The following websites are both free and educational, spanning the academic spectrum across multiple disciplines and age groups. With a little guidance these sites should help students have a great time while exploring the wealth of knowledge around them.

1. Howstuffworks

Howstuffworks is a site is geared toward older kids or teens (or just curious adults), although it is also a great site to use as a resource. Great for those kids who have science based questions about consumer products, current events or just topics adults rarely stop to explain.

2. Factmonster

Factmonster is essentially a searchable encyclopedia for kids. Information can either be found by typing in the search bar or by following the link to various topics, like ‘money’, ‘people’ or ‘sports’.

3. Professor Garfield

At Professor Garfield students will learn about various academic topics with a focus on art and creativity. Students can make their own cartoons and watch videos of artists at work in a number of genres.

4. Funbrain

Funbrain has tutorials and games for such subjects as grammar, math and reading for all grade levels, including more advanced subjects like physics and chemistry. You can search games by grade level or age.

5. BBC Schools Typing

Typing is not a skill that we generally think to teach young children, but it certainly makes sense to start this indispensable skill early. At BBC Schools Typing, kids of all ages can learn to type with the fun tutorials.

6. Try Science

Try Science is an engaging website where kids can do virtual experiments or take virtual field trips related to science. Through the virtual adventures kids get to go through the stars or race across various terrain.

7. Internet4Classrooms

Internet4Classrooms is a comprehensive resource for all academic subjects and is easily navigated according to grade level and subject. Resources and links include both games and supplemental materials.

8. Kidsknowit

Kidsknowit is a network of free sites, each focused on a different academic area. Kidsgeo.com focuses on geology and geography, while Kidsbiology.com explores the human body and at Kidspast.com you can find games that help make history fun and memorable.

9) Kids National Geographic

Kids National Geographic is all the scope and depth of National Geographic brought down to kids size. The kid-friendly site includes dozens of games and activities based on geography, culture, science, adventure, nature and animals.

10. CoolMath4Kids and Cool Math

Coolmath4kids is full of fun puzzles and games designed to help elementary aged kids have fun with math. Coolmath focuses on pre-algebra and beyond and aims to get kids to have fun with math and overcome and negative feelings about difficult math topics.

This post was inspired by Mashable’s 10 Sites to Learn Something New in 10 Minutes a Day.

Google Wave is a new service from the internet giant that has the potential to greatly enhance the way students communicate with each other when creating group projects for class. Wave combines many of the best features and benefits of other real time editing tools into a near total solution for group work and project development.

When Google Wave is launched a student or educator will immediately be presented with a window where waves are separated into viewing fields in the center and right hand side of the screen. A handy organizer (much like an e-mail folder lit) and contact’s list are present on the left side.

A button aptly labeled “New Wave” will start a new project, and this is where a teacher or student can really begin to utilize the features of this service. If a social studies class project requires four partners to work together to create a presentation, then each of the four students can be quickly added to a new Wave specific to their assignment.

Each participant can log in and out of the Google service from home, school, or a public library while conducting independent research. Videos, pictures, and other attachments can be uploaded directly into the Wave viewing field for quick and easy access to all source materials; this also provides an easy way to back-up all versions of a project!

Wave provides many handy features and keyboard shortcuts that make it an ideal choice for schools where students are encouraged to utilize laptops for note taking and homework assignments. Students can add materials, chat about the progress of a class project, and more after mastering a few quick commands provided in an introductory video to Wave compiled by Google (this video will show up in a sample wave the first time the service is accessed).

Teachers concerned about unevenly balanced workloads within a group project can easily view a Wave with the built-in playback feature and see the development of the Wave (and research) to ensure that all students are properly credited for work done. Teachers can also use this feature to ensure that all participants are behaving according to school rules when communicating with each other in the course of a classroom assignment and to make sure that no instances of cyber-bullying occur. Parents and teachers can also rest assured their students are safe, as Waves can only be viewed by contacts who have been cleared to contribute to the project.

