4065 social-studies results | sort by:
return to subject listingLearn 48 Languages Online for Free - Open Culture
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): chinese (44), french (74), hebrew (16), italian (28), portuguese (22), russian (24), spanish (105)
In the Classroom
Share this site on your interactive whiteboard or projector in world language classes. This is a great tool for students to use to explore MORE of their new language both in the classroom and at home. Use this tool to enrich your classroom during world cultures units and let students explore a new language. Offer this site to gifted students to explore and learn (or compare) new languages on their own. This is a great site to help YOU learn some of the native languages of your ESL/ELL students, even how to say "hello" could make their day! If your school celebrates an ethnic heritage festival, you will find ideas for activities among these many resources.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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Sort My Box - Sortmybox.com
Grades
4 to 12In the Classroom
Use to manage pictures or videos taken in the classroom and uploaded to Dropbox. If you are using Dropbox in your class, set up this site at the beginning of the year to save you time! Create a rule that moves them all into the same folder (or folders) for easy organization and location of files later. Assignments that are turned in can be moved by a rule you create to go to a private folder that can be accessed later for grading.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Populr - populr.me
Grades
K to 12tag(s): blogs (65), communication (136), portfolios (21), social networking (66)
In the Classroom
Use this site for students to post simple projects such as stories, poems, and art projects. This is a simple tool to create individual portfolios, too. In lower grades, create a page together as a class on a projector or whiteboard. Collect a master list of the links to student pages on your classroom website, wiki, or blog for easy access. If students create pages, be sure to check with your district's policy on student use of email as well as publishing of student work. You may want to use a single class account so you have control. Create websites for many projects: back to school introductions, any subject/topic, research projects, book reports... the possibilities go on and on! Create a handy page to share resources and information during field trips or outside activities. If you assign gifted students (age 13+) to do alternate projects beyond the regular curriculum, this may be one of the tools they like to use. You could use a teacher account so students do not have to create a login. This would also be a useful tool for middle and high school gifted students to create an online portfolio. Start by having them create a real world presence to publish links and images of their best work, especially projects that take on a life of their own long after the assignment ends. This is for students to present their best face to the public. Encourage them to take ownership of it.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Ice Age Floods - Tom Foster
Grades
8 to 12tag(s): glaciers (17), landforms (37), rock cycle (12), rocks (36), volcanoes (55)
In the Classroom
Use as part of a flipped lesson. Have students watch videos or read portions of the site and create blogs sharing their learning and understanding using Penzu, reviewed here, with Penzu you can add images or your own artwork as illustrations. Take this a step further and challenge students use a mapping tool such as MapHub, reviewed here, to add points of interest with display markers featuring text, photos, and videos. Share videos and site information on your interactive whiteboard for viewing together.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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StoryToolz - Chuck Heintzelman
Grades
2 to 12tag(s): creative writing (121), readability (5), stories and storytelling (40)
In the Classroom
Enhance and modify student writing by having them use StoryToolz. First, share it with students with a projector in your writing class to generate ideas for stories, possible centers of conflict to map out the new tale, and show them how to use the tool. Use the readability section with any writing to determine appropriateness for use with students. Have students paste their writing in the readability section to determine if their writing is at an appropriate grade level or to note information such as words per sentence or use of various parts of speech. Paste into the cliche buster to point out ho-hum wording and overused expressions. Suddenly, students may begin to write more complex sentences or use more vivid language. Be sure to include a link to this site on your class webpage and classroom computers for use throughout the year. The readability portion of the site is a great resource for ESL/ELL and Special Education teachers to help determine the appropriateness of reading materials.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Calkoo - Trinity Capital
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): addition (128), area (52), calculators (37), division (98), fractions (159), measurement (126), multiplication (122), percent (58), quadratics (26), subtraction (109), volume (34)
In the Classroom
Calkoo is a great free tool to replace expensive graphing calculators that many students may not have. Calkoo works well on computers, mobile devices, and interactive whiteboards. Use this site during a unit on careers, economics, or financial literacy. Include it as part of a measurement unit. Share during Family and Consumer Science units to explore the cost of living and have students put together a mythical "budget" for living in their chosen career. Have students send you on a vacation and include calculations for the currency converter, fuel cost calculator, sales tax for souvenirs, and more! This is a great site to support many experiments in science. Calculate acceleration, velocity, and time, or use the mathematics category to complete problems. Use this tool in social studies class for quickly calculating years or months from important timelines or when figuring out geographical distances. In English or L.A. classes, quickly figure out the life span of authors or how long ago a story took place. In health or science classes, use the BMI calculator or get other accurate measurements. Visit Calkoo and select a calculator to meet your needs! Include this site on your class web page for students and parents to access as a reference. The various languages make this tool very useful for ESL/ELL students.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Multiple Intelligences Posters - Marek Bennett
