Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

BookRix is a very cool program for readers and writers! You don't even have to register to read a book. It's all free. If you or your students are aspiring authors, you can register and publish your writing here, again for free. Check out the lists of categories before giving students this link. At the time of this review there were a two that could be inappropriate for your students (erotic and esotericism). You could create your own list with the URLs; click on "read the book" to get the URL for that book.

tag(s): creative writing (121), ebooks (39), independent reading (85), writing (315)

Use Alternative to... and find a new alternative to one of your favorite online tools. Use the social-network powered database to suggest the new application. Find featured applications ready to view. Use the tabs below to find the applications with the "Most views," "Most likes," "Recent," or even those that do not have an alternative. Join/follow the site to vote on favorite and alternative apps as well as uploading new applications to be considered.
This site includes advertising.

tag(s): social networking (67)

Are you looking to collect and analyze class data easily? Choose from 16 different ways to view data. Decide the items you wish to count (the free plan allows up to 1000 different things to be counted.) Also determine the category the items can be placed into (use up to 24 different categories in the free account.) Add a statement panel to your display panel to add notes and make comments about the data. Be sure to click the How To at the bottom of the home page to learn how to use the Daytum site. Also click the "Watch A Screencast" link for additional help. Data can also be collected via text or Twitter tweets.

tag(s): charts and graphs (169), data (147), infographics (56), statistics (114), visualizations (11)

H.S.I. or Historical Scene Investigation takes the work out of locating primary sources, and provides you with an interesting way for students to "investigate" history. This site presents "case histories" for "Dropping the Bomb," "Antonio the Slave," "Children in the Civil War," "The Boston Massacre" and many others. For each "case" there is a student view and a teacher view. The teacher view is a lesson plan with a list of objectives, additional contextual information and resources as well as instructional strategies, and suggestions for such things as age group and further questions to explore. The Student View includes links to 13 cases with primary documents, images, videos, and secondary documents to use as evidence along the way. The student view is set up as a mystery to solve. Students are presented with the situation and given a question to guide their inquiry. There are three steps for students to follow "Investigating the Evidence" where students are provided links to appropriate digital primary sources, "Searching for Clues" where students are provided with a set of questions to guide their analysis of the evidence, and "Cracking the Case" when students give their answers and cite the evidence they found to support their answers. This site is definitely the C.S.I for history!

tag(s): american revolution (82), atomic bomb (9), civil rights (194), civil war (134), constitution (87), jamestown (7), mysteries (19), primary sources (117), slavery (75)

Goodreads--it's an intersection between Facebook, your local book club, and your neighborhood library. While it is a social networking site (and TF warns all teachers of the complications and dangers of encouraging such sites in a school setting), English and social science teachers, especially, will find benefit in the intellectual commentaries written about certain books. Perusing this site is like viewing the personal library of all your friends. You may want to create your own Goodreads page to prove to your students and colleagues that you take reading seriously. It will encourage your students to do likewise. You may even want to form a network of teachers to post valuable educational books for professional development. Of course, if monitored closely, your high school students will enjoy creating their own Goodreads page to promote their favorite 'good reads.' We definitely suggest that you watch the 'tour' at the top right to learn about the inner workings of this site. Don't miss the Quotes area, available by clicking "more quotes" after the featured one in the sidebar.
This site includes advertising.

tag(s): authors (103), independent reading (85), quotations (20), social networking (67)

Explore health questions and answers with this free site. Click Health Tools and Topics on the bottom menu to view the most asked questions and click for specific information. Be sure to scroll left and right to view all topics. Click on a topic. View the answer to the question in the pop-up as well as related information and images. Answers are provided by contributors from the health field. Be aware that any health site includes topics such as reproductive health. Preview and decide whether this site is appropriate in your school community.

tag(s): body systems (40), dental health (15), diseases (66), fitness (38), human body (93), nutrition (134)

Ever think that you could look more professional if you used a teleprompter just like the President? Try this free version then! Simply copy and paste your text into the field, highlight words if desired, and then click "Start prompt." Click play on the next screen to start the prompter. Speed up or slow down the speed of the prompter using the "+" or "-" buttons. The size of the prompter text can also be increased easily. Users must be able to copy and past text from one application to another. Player controls look much like standard video player controls. Follow the demo to watch how it is used or take a few moments to play with it. Close the site, and the information in the prompter is lost.

tag(s): speeches (18)