Google Wave provides a tremendous amount of benefits to the teacher or student wishing to maintain a hub for real time project collaboration in a controlled environment. Classroom and school utilization of Google Wave will help students learn the collaborative skills needed to succeed in a business world that centers around social media integration and introduce them to practical applications of technology.

Google Wave demo video:


This post has been republished from the Intand Blog.

Ning is a social networking platform that allows any user to create their own social network in a relatively quick amount of time for free. In an educational context, there are countless of ways to integrate Ning into a school or school system.

A Ning social network has a main page that serves as a hub for the entire network. From this hub users can fan out into blog posts submitted within the network, photos uploaded to the pages, a calendar section, and user-driven forums. Schools, teachers, and school districts can all create Ning social networking groups to further communication between administrators, parents, and students.

Each part of a school can utilize Ning in a different way. For instance, a school board can create a Ning community to keep parents up to date on district developments and conversations can be held within the Ning forum concerning proposed legislation that will affect local schools and improvements parents would like to see within the system as a whole.

While schools and school boards can leverage the power of social networking effectively, a lot of Ning’s real appeal for educators focuses on teachers. Whether they are on the site as members of an educator’s group or as owners of a network tailor-made to suit the needs of their students, teachers have a lot of options.

Teachers can create a social network focused on bringing together English or math teachers to network ideas and provide insight into course specific issues. A class specific Ning could feature test dates, a list of homework assignments and projects due, and links to internet resources that can provide homework help or additional insight into a classroom theme. Since a Ning features customizable privacy options, including the ability to make a Ning invitation-only or private, the safety of students accessing the material can be assured.

The value of social networking in education is only beginning to be fully realized, and Ning is on the cutting edge of specialty networks created to bring together a specific group of people - like educators and their students.

Teachers.tv is a dynamic site featuring a wide variety of educational videos for several different grade levels. While the site is based in the United Kingdom, the topics touched upon will provide an excellent learning aid to students worldwide. However, the usefulness of the site is not limited to students, both teachers and parents can use teachers.tv to find new ways to present content to their students or pick up tips from numerous videos focusing on educational concepts.

Teachers.tv contains instructionals covering the basic school subjects such as English, math, and science but also incorporates several electives. Videos on art classes, religious studies, music, and foreign language are also readily available for viewing. The content is easily divided into sections based on learning needs; Early learning, primary education, and secondary education classes are all covered.

The videos on teachers.tv vary in length with some as short as three minutes. One example of a short video entails a visit to the home of Charles Dickens - the short running time allows for the program to be implemented into an English period without draining a large block of class time. On days when a longer project is desired, there are plenty of additional options to choose from.

On the teachers.tv web-site, instead of the format for each class or video being the same, each teacher or video instructor is able to inject their own personality and teaching techniques into their presentation. A prime example of this is John Heely who leads several videos on teachers.tv focusing on algebra and algebraic concepts. Heely’s videos have a quality that rivals public television productions while maintaining a definite focus on presenting math in a relatable manner.

Whether they do it through the course of home study or as part of the school day, students will have no trouble identifying favorite subjects and instructors on teachers.tv. On a slow day for learning at school or for additional help mastering a new concept, students will never be without new educational material after a visit to this site.

Aviary features a wide variety of free tools to enhance the photo editing and graphic creation process. The tools and web-based programs available at Aviary.com can be easily used by students to create dynamic reports, educational fair projects, and slideshows for any subject.

Aviary features six core applications: Phoenix, Toucan, Peacock, Myna, Raven, and Falcon. Each program can stand alone as a creative tool, but some, such as Phoenix, can bring in elements from other applications to enhance projects.

Phoenix is an image editor that features a wide variety of tools to enhance photographs or assist in the crafting of new images from a blank file. It contains many features that are found in software packages such as Adobe Photoshop and Corel Paint Shop Pro, such as the ability to edit in layers and add unique filters. For a student who wants to add a deep visual element to a school report or display photos, this program will work well. Text can be added to pictures to eliminate the need for a separate caption and the clone stamping feature can be utilized to remove unneeded elements from a photo.

