2 + 2 Mathematics for Children (downloadable program) This completely free downloadable program is well designed to help build numeracy. The program offers a variety of activities for students to practice basic number facts and computation skills–addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Activities are accompanied by soothing music and a human voice to provide encouragement. You have the option of downloading an Italian or Polish version of this program if you happen to need that. The download is available from funnymathforkids.com
2Learn.ca Education Society (online resource) This website houses an amazingly extensive collection of online resources for K – 12 students, for their parents, and for their teachers. It is sponsored jointly by Alberta Education, The Alberta Teachers’ Association, The College of Alberta School Superintendents, The Faculty of Education at the University of Alberta, and Telus. In addition to offering a few of its own resources, this website provides links to some of the best educational resources and online activities available elsewhere on the internet. The site is well organized, making it easy to locate material and activities to support specific areas of the curriculum. For Canadian schools, the French language resources may be especially helpful.
One of the following links may suggest the part of the site that you want to check out first: 2Learn.ca Educators’ Resource, 2Learn.ca en francais, Parents Want 2Learn.ca Too!, ABC@2Learn.ca, l Kids Love 2Learn.ca, 2Learn.ca for Teens, Senior High Source@2Learn.ca.
There is one more section of 2Learn.ca that deserves special mention. It is SATIR, and that stands for School Administrators’Technology Integration Resource. Within SATIR there is a helpful emphasis on the implementation of assistive technology.
BBC Schools Page (online resource) Many high quality interactive online activities for kids of all ages. Activities include stories, language learning exercises, science lessons, music, numeracy skills, and much more. Be sure to check out the Little Animals Activity Centre under literacy for 4 to 11.(Select sound for the stories by “Story Bear”) This site from the British Broadcasting Corporation is ad-free..
BlockCAD (downloadable program) BlockCAD is a free onscreen lego program where you can build and save lego creations on your computer. This program is sophisticated and attractive. There is a tremendous variety of lego blocks to choose from, so the options for creative art and problem solving are virtually unlimited. In addition to the potential for fun, this program might be used in a wide variety of ways–perhaps to investigate concepts in science, to illustrate social studies projects, or to explore three dimensional graphic design. Download the program, as well as additional resources at Anders’ Corner of the Web . You’ll also find a gallery of virtual creations built by others. It can be a bit challenging to learn how to work the program, but some online help is available. For those who persevere, the journey is well worthwhile!
Calendar Magic (downloadable program) There are numerous free calendar applications, but this one is unique. Calendar Magic offers calendars in Gregorian, Chinese, Hebrew, Julian, and Persian formats. This calendar enables you to go back to virtually any date in history. It’s easy to go back and find the day of the week on which you were born, or to discover how many days you have lived. If you need to know the date and time of an equinox, solstice, or moon phase in any year between 1582 and 3000, then this is the calendar for you. Also, if you need to know when religious festivals or other days of observance occur, Calendar Magic will help you with that. Of course, Calendar Magic can give you reminders for current events such as birthdays or anniversaries, even an audible reminder for something that is about to happen immediately. Other features include a Geometry calculator and a mathematical Expressions Calculator. This program has been developed by a company called Eurosoft, and they continue to update it. The latest release was on Aug. 11, 2006. (This program runs in Windows.)
Celestia (downloadable program) This is a “…free space simulation that lets you explore our universe in three dimensions! Celestia doesn’t confine you to the surface of the Earth. You can travel throughout the solar system, to any of over 100,000 stars, or even beyond the galaxy.” This is super cool, and you can download this open source program and find out much more at http://www.shatters.net/celestia/. There are exciting add-ons and instructional units available from the “Motherlode”, but it requires a little computer savvy to install them. Entire educational units have been prepared for students in grades 7 – 12. A 46-page downloadable User’s Guide has been prepared by Frank Gregorio. Further support is available through forums hosted on Celestia’s website.
Cliffs Notes (online resource) Extensive collection of free online study notes for literature, covering a wide range of titles and authors. There is plenty of advertising on this site, and the folks who operate the site would like to sell you print copies of their notes. Still, it doesn’t cost anything to read the notes online. The notes from this site can be printed into Kurzweil 3000 so that a student can take advantage of Kurzweil’s many study aids.
