. I seriously can call this web site and Educational Wal-Mart!

Adam Sharp- Kid’s Corner http://www.learn4good.com/kids/index.htm Kid’s corner is an interactive website that allows for a student interactively learns and follows specific topics. Included are language, arts, music, math, science, books, games, toys, sports, and clothing. Each section has a variety of helpful educational activities that can be done. This is perfect for younger students because they are allowed to learn while using the computer as well as it allowing for educational value. This site also has a section of recommended books for the different levels of education which can be helpful for teachers as well. This site would be perfect for a family to do together.

Adam Sharp- 10 Websites Offering Free Online Teacher Education http://educationportal.com/articles/10_Websites_Offering_Free_Online_Teacher_Education.html This site is a good link to 10 websites that are mostly colleges that help provide free developmental resources for teachers. Each section has an overview of what their site offers to teachers. Examples of things that are offered include; a free elementary Ed course for teachers in science, workshops for the public, and designs for a good model of research. This site also allows for you to link to school in a particular state that is among the best in teacher education. This is a good site for teachers to do research on different schools that may offer an area of interest to them. It is easy to link up to different sites.

Adam Sharp- U.S. Department of Education http://www.ed.gov/index.jhtml The U.S. Department of Education was designed to help students, parents, teachers, and administrators. This site has all of current top stories involving education. This site is a good source of information of all thing education. There are many areas that you can check out that will keep you informed in the progress of education in our country. This site has plenty of information on things such as grants, financial aid, educational programs, and research and statistics. You can also learn more through the press room and publications about educational topics. This is a government site so it is very reliable.

Jake Meyers- National Association for Single Sex Public Education http://www.singlesexschools.org/home.php This website has very good information on the new trend of single sex classrooms. There are outlines and worksheets that demonstrate the fundamental differences of boys and girls. There are also outlines for implementing standard educational requirements within an all girl or boy classroom. The website explores the differences between co-ed classes and single sexed classrooms. The main goal of the website is to promote the proper usage of single sex curriculum. Too many schools across the nation are blindly implementing single sexed classrooms without knowing how to effectively teach to an all boy or all girl class. The schools that have followed the associations curriculum have proven to have higher test scores and better learning across the board.

Jake Meyers- Education World http://www.education-world.com/ This website has many links to helpful lesson plans, blogs, instruction information, news story and many other education related information. This website provides a place for administrators and teachers to go and get information to further their knowledge. There is a whole section related to technology in the classroom. There are also places for early childhood educators to find exclusive information.

Jake Meyers- National Workforce for Emerging Technologies http://www.nwcet.org/programs/cyberCareers/students/teachingtools/overview/default.asp This website provides teachers with information to help their students learn about technological careers. The teacher does not have to be an expert they only are facilitating in the exploration of cyber careers. These jobs will be in high demand as technology advances and the websites aims to help teachers transfer the knowledge of these jobs to their students. There are several modules and lesson plans provided to inform educators on cyber careers. Information technology (IT) jobs are everywhere and this website helps show how it is an integral part of teaching. This is an interesting website because it helps teachers help their students find future careers in a growing field.

Bonnie Breckenridge- Unit 5 School District http://www.unit5.org/ This website is a great source of information to teachers, parents, faculty, the community, and future educators who are looking to teach in this area (Bloomington-Normal). this website expresses the mission statement of the Unit 5 school district along with much more. It posts job opportunites, extra cirricular event schedules ( such as sports and musicals..) Another great thing about this site is that it informs the public what their local school district is doing to enhance the surrounding areas. You literally wouldn't need to go any where else in order to find out information about this school district. It shows the bus routes and even gives links to other helpful information such as weather and traffic updates.

Bonnie Breckenridge-Basic Skills Test http://www.icts.nesinc.com/ This web site gives future educators the resources for the basic skills test that is required by the state of IL. This website gives accurate times and places to take the basic skills test. Along with that it has links to great resources to help you prepare for the test. What i thouht was great about this site was that it gives you unofficial results of your test. If someone was not aware of this they would be waiting anxiously for months for their tests results but here you can see them as soon as they're graded. I reccomend that everyone that has not taken the test yet use this website as a great source of information and preperation.