Toucan, the color editor from Aviary.com is useful for a student who is planning a project where a coordinated color scheme will come in handy. The various controls can be toggled to bring up a palette of compatible colors which can then be saved to a clipboard.

Peacock is an effects editor which features a drag and drop interface. Starting with a central canvas, various patterns and filters can be dropped onto the workspace and connected with the canvas to create unique files that would be perfect as backgrounds or accent pieces in a science or social studies fair presentation or slideshow.

Myna is an exceedingly easy to use audio editor perfect for the student who is crafting a presentation that needs to utilize various sound bites or feature a prerecording of various elements. It could also be used to create a podcast promoting school related activities.

Aviary.com has an exceedingly well-developed vector editor in Raven. Raven will provide any student with the ability to create stunning graphics for projects, reports, displays, and school related publications. Aviary features a wide variety of tutorials and guides to ensure that this program does not leave an eager learner behind. The diversity of Raven also means it can be a fitting alternative to the typical art class. With the various effects and dimensions that can be added to graphics, stunning art can be crafted which makes Raven perfect for encouraging creativity.

Falcon Image Markup is the last Aviary program currently available. This is another photo editing program, but its focus is not so much enhancing photos as adding to them. A selection of arrows, straight lines, and pencil strokes can be placed on any photo or created file within Falcon. This could work out particularly well when wanting to give a school presentation a more personalized and dynamic feel.

With the wide range of web-based photo and art programs to be found at Aviary.com, school students and parents can concentrate more on creating and less on the prohibitive cost of many designer programs. It also has the advantage of going home with students since it is free and can be used through a browser. Most schools will not let students take home computers with Adobe Creative Suite, which costs about $400 per license for the student version.

This post has been republished from the Intand Blog.

In blogs, educators are discovering a new tool for engaging students who live in a world increasingly dominated by technology. By incorporating blogging into the school environment, educators can capitalize on the social media explosion, turning a potentially isolating medium into a window of discovery and self-expression as well as a bridge to the broader learning community.

Naturally when confronted with change there will be some resistance among educators to adopt and embrace this new medium, just as the advent of the internet posed a classroom challenge. Yet the reality is that today’s students are already immersed in social media and schools can either seize this new opportunity or play the proverbial ostrich. Ideally educators will lead and not lag behind at this transformative moment by encouraging youth to utilize this amazing technology as more than just an entertaining diversion.

Subscription services like EdublogsCampus, based on the WordPress platform, provide the technical framework and support to get schools started. Luckily for educators, tech-savvy students make excellent navigators, and engaging their help fosters a spirit of cooperation and sense of mastery. Classroom blogs can serve any number of purposes, as student newspaper, sharing information, writing practice, homework submission and testing forum, tracking tool for parents, online calendar, and so on. Security is of course a key concern, and web-hosting services offer custom access levels to assure student safety and confidentiality.

Blogging is a natural for facilitating extension of lessons, replacing old norms of information regurgitation and bringing lessons to life through interactivity, journaling and use of multi-media. Blogging provides the ideal avenue for sharing the learning experience, furnishing a vehicle for budding photographers, poets and artists to share their talent in a non-threatening forum. Blogs offer a creative outlet and give students a voice in what may be their only outlet or experience of being heard.

Beginning at the earliest school level, introducing blogs into the classroom fosters an environment of cooperation and recognition of the talents of each individual. At the same time, students are learning and applying technical and communication skills that they will take into the workplace, fulfilling the ideal of learning as an ongoing process and lifelong journey.

This post has been republished from the Intand Blog.

While the thought of Facebook as a learning tool might elicit some skepticism, savvy students are discovering uses for the ubiquitous social media site beyond trading gossip and playing games. In fact, Facebook offers an array of applications geared to student needs. Web tools like Do Research 4 Me, Wikiseek Search, and JSTOR Search take the tedium and legwork out of researching term papers. Applications are available for homework assistance, forming virtual study groups, finding the best deals on textbooks, and of course Rate My Professors.