Grades
3 to 12tag(s): back to school (63), comics and cartoons (53), multiple intelligences (7)
In the Classroom
Print and share posters to get your colleagues and students thinking about their own multiple intelligences. Be sure to maintain the attribution and copyright information on the posters. Explore with students learning about their own strengths in learning. Hang the posters in your classroom. Share information during parent conferences and professional development. Share posters on your board during back to school information sessions to help parents understand different types of intelligences. Encourage students to create comics of themselves using their most comfortable "intelligence" and use it as a locker decoration or on a class bulletin board during the first part of the school year. Use one of TeachersFirst's many comic/cartoon tools reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Quadblogging - David Mitchell
Grades
2 to 12tag(s): blogs (65), communication (136), cross cultural understanding (157), writing (315)
In the Classroom
If you never blogged before, you might want to check out TeachersFirst Blog Basics for the Classroom. Have your students choose a question from Thought Questions reviewed here. Have students respond to the question, and then have them ask the reader to respond to their writing and answer the question from their point of view, too. The benefits go beyond just writing. You can also build cultural understanding and world language skills through blogs. Help your students become aware of environmental issues or how to live "green" for our planet. Try Greenlearning.ca, reviewed here, or choose something from the Environmental News Network, reviewed here, for students' Quadblog projects.Edge Features:
Includes an education-only area for teachers and students
Parent permission advised before posting student work created using this tool
Includes social features, such as "friends," comments, ratings by others
Requires registration/log-in (WITH email)
Multiple users can collaborate on the same project
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PDF Mergy - PDF Mergy
Grades
K to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): classroom management (128)
In the Classroom
PDF Mergy is an excellent resource for combining multiple ideas for lessons. Save fraction handouts, continent maps and worksheets, or plant identification activities all together as one file. Remember that copyright still applies to any copyrighted pdfs you combine! Save student reports in PDF and combine to put the entire class' work in one single document. Save project receipts in one easy to find file, the possibilities are endless! Want to make a cool flippable book from your combined pdf of student writings? Try PDF to Flipbook Converter, reviewed here to turn the PDF into a flippable online book.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Compress Now - compressnow.com
Grades
K to 12tag(s): images (262)
In the Classroom
Bookmark Compress Now (or save it in your favorites). Use this site throughout the year when working with images. Compress images for use on web pages to make pages loading more quickly. Use when emailing images to make sure they will get through.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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White House Tapes - The President Calling - American Radio Works
Grades
8 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): kennedy (19), presidents (121), vietnam (35)
In the Classroom
Include the tapes and transcripts as part of any unit involving the 1960's, Vietnam, presidents, and more. Have students create timelines with music, photos, videos, and more using Timeline JS, reviewed here, and include information gathered on the audio tapes. Have students use Fakebook, reviewed here, to create a "fake" page similar in style to Facebook about characters involved in the audio tapes.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Artifacts & Analysis - Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum Studies
Grades
9 to 12tag(s): 1930s (20), 1960s (27), 20th century (59), cultures (132), decades (7)
In the Classroom
Start off with a visit to the Teaching Guide to find some great ideas to incorporate in your class. Use materials from this site to enhance and bring historical teaching to life. Print the student guide for writing effective essays for students to include with history notebooks. Use questions from the teaching materials here to add to your current teaching plans or as discussion topics. Create a link on your class website for students to view this site at home. Have students research and find documents and artifacts in your own community or online to share in the classroom. Have them create curated collections in digital form with accompanying writings to explain them. Students could create annotated images including text boxes and related links using a tool such as Thinglink, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Pulitzer Center Lesson Plans - Pulitzer Center
Grades
3 to 12tag(s): africa (137), careers (139), china (62), debate (37), earthquakes (44), ethics (23), food chains (17), hiv/aids (16), india (25), journalism (72), media literacy (102), water (102), women (137)
In the Classroom
Use the lesson plans on the site as a resource for discussing and debating global issues. If there is no time to complete a full unit, explore resources from each topic for ideas to use in your classroom. For example, try the ideas on interviewing individuals who migrated to the United States offered in the How Did I Become the Person That I Am unit. Share this site with students interested in journalism careers as a resource for learning more about the profession and some of its members.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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CurriConnects Book List - Colonial America and the Revolution - TeachersFirst
Grades
1 to 12tag(s): american revolution (82), book lists (161), colonial america (95), independent reading (85)
In the Classroom