Patty Landsly – Ed Helper [|www.edhelper.com] Edhelper is a resource site for teachers, parents, and students. This site is full of supplementary materials, worksheets, theme units, classroom helpers, daily skills review and much more. There are free downloads however, there is greater access to broader materials for members. The annual membership fee is around $30. Topics include math, language arts, reading and writing, science, social studies, critical thinking and so much more. You can access a worksheet for practice or plan an entire unit. The membership also includes the ability to customize the worksheets and units to the specific needs of your classroom. I like to enter the weekly spelling list and come up with a variety of review tools customized with my list.

Patty Landsly – Kids Weather Links http://illiniweather.com/pages/kids_weather_links.htm Weather is an important component of many science units in many different grade levels. This site has a lot of fun and informative links to weather related activities for students from elementary to high school. Eighteen different sites offer a range of interactive information. There are also links to Illinois specific weather conditions, road conditions, satellite images, aviation and marine weather. Teachers can use these sites to plan lessons, have students’ webquest weather facts, research severe weather and play weather games. My favorite link is the Scholastic Weather Maker site where kids can make their own weather and see the impact. You can even get specialized weather for kite flying!

Patty Landsly – Planet Esme [|www.panetesme.com] Planet Esme is a fun and functional site specializing in children’s literature. Esme Raji Codell is a teacher and children’s author. Her site is dedicated to spreading her love of reading and the site showcases her infectious enthusiasm for children’s literature! Esme offers book recommendations, a book –a –day plan, motivational ideas and tips. Esme is a big proponent of read aloud – at any age - and she has a section of tips on how to effectively read aloud to your class. Hearing the written word helps students with their own reading skills and also with their writing skills. Book recommendations are one staple of the site. The story time central link has over 20 themes with booklists to create fun and meaningful story time in your class.

Monica Maurer – Looky Book website http://www.lookybook.com/ Looky book is a useful website that offers countless picture books to be viewed online by children, students, parents or teachers. You must first become a registered user by submitting minimal personal information, and once a member, there are many features to benefit from. If you decide to purchase a book after viewing it, the site will link you to an online bookstore. You can create your own personalized bookshelf that allows you to post and comment on your favorite books; you can share your bookshelf and discuss books with other members as well. The site will automatically list names of books that it assumes you’ll like, according to what books you are viewing.

Monica Maurer – Rubric maker [|http://rubistar.4teachers.org/ index.php] This is a great site that allows you to make rubrics at no cost. You must first become a registered member by submitting minimal personal information. It offers many different templates in the various subjects, and you can edit and personalize these templates. You can create a rubric from scratch with as many categories and columns that you need, and even provides some chosen category titles for you. This site lets you save your rubrics, and then search the saved rubrics to edit or change them if needed. The site also offers tutorials on how to make or edit rubrics within the site.

Monica Maurer – Spell City http://www.spellingcity.com/ This is an amazing website that helps students and children with their spelling abilities. After entering the spelling words on the list, you can create puzzles, play games, or practice with your words. You can choose to take a test on your words, and the site can pronounce the word for you or say it in a sentence. This site has a search feature which allows you to find a spelling list already created under a specific category. You can choose to work with one of the spelling lists that has been prepared and appropriately sorted by grade level and alphabet.

Brianna Duvall-Teachers Planet http://www.teacherplanet.com/calendar/A.php Teachers Planet is another very helpful website for teachers. It has over 250 theme based resource pages that are listed alphabetically. If you click on one of these themes it will provide all of the information that you would need on that topic. This website provides samples of lesson plans and samples of worksheets for the students. There is also free software that you can download on this website, including an electronic grade book. There are helpful teaching tools that are very useful for all teachers. They also have a newsletter that you can sign up for to learn about updates with the website. On this website there is a calendar that has special holidays related to school and special sites for teachers and even free items from time to time.

Brianna Duvall-Back to School: Middleweb’s The First Days of Middle School http://www.middleweb.com/1stDResources.html This website is a great website for beginning teachers that are teaching at the middle school level. It offers support, instruction and discussions on many different topics that come up when teaching middle school. There is even a section on discipline and classroom management. There is some great advice from veteran teachers to beginning teachers in this field. You can subscribe and join the discussion as a teacher. The support on this website is amazing, encouraging beginning teachers to “just hang in there”. You can get on the website and post your questions related to this field and what for responses from other teachers.

