E is for Explore!

School I have tried several types of classroom behavior management systems, and heard of many more, but this one is hands-down my favorite. Of course, by the time I decided to take a picture of it we were six weeks away from the end of the school year, so it's pretty beat up. The concept is very simple. You need 1 piece of cardstock in each of these colors: purple, blue, green, white, yellow, orange, and red. You also need 1 clothespin per student, labeled with their names. Lesson Plans/ Activities Here are some lesson plans that demonstrate Inquiry-based learning. Inquiry-Based Learning Activity: Prezi Kindergarten Science Kindergarten Language Arts Kindergarten Mathematics

20 Online Tools to Make Learning Fun by Karen Schweitzer Looking for a great way to engage and stimulate students in even the most tedious subjects? There are many online tools, games, activities, learning aids, and even web apps designed to make learning fun. Here is a list of 20 sites to try when the new school year begins: Games and Activities History Detective Kids – Based on PBS’ History Detective television show, this site encourages children between the ages of 8 and 12 to use critical thinking, problem solving, and dramatic play while digging through the past.

Project-Based Learning Research: Avoiding Pitfalls The challenges many teachers face in implementing project-based learning well are not to be taken lightly, but we've compiled a list of strategies to avert the most common issues educators face. There are many potential barriers to implementing successful project-based learning -- it requires serious student and teacher commitment, adequate planning time, and buy-in from the top down. But with these practical tips based on research findings, you can stay away from the most common mistakes educators make, and be confident you are getting started on the right foot with PBL.

Internet Safety K-12 The Internet is a terrific resource. Just like any other place you visit, Internet safety rules must be followed. We have great webpages with many links appropriate for elementary, middle and high school students to review those rules and keep safe on the Internet. Enjoy and be safe! DIY spinny spellers and repurposing Duplo bricks Almost a year ago I made a couple of DIY spinny spellers for my kids, because they were learning to sound out letter combinations and blend sounds to start reading. The spinny spellers you can buy are all upper case letters though, and I wanted something that was lower case, so I just used a bit of dowelling and some wooden beads and some letter stickers we had handy. It worked a treat and I agreed with my older daughter's kindergarten teacher that it would be a good tool for the classroom, so I've got a box of wooden blocks that her husband kindly cut and drill pressed holes in, plus a bunch of dowelling and all the left over wooden beads from a thrift store find, to make over 40 of these things. I'm hoping I can get my act together and find some appropriate letraset cheaply to put letters on all the blocks and varnish them.

3rd grade Geography Supporting Question Where are we, as a class community, located? Formative Task Describe the location of the school using geographic tools and vocabulary. Sources Source A: Google Maps Supporting Question Where are we, as people on Earth, located? Formative Task Complete a two-column chart that describes the location of the world’s people in terms of population density. 85+ Resources: Educator Guide for Integrating Social Media : Engine Feed : MediaRights I hope this post will be a handy reference guide, especially for those teachers new to social media technologies and how to integrate them into the classroom. This resource is by no means exhaustive, but it’s a good starting point for finding the information and people that will help you make the transition into a ’21st century learning environment’. I intend for this to be a wikipost (I will update resources as they are shared with me by others), so feel free to bookmark the page and check in to my official blog at emergentbydesign.com periodically for new material.

How To Use Google Drive and Evernote To Create Digital Portfolios The following post is written by Greg Kulowiec & Beth Holland from EdTechTeacher. You can hear them both present at the April 10-12 EdTechTeacher iPad Summit in Atlanta! As iPads proliferate in schools around the world, and students as well as teachers create more and more content, questions about what to do with all of those learning objects have arisen.

Google Earth Virtual Voyages, Virtual Field Trips: Resources Google Earth Articles: We need our Earth! Resources: Juggling With Kids: Sight Word Parking Lot My son started Kindergarten this year and has a list of sight words he is required to memorize. It can be quite boring and frustrating for kids....so I am trying to search for ways to make learning this a little more fun. My son had a lot of fun learning his sight words by playing the Parking Lot Game. Supplies: -Paper -Cars -Marker -List of sight words Directions:Draw parking spaces and fill in each space with sight words. Your child should park a Hot Wheels® car on the designated word that you call out. Caleb's Creek Media Matters: Spring Has Sprung! Last week was our Spring Break, so to welcome kids back and practice the Super 3 a little, I decided to do a lesson on spring with my Kinders. We started by talking about spring and what they did over break, but then talked about the 3 steps of the Super 3. (I took some slide shots of my SMART notebook using Jing which I love and is a free download by the way.) After talking about the 3 steps and why it is thus called the Super 3, we talked about the questions you might ask yourself for the steps.

100 Helpful Web Tools for Every Kind of Learner For those unfamiliar with the term, a learning style is a way in which an individual approaches learning. Many people understand material much better when it is presented in one format, for example a lab experiment, than when it is presented in another, like an audio presentation. Determining how you best learn and using materials that cater to this style can be a great way to make school and the entire process of acquiring new information easier and much more intuitive. Here are some great tools that you can use to <a href=">cater to your individual learning style, no matter what that is. Visual Learners Visual learners learn through seeing and retain more information when it's presented in the form of pictures, diagrams, visual presentations, textbooks, handouts and videos.