Make history more real during your unit on Colonial America and/or the Revolution. Have students choose a book from this list and present their impressions from it in the form of a blog post from the times. If you are beginning the process of integrating technology, have students create blogs sharing their learning and understanding using Tumblr, reviewed here. Collect the links to all the student posts on your class web page for students to browse and gather a "human" experience of history.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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History Labs - A Guided Approach to Historical Inquiry in the K-12 Classroom - UMBC Center for History Education
Grades
5 to 12tag(s): african american (110), american revolution (82), civil rights (194), civil war (134), colonial america (95), colonization (20), great depression (28), iran (8), jefferson (18), kennedy (19), native americans (91), roosevelt (12), slavery (75), washington (25), womens suffrage (44), world war 2 (149)
In the Classroom
Bookmark and save this site for use with any American History topic as a complete lesson or to offer another angle on current lessons. Enhance learning by having students create a simple infographic sharing their findings using Venngage reviewed here. Before beginning a unit, have students brainstorm or collect ideas on a collaborative bulletin board like Scrumblr, reviewed here (quick start- no membership required!).Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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GR8CTZ - Great Cities of the World - Vadim Temkin
Grades
8 to 12tag(s): countries (69), cross cultural understanding (157), map skills (56), maps (207)
In the Classroom
Use this tool on an Interactive Whiteboard (or projector) with an entire class. Students can work as a class, individually, or in groups to identify locations based on clues. Use the clues to discuss information about social structure, livelihood, religion, landforms, and other cultural information. Use this information to uncover and correct misconceptions and discuss cultural differences in countries outside the US. Go beyond the map to learn about the various foods, agriculture, and other aspects of their lives. Research the local ecosystem to determine native plants and animals found in the country. Create a poem or story set in that locale using information learned through research. Are you a connected educator? Find other educators around the World using Twitter (reviewed here) to make connections between classrooms. Join the Across the World Once a Week project ( here) to share about the culture where you live.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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New Bedford Whaling Museum - New Bedford Whaling Museum
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): 1700s (36), 1800s (72), colonial america (95), marine biology (25), whales (11)
In the Classroom
The museum's exhibits focused on the Arctic and on the migrations and habitats of whales are useful from a historical perspective. Consider using early maps and photographs from the exploration of Arctic regions to compare with current maps for a discussion on global climate change. Use information about current and past whale habitats to illustrate the impact of ocean changes on the largest of its inhabitants. Students doing independent research will find the individual images of the museum's extensive collection useful as well. Have students act as curators for an imaginary special exhibit, perhaps creating a map using MapHub, reviewed here, to add points of interest with display markers featuring text, photos, and videos. to show the artifact locations and tell the stories of their "artifacts." (Simplify adding images by inserting them using the online URLs of the artifact images from the museum catalog. To find and copy the URL for an online image, RIGHT click on it to "Copy Image URL" or "Get Info," depending on your browser and computer type.)Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Words of the World - The University of Nottingham
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): cross cultural understanding (157), vocabulary (237), vocabulary development (90), word study (58)
In the Classroom
Words of the World is a great site for some quick vocabulary building, but even more it is a window into words as vital components of culture and history. Share these videos on your interactive whiteboard (or projector) for a quick lesson on the background and meaning of several words. Use it to talk about how words can also define a time period in history or a concept that is vital to a particular culture. Explore language as PART of a culture as you study different countries. Find out what words are unique to that culture. Use this site as an example, then challenge cooperative learning groups to create their own word background videos of culture-connected words and share them on a site such as TeacherTube reviewed here. Share a link to videos using links provided on your class website for students to view as a word of the week. Challenge students to use the word of the week in class discussions or other written work throughout the week.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Documentary Tube - DocumentaryTube.com
Grades
4 to 12This site includes advertising.
tag(s): video (258)
In the Classroom
Discover the power of documentaries while studying point of view, primary and secondary resources, and debate skills. Examine the aspects shown in documentaries and help students find structure to provide an unbiased research project. Challenge existing knowledge in many areas. Help students become active thinkers and become involved in current events. Sharpen your own understandings.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Documentary Storm - 2013 DocumentaryStorm
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): video (258)
In the Classroom
With documentaries challenge your students' understanding of food, history, politics, or people. Use to provide another point of view which might not be available in traditional text books. Use to explain primary and secondary sources, as well as an example of a way to extend thinking. Provide a documentary as an example for your students to do an in depth research project. Use documentaries to challenge knowledge, create new knowledge, and learn.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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