Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

Create and personalize a music playlist using Musicovery. Hover your mouse over different areas of the mood pad to define your radio settings of energetic, dark, positive, or calm. Narrow choices by different genres such as pop, soundtracks, world music, and more. A song list starts playing once you selected the mood. Create an account to save favorites for use later.
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tag(s): creative writing (160), learning styles (19), sounds (68)

The cost of college continues to rise, and student debt has a significant impact on the US economy. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offers several important resources for those thinking about how to pay for college. An overview of student loans and how they work provides important consumer information. Also, some brief money management and banking can help those just starting out. The best part of Paying for College, however, is the financial aid offer comparison tool, which allows you to evaluate up to three financial aid offers from colleges using real "apples to apples" data. Finally, there is excellent advice about repaying student debt.

tag(s): banks (11), college (47), financial aid (16), financial literacy (109), money (185)

What just happened here? The New York Times offers hundreds of user-submitted photographs from all over the world, each capturing "a moment in time" on a Sunday in May, 2010. Search by theme, and then give the virtual globe a spin to select a location from which to view your moment in time. Repeat. You won't want to stop. See the world in images from all over the world, all on the same day.

tag(s): creative writing (160), cross cultural understanding (134), debate (47), expository writing (38)

Try your hand at spelling practice using Spelling Wizard. Enter words into the blanks and then choose to make a word search or word scramble. You can do the spelling activities online or click to print.

tag(s): spelling (166)

Visually compare current data about cities all around the world. Choose three cities at a time to access information such as work, movement (including transportation), systems, and people. View the findings of all three cities side by side. After viewing introductory maps and a summary of trends about any specific city, click on specific information you need. The interactive and manipulable maps change as each different theme about the city comes up. You can easily and quickly compare different parts of the population, weather details, transportation facts, historical boundaries, parks, and many other themes. Creators of the site have the goal of adding data about more cities around the world and welcome outside additions to the fact bank.

tag(s): cities (26), data (157), population (64), railroads (12)

Big History Project is a free, online social studies course designed for secondary students tracing from the Big Bang through the history of humanity. This course takes a VERY broad view of the "big picture" to provide greater perspective in how we see history. View course information in 2 sections with 10 units covering a time span of 13.7 billion years. Each unit contains between 20-30 modules including projects, discussion topics, and assessments. All are aligned to Common Core Standards. Other course offerings include Project Based Learning activities, videos, animations, infographics, and much more. A simpler, shorter version of the course for the general public is available under "Not an educator?. Click on "Check out our public course."

tag(s): agriculture (57), geologic time (10), industrialization (14), solar system (123)

Learn fascinating information in video format on a plethora of different topics. As you click through, click FREE at the top of each category to se only the free offerings. Choose from categories such as Game On, Curious 52, Art and Photo, Smarty Pants, Fit and Active, and Health and Beauty. There is so much more: Learn to Code, Great Outdoors, Popular, Fancy Pants, Around the House, Staff Picks, Pocket Perfect, Language, Crafting, Green Thumb, Software, Tasty Treats, Song and Dance, Business Savvy, and Party Time. Each video has a clickable "timeline" under it where you can read about the video, find lessons, make comments, find related topics, and see assignments. Teach others your skill or talent. Send Curious cards to teachers or others to show what you know. Be aware, not all of the video clips are free.
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tag(s): art history (78), coding (77), dance (27), family (59), financial literacy (109), money (185), nutrition (156), sports (102), video (263)

LitPick is a great place to find preteen and teen literature reviewed by students from all over the world. Discover the latest reads reviewed by students. Students apply to become a reviewer, along with an adult sponsor, and get a free eBook or print book. Choose a book by age or genre. Read within 4-6 weeks and write a 5-10 sentence review summarizing the book, without giving away the ending. Submit and receive feedback before the final review is approved and published. Receive points and badges for well written reviews. Find books listed by author, genre, or age group. Adult members of LitPick can participate in the monthly book giveaway contest and newsletter that features student book reviews and special offers. Sign up to receive the latest announcement and promotional giveaways. Start book clubs, or use in classes. LitPick was selected as Best Website for Teaching and Learning by the American Association of School Librarians, and selected for the Gold Award from Mom's Choice and the Association of Independent Authors. LitPick also hosts a video review channel titled BookTube residing on YouTube. If your district blocks YouTube, the videos may not be viewable. You could always view them at home and bring them to class "on a stick" to share. Use a tool such as Freemake Video Converter, reviewed here, to download the videos from YouTube.

tag(s): expository writing (38), independent reading (121), literature (265), literature circles (5)

Try Codecademy to learn how to code. Build projects such as interactive websites, games, and apps. Join a community of coders and share the knowledge. Collaborate with others from all over for new projects. Find 18 adaptable lesson plans that link to Codecademy's online courses. You can also build a profile to track progress. Included is a free kit to start an after school coding club. Check out the one hour introductory class on coding for teachers. Codecademy's small lessons help one focus on tasks that might at first be completely foreign or overwhelmingly technical. Discover the curriculum developed for primary and secondary schools. Download an app for iPhones to continue coding. Lessons for coding include JavaScript, HTML/CSS, PHP, Python, Ruby, and APIs.

tag(s): coding (77), computers (102), engineering (131), STEM (209)

Garbology is an interactive that teaches about garbage and answers the question, "Where should my waste go?" While exploring, uncover startling facts about trash, waste, recycling, reuse, landfills, and composting. Find lessons and activities to extend your Garbology knowledge, from how to pack a waste-less lunch to getting the dirt on composting. The Trash Talk blog gives stories of conservation in practice.

tag(s): earth day (100), environment (323), recycling (60)