Brianna Duvall-Inspiring Teachers http://www.inspiringteachers.com/index.html Inspiring teachers is an amazing website for all teachers. It is a community of educators that are networking together for the mutual growth and support of teachers allover. Their goal is to make teachers become better teachers and improve student success in the classroom. There is a newsletter that you can subscribe to for free that will update you with all of the new information. There are specialized sections for beginning teachers, student teachers and veteran teachers, even mentors. You can find any information you need on becoming a teacher, you can locate a university, find information on scholarships, attend webinars and much more.

Adam Padjen- The Teacher's Corner http://www.theteacherscorner.net/ The teacher’s corner website is a site that teachers or aspiring teachers can go to get all kinds of information on teaching. This site can help you with lesson plans on anything including seasonal lesson plans for certain holidays and other things like that. This site also has links to other sites that could help you out if you are looking for something and has a link to help look for certain teaching jobs. On this site there are also printable worksheets, calendars, and other things like this that could come in useful for teachers. Overall this is a very helpful website for teachers of all ages and it can give you valuable information on anyting.

Adam Padjen- All Teachers Websites http://www.allteacherwebsites.com/ All teachers websites is a site that is a search engine that only brings up websites for teachers. This is the good for teachers. The site is very helpful for any teachers because whatever you type in to search for it only brings up websites for teachers. This site helps you find anything teachers want and it helps you find it faster. With this site you won’t have to search through a bunch of results for your search that are not for teachers. The site does all that for you and only shows you results that are for teachers. This is a great site for a quick search for something you need as a teacher.

Adam Padjen- The lesson plans page http://www.lessonplanspage.com/home.html The lesson plans page is a website designed to help you with lesson plans for any subject matter. It will give you ideas and worksheets for any subject that you are trying to teach to students. If you cannot think of a good plan for something that you are trying to teach you can go to this site and see what they have to offer. This will give you ideas for any subject, and you can change the plans as much as you need to gear it towards your own class. This can be a very helpful site for teachers to use for lesson plans and it gives you links to other pages that can be helpful.

Stephanie Colby--Tumblebooks [|http://www.tumblebooks.com] Tumblebooks are animated, talking picture books that teach kids the joy of reading in a format that they will love. Tumblebooks are created by taking existing picture books that are added with animation, sound, music, and narration. The student has the choice to read the story or have the story be read to them. This website also includes Tumblebooks for middle school and high school students with chapter books and teen novels. I will definitely use this website when I become a teacher because I think reading should be very important in the classroom. These animated stories are a delight to have in the classroom!

Stephanie Colby--Kideas http://www.kideas.com/list?mytag=%2 Kideas is a wonderful website full of easy crafts and recipes you can do in the classroom. It is 100% free for educators or parents to use but the content is not available for mass distribution or resale. There are some really cute craft ideas for the classroom such as how to make a spooky black spider or how to make a feather and pine cone turkey. There are also coloring pages and activities you can get from this website for your classroom as well. You also don’t need a lot of materials to make these crafts and they are very easy to do with your students.

Stephanie Colby--Enchanted Learning Website http://www.enchantedlearning.com/Home.htm Enchanted Learning is a wonderful website to develop creativity in your students. The website includes: pictionary, foreign language dictionaries, puzzles, games, and crafts. Enchanted Learning is for children from five to ten years old. There are so many activities for teachers on here and coloring sheets as well. This would be a helpful website if I was a teacher desperately looking for an activity to do in the classroom or I needed coloring sheets for a certain subject. I would recommend this website to teachers because of the vast information it offers and all the activities and crafts on the website too.

Corey Heisel--kids know it http://www.kidsknowit.com/

Kids know it is a great online learning center for kids to use to get help or just play games and do activites on. This site has several different links in which kids can use to learn about animals, outer space, dinosaurs, music, and whatever else they can imagin. The site also offers tutoring link for kids who need extra help. I would recomend this site to parrents and teachers alike who want fun activites for the kids to do and have them learn at the same time. This site also has great information for students as high as 8th grade too so the site isnt just for the little kids.

Corey Heisel--Sites for teachers http://www.sitesforteachers.com/

Sites for teachers is great for new and upcoming teachers as well as it is for verteran teachers alike. This site gives tons of information on just about every topic you as a future teach can imagin. It has a huge range of information and tons of different activites and leason plans that other teachers have posted. This site literally has thousands of activities to choose from that will let you prepare a great and fun lesson plan for your students. I would deffinently recomend this site for any teacher and anyone who wants to become a teacher. This looks like a great resorce for anyone who needs some extra help.

Corey Heisel-- Cybrary Man's educational websites http://www.angelfire.com/stars3/education/

Cybrary Man's site is a basic site on information about the different types of education. This site is a gateway into other websites about different methods of teaching different subjects. Its also great because it has fire safety instructions and different websites featuring the different holidays. I think that this site will be great for making lesson plans and that future teachers will enjoy using it as a resorce for their classes.

Crue Harmon - Assistive technology issues [|__http://atto.buffalo.edu/registered/ATBasics/Foundation/intro/index.php__] Assuming that difficulty level in dealing with assistive technology is very high due to the technological difficulties, this website would be great to visit to gather some information and how to better your classroom services for kids that do need assistive technology. The site explains basic concepts as well as basic technologies and different trends or issues. It is nice to be able to come to a site and see what other people are going through and see if it isn’t the same issue as yours and possibly find out how to handle it.

Timothy Thrasher-Learning Pages http://www.learningpage.com/free_pages/home.html Learningpages.com is definitely a website that I will use once I become a teacher. On this site there is everything for a teacher. You can get worksheets on different lesson plans; books that your class can read that go with your particular lesson, and educational news. This website is aimed more at preschool teachers and grades first thru third. In order to get the full use of the site you will need to create an account which is fairly simple and free. I would recommend this site to new and experienced teachers, because it can really come in handy with the lesson plan or little activities for the class to do.

Crue Harmon - Science Education/Enhancing problem solving skills [|__http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/36652/how_to_enhance_creative_problem_solving.html__] In a lot of instances, some people like myself have a hard time solving different problems at different times. In this website it gives you access to a list of different problem solving skills and how to enhance them. It also gives access to different links regarding other people skills which can help you get over your shyness, creative thinking, different types of problem solving and different computer skills to better your communication with other people. The site is great because it makes your different problem solving skills a task instead of something that you pick up later in life by associating yourself in society. This site can help you better your people skills as well as problem solving skills enhancing your communication with others.

Timothy Thrasher lesson plan search http://www.lessonplansearch.com/ Lessonplansearch.com can really benefit all teachers. This website is intended to assist those teachers that are having a hard time coming up with a lesson plan for a certain curriculum. This website covers topics from math, reading, writing, and science all the way to cooking. You do not have to have any type of account to view these lesson plans which is great. I believe that this website can benefit the newer teacher more than anyone. A newer teacher may have a harder time coming up with a lesson plan, but this website it can give you a lesson plan that is used by other teachers. I will definitely recommend this website to all teachers. Even if you are not having any trouble with your current lesson plan, you can find maybe a easier or more efficient way of implementing the curriculum.

Crue Harmon - Drill and practice goals in edudation [|__http://www.ion.illinois.edu/resources/otai/Drill.asp__] Drill and practice is a great way to learn a lot of different activities. What better way is there to learn something then by simply doing it. This website gives you a great understanding on how to best implement drill and practice in the classroom as well as different strategies in using it so it doesn’t wear out too quickly. Instead of making drill and practice a very boring skill, it teaches you how to do various activities to help students remember the drill and then simply performing it numerous times to then make it a masterful skill.

Timothy Thrasher-Microsoft Education http://www.microsoft.com/educational/default.mspx#one This website might be one of the most important websites for future and current teacher. Since technology is on the rise for teacher and students this website is excellent. Microsoft has created this website to basically help those teachers that aren’t too technology savvy. Microsoft also provides the teachers with lesson plans that can enhance students understanding of technology. This website can help you better use technology in the classroom (Microsoft products) and at home. As a teacher you can learn how to better assist your students with any Microsoft questions that they may have. This website is really helpful for teachers both experienced and inexperienced.