Teachers are getting aboard the Facebook bandwagon and establishing accounts of their own, finding it an effective bridge beyond the classroom, freeing them of late night calls from frantic pupils and parents seeking last-minute information on the week’s spelling words or a project due the next day. Facebook also fills a crucial gap as a forum for providing homework guidance and lesson-extending tutorials that may be lacking for latch-key kids. When Facebook is integrated into the learning environment, it helps create a safe online community that parents can feel confident about.

Facebook even provides opportunities for parent involvement through online interaction in a platform that is flexible enough to fit even the busiest schedule. As a conduit for communication it helps build teacher-student-parent relationships beyond the constraints of classroom walls and school schedules, and it does so in a way that is non-intrusive and non-threatening. A parent who dreads the idea of attending a parent-teacher conference after a long day of work and putting a meal on the family table is likely to relish being able to conduct a meeting at their fingertips. In this manner, Facebook creates new opportunities for dialogue between teachers, parents and students, spanning generational, geographic, and cultural distances. When students see that teachers are willing to “speak their language” and use the tools of their generation, amazing connections can occur.

Do you think Facebook has a role in education? Leave your comments below.

This post has been republished from the Intand Blog.

WordAhead is a vocabulary word centered website sure to be of help to any student who wants to do well on state administered standardized tests, the SAT, or ACT as well as increase their personal vocabulary. The WordAhead premise is a simple one. The site provides a video featuring each vocabulary word on the site and its definition. A casual user can utilize the site very passively by signing up for a word-a-day email, but there are also several unique features at WordAhead to allow a more active learner to get ahead.

At Wordahead, scientific studies emphasizing the importance of repetition as a learning device have been taken fully into account. During the videos presented for almost all vocabulary words, the actual word is repeated several times. A video for a word such as “adjourn” will start with the word being presented with its full definition while the information is also read aloud. Then, a still cartoon image is shown to illustrate the meaning of the word while several sentences are read presenting the word in context. In many of these sentences the word will be used at least twice and typically in multiple tenses (i.e. present and past tense).

A multitude of vocabulary words and definitions are presented on the site and many students will likely find that they are already familiar with certain words and do not need to thumb through them on every visit to the site. In this instance, a free Wordahead account can be created which will allow any user to create a customized word list featuring as many or as few definitions as needed.

When a customized word list is toggled from the drop down menu at WordAhead, the videos will automatically begin to play in the browser window. This feature can also be used by a teacher to create a word list centered around a current lesson plan or as a study aid for an upcoming test. Any vocabulary list can be shared with other WordAhead members through the use of a class specific name like “Mrs. White English I, Test 3 Word List.”

These customization features and the targeted word repetition, featuring learning through hearing a vocabulary word in context and seeing an illustration while reading the word’s definition, makes WordAhead a unique educational resource.

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English classes generate some of the more complex pieces of homework students are assigned during primary and secondary education. Between book reports, essays, creative writing challenges, and research papers, English demands a lot of time and effort be put forth in both the actual crafting of meaningful paragraphs and the research behind each assignment. Technology has presently caught up with the challenges issued by English teachers and several exceedingly handy tools can be utilized by students to expedite and organize their English assignments no matter the scope.

Finding a wide variety of credible sources for a research paper can be a daunting task for the best of students as many basic internet searches can pull up results that are either mostly irrelevant to the particular topic or do not contain enough verified information. Ultimate-research-assistant.com helps clear through some of the clutter by compiling the results of a search in an easy to read summary format in addition to providing a list of clickable links for additional research. A tag cloud featuring the search results is also presented in the right hand margin of the page and can provide insights into additional keywords to search out or topics to explore.

Zotero.org features a handy tool to expedite crediting sources used while writing a research paper. Zotero is a Mozilla Firefox extension that can be utilized as sources are gathered online. The extension will help compile data and create a properly formatted Bibliography in several different styles. By progressing with the bibliography as research material is acquired, students will not have to frantically scramble to identify which source provided what information from where. When the research paper is done, a simple copy and paste will suffice for creating a well-structured Bibliography.

Rhymezone is a fairly basic web-site