Community Signs (downloadable program) Here is a simple and completely free downloadable program that has been designed to help individuals learn to recognize signs that they encounter in the community. 63 different signs are included, and the activities can be customized in several ways to suit the user. For example, any or all of the signs may be selected for an activity, depending on the needs of the learner. There can be as few as 3 signs to choose from, or as many as 8. The user hears the name of a sign and is asked to click on the associated picture. The speech is clear, and the interface is clean and uncluttered. Animated rewards are available for correct responses. This is an excellent resource for anyone teaching essential life skills to individuals of all ages. The author of this program is Bill Straub, and it can be downloaded, along with several other basic skills programs, at Resources for Teachers of Basic Skills.
Count On (online resource) is another high quality ad-free educational site from the UK. As the name implies, the focus here is on maths. There are numerous games, puzzles and activities here. The math that is explored and reenforced here goes well beyond basic skills and concepts. Some of the activities are even a little unusual such as the art gallery that showcases western and Islamic art with connections to mathematics. At Count On, you’ll also find multiple links to other good math sites. This one is well worth a look.
Create a Sculpture (online resource) A free online interactive art activity where students create their own sculptures, offered by the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden of the Smithsonian Institution. Once you’ve created your sculpture, you can upload it to the “museum” for others to enjoy. At this site, you also have the opportunity to learn about sculpture in contemporary art.
Dragonfly TV (online resource) This is an excellent website for kids from PBS. Investigative activities are conducted and presented by kids. Many of the presentations incorporate video footage. There are also suggested investigative activities where students are invited to submit their findings. Just in case that isn’t enough, there are also great online games here. Click on this link to go to the Dragonfly Video Podcast Channel for podcasts showing “…real kids doing real science. DragonflyTV taps ordinary kids doing extraordinary investigations, and showcases them in fast-moving video with wall-to-wall music.
Drawing for Children (downloadable program) This is an attractive multi-featured drawing program designed specifically for children. Artwork can be saved and/or printed. The program can be downloaded from Free Software by Mark Overmars.
Garden With Insight (downloadable program) This amazing free program is an “…educational simulation that uses weather, soil, and plant growth models to simulate a simple garden in an open-ended microworld setting. You can plant vegetables and grow them to learn more about plants, the soil, the weather, gardening, and science.” For the complete package, you need to download and install both the program and the extras. The program comes with a tutorial and extensive help. Download the program and learn a great deal more about it at: http://www.gardenwithinsight.com/ You may find some other free software here that will be of interest to you.
Google Earth (downloadable program) This is a free downloadable program from Google that can enrich anyone’s life, including his or her curriculum at school. In Google’s own words, “The idea is simple. It’s a globe that sits inside your PC. You point and zoom to anyplace on the planet that you want to explore. Satellite images and local facts zoom into view. Tap into Google search to show local points of interest and facts. Zoom to a specific address to check out an apartment or hotel. View driving directions and even fly along your route.” If you haven’t yet experienced Google Earth, and used it to explore your world, you will be rewarded handsomely for checking it out. If you want to learn more about Google Earth, go to http://earth.google.com/.
Graphic Organizers (online resource) Great online source of graphic organizers from Houghton Mifflin’s Education Place. The downloadable templates here can be customized for an infinite variety of learning activities across the curriculum. Although this is a resource that supports curriculum, it is definitely a form of productivity tool for teachers.
Hammerhead Rhythm Station (downloadable program with online resources) If you like drums, you can use this totally free program to create, play and save music on your computer. I’m not a musicia, so I’ll let the developers do the describing: “You can use it to create perfect Techno loops, Jungle patterns, or House beats, but it’s also suitable for Hip Hop,Trihop, Rap, Industrial, and almost any other music you can think of. Hammerhead features six separate channels, 29 built-in drum sounds, six complete breakbeats, and the possibility to import six samples of your own. You can save your patterns to completely noise-free CD-quality wave files to use them with your sampler, tracker, or sequencer program.” You can download the program at http://www.threechords.com/hammerhead/introduction.shtml, and also access multiple resources to support the program.
Interesting Things for ESL Students (online resource) This site is a source of numerous online language development activities–games, puzzles, podcasts and more.
Internet4Classrooms (online resource) This website offers a veritable catalogue of links to internet resources for educators, many of them of outstanding quality. The site is well organized and easy to navigate so that you can browse through the literally hundreds of suggested resources. Main categories include Links for K-12 Teachers, Assessment Assistance, On-Line Practice Modules (for learning computer applications), Daily Dose of the Web, and In-School Integration Support. Each category is also well organized for convenient browsing. In the Resources section, under Links for K-12 Teachers, there is a helpful page of Assistive Technology links.
Jetstream (downloadable program) This is a challenging and sophisticated free single switch game that has the potential to be powerfully motivating. This and other free single switch games can be found and downloaded at http://www.brillsoft.com/Index_files/Page396.htm If you, or someone you know, is looking for a single switch challenge, it will be worth your while to check out Jetstream.
Keyboard Pounder (downloadable program) Here’s a delightful program if you are looking for a single switch activity to reenforce cause and effect. Actually, this program was created for toddlers. It is designed so that by hitting any key, or by clicking the mouse, there is an immediate response on the screen. In one activity, with every click a tropical fish appears and swims away. In the other activity, a flower or butterfly appears. The activities are accompanied by gentle strains of classical music. Keyboard pounder can be downloaded from Little Bits Media. Several other interesting free programs are also available here.
Kidspace @ The Internet Public Library (online resource) is a huge repository of information and resources for children. Essentially, this site is a very well organized collection of links to other web sites. The main headings are: Reference; Our World; Computers & Internet; Health & Nutrition; Reading Zone; Math & Science; Art & Music; Sports & Recreation; Fun Stuff. Kidspace itself is ad-free and the site is clean and uncluttered. The sites that are linked are generally of very high quality, but they are not all ad-free. Kidspace provides links to both content and skill-building sources.
In addition to its “Subject Collections”, Kidspace offers what it calls “Features”. These include: Science Fair, Stately Knowledge, Learning HTML, Orca Search, Poison Prevention, Culture Quest, Story Hour, US Presidents. The site is searchable, and for children under 13, there is an “Ask a question” feature as well. The site says it requires 3 days to answer questions that are submitted.
The Internet Public Library is sponsored by The Regents of the University of Michigan.
Kidz Online This is a high quality site offering a wealth of resources to help kids learn to use technology effectively. There are excellent streaming video units, designed to help kids learn animation, PowerPoint, digital audio, digital video, webpage creation, etc. You have to register to access resources here, but registration is free and it does not result in any unwanted email or other unsolicited advertising.
Maps that Teach (downloadable programs and online resource) This is a set of 13 individual well designed and attractive downloadable map puzzle programs from Owl & Mouse Educational Software These include maps of countries, regions of the world, continents, and cultural landmarks. In addition to the programs you can download, there are interactive online map activities available from Owl & Mouse. Several other free educational programs can also be had from their website.
Minisebran (downloadable program) This is another free suite of early learning activities by Marianne Warthoff, the same author who gave us SebranABC. Minisebran is intended for younger children (2-6). There are 8 simple activities that provide children the opportunity to explore letters, numbers, colours and the computer keyboard. Three of the activities involve doodling with basic drawing tools. Minisebran can be played in French and Swedish as well as English. Minisebran can be downloaded at http://www.wartoft.nu/software/minisebran/ In order to run, Minisebran requires that .NET Framework be installed, and there is a link for downloading this at the Minisebran download site. (This program runs in Windows.)
Music Games (downloadable program) A free program containing a set of five simple music activities written by Inclusive Technology. Auditory cuing for instructions is available, and activities are self-checking. These activities can be easily accessed with Intellikeys or with switches.
National Geographic Education (online resource) Although this site is ad-supported, it is an excellent source of otherwise free high quality educational resources from National Geographic. National Geographic Xpeditions is a comprehensive set of lesson plans and activities for K-12 referenced to the US National Geography Standards, as established by National Geographic. The lesson plans are well organized and clearly laid out. The site also offers an extensive collection of map and photo resources. Among the numerous other features on the website is a very helpful one labeled “Homework Help” for students.
NLVM (online resource) The National Library of Virtual Manipulatives is an exceptional website! It is a comprehensive and systematic virtual resource to support the development of numeracy and the learning of math concepts and skills from K to 12. A team at the University of Utah has created an extensive set of virtual manipulatives and interactive exercises.
Activities are organized under 5 main headings: Number & Operations; Algegra; Geometry; Measurement; Data Analysis & Probability. Within each heading, exercises are designed for Pre-K – 2, 3 – 5, 6 – 8, and 9 – 12. Under each heading, and for each targeted grade level group, there is a variety of well constructed activities. For each activity, there is a clear set of instructions as well as a detailed rationale for the parent or teacher. The website is ad-free and totally free of distracting clutter. Activities have been created using Java. The user may view the site in Spanish if he or she wishes.
eNLVM is a sister website to NLVM (above) that offers “eModules”, consisting of online interactive units with assessment, tracking tools that enable students to submit activities, adaptation tools that allow teachers to modify activities, and collaboration tools that make it possible for teachers to work together in creating and publishing materials.
NOVA Flash Activities (online resource) This is an extensive collection of interactive flash science activities–from Tsunamis, to the Wright Brothers, to How Cancer Grows. These are high quality educational activities from the folks at PBS.
pictureSET from SET-BC (online resource) A collection of downloadable visual supports that can be used by students for both receptive and expressive communication. Most of these resources have been created in Boardmaker, with some in other programs such as Writing With Symbols. Files can be downloaded in their original format (eg. as Boardmaker files) or as pdf files. This searchable database allows you to find a wide range of useful visual supports for different curriculum areas, activities, and events–life skills, social skills, basic concepts, literacy, numeracy, art, music, physical education, French language, science, social studies, holidays/seasons, etc.
Podcasts for Educators (online resource) Podcasts are a rapidly growing source of educational enrichment available at no cost on the internet. Many podcasts are updated regularly, and you can subscribe to those of particular interest to you. Podcasts for Educators is a directory offering links to many excellent podcasts that are of value to educators and their students. Although the directory is based in the UK, the podcasts listed are from around the world. Podcasts are categorized according to subject area, and there is also a comprehensive alphabetical listing. Many podcasts are actually produced by students for other students. There are podcasts of interest to students of all ages, and the subjects addressed range from basic literacy and numeracy to advanced science, math, history, literature, music, art, etc. For two examples of what is available, check out Astronomy a Go-Go or Storynory.
Poisson Rouge (online resource) is a delightful website with a variety of activities to help develop basic literacy (French and English), numeracy, and other thinking skills. There are also simple art and music activities. All activities here provide excellent mouse practice. There are absolutely no ads at this site. Nor are there any onscreen instructions to follow. This is a quality site for young children.
Rainforest Math (Online Resource) This website contains literally hundreds of high quality online math activities for K-6. Activities are organized by grade level, and cover the whole mathematical spectrum–basic counting and numeracy, computation, algebra, measurement (including time), geometry (space), probability, data graphing, money, etc. This really is a gold mine of appealing and varied activities designed to practice and extend math skills and understanding. This is a truly free resource. There aren’t even any distracting ads to contend with.
Reconstructors (online resource) In this set of online activities, you join a team from the future to solve medical mysteries of the past. The learning adventures involve investigative problem solving. Doing the science requires analysis of history and geography. These excellent activities have been developed bythe Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning at Rice University. The activities are supported by a well prepared set of learning objectives and teacher resources.
Roxie’s ABC Fish (downloadable program) This free “Go Fish” game reinforces learning of upper and lower case letters as well as numbers to 100. Find out more and download at Lattice Work Software
SenseLang Typing Tutor (downloadable program and online resource) This is a free typing tutor program that you can download to your computer. Actually, you can either download the program or practice online at http://www.senselang.com/ It is easy to add your own text for practice exercises with this program. If you need to learn to type on a Hebrew keyboard, that is also an option with this program.
SENSwitcher (online resource) is a suite of 132 activities designed to help teach computer skills to people with profound and multiple learning difficulties, especially those who need to develop skills with alternative input devices. These sequenced activities target skills sequentially, from purely experiential through cause and effect, switch building, timed activation, targeting and row scanning.
The activities have been developed by InclusiveTechnology and implementation strategies have been prepared by the folks at Priory Woods. This systematic set of activities have been designed to be used online or downloaded to be used offline. We have experienced difficulties in installing the programs after downloading them, but they work fine online. SENSwitcher, along with support material, can be found at Northern Grid.
Sight Words Buddy is a completely free downloadable program designed to help build basic literacy skills. This program is made up of a set of activities that provide practice in identifying sight words. The words are from the Dolch word list, and there are four practice levels–from pre-primer to third grade. The user interface is clean and the activities are simple. Each word is spoken in a clear natural voice, and the learner simply clicks on the word that he or she hears. The program can be downloaded from Quiz Tree. Other literacy building activities can also be done online at the Quiz Tree website.
Soda Play (online resource) This site offers the opportunity for online creative play and exploration. You can make and race virtual soda straw creations. The site is evolving, with a vision for even greater things to come.
TeenSpace – Internet Public Library for Teens (online resource) The part of the Internet Public Library that is geared toward teens is a truly amazing free resource for teens and those who support them. This website offers a large and well organized collection of valuable links that point teens to sources of relevant information–both academic and otherwise. The site is uncluttered and ad-free.
To give some idea of the range of material that is catalogued, the home page features the following “Hot Topics”: Homework Help; A+ Writing; Graphic Novels Guide; Poetry Wiki; FAEQs (Frequently Asked Embarrassing Questions); Procrastinator. The home page’s “Directory” consists of the following headings: Clubs and Organizations; Reading and Writing; Health and Sexuality; School and Homework Help; Money and Work; Sports, Entertainment and Arts; Technology. This site and many of its component pages deserve to be bookmarked.
Virtual Electricity Lab (downloadable program) has been around for a while, but it is still very cool if you want to have fun exploring how electrical circuits work. Virtual Electricity Lab offers a selection of batteries, switches, bulbs, fans, and audio devices. Your job is to figure out how to connect them on a circuit board to make it all work. If you wish, you can have resistors, capacitors, and breakers to work with, along with meters to measure volts, amps, and ohms. There are suggested circuits to try, and even an opportunity to take and save bitmap snapshots of the circuits you do make. There is a built in reference and glossary of relevant terms. This program was developed originally by Edmark, which is now Riverdeep You can still purchase the full program, along with a set of lesson plans from Riverdeep. Or, you can download the free demo from http://www.wsd1.org/LTCActivities/46%20Freeware/virtual_labs_electricity.htm. (Unfortunately, it seems that Riverdeep is no longer permitting the free version of this program to be downloaded.)
Wikipedia (online resource) Wikipedia is a truly remarkable online resource. It is an online encyclopedia offering an incredible wealth of information on a huge range of subjects. Since this site has been constructed as a wiki, you and your students even have the opportunity to add to this amazing online resource. Here’s how Wikipedia describes itself: “Begun in 2001, Wikipedia has rapidly grown into the largest reference website on the Internet. The content of Wikipedia is free, written collaboratively by people from all around the world. This website is a wiki, which means that anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer can edit, correct, or improve information throughout the encyclopedia, simply by clicking the edit this page link…”
Writing Fix (online resource) Here’s an interesting free resource for anyone involved in teaching or learning writing skills. This site has been put together by the writers, teachers and students of the Northern Nevada Writing Project to support the development of writing skills with the Six Trait Model. The site hosts an extensive collection of lessons, activities and other resources. (The Writing Fix is one of 190 web sites sponsored by the National Writing Project in the US.)
Featured prominently at the Writing Fix are two separate “prompt generators”. One is called the “Interactive Instant Plot Creator”. You press separate buttons to bring up random suggestions for setting, character, and conflict. To go along with this idea generator, there is a downloadable “pre-writing worksheet” as well as a “rough draft worksheet”. The other generator is called the “Random Prompt Generator for Writers”. This second prompt generator consists of 470 prompts, each of which begins with a question that is followed by a suggested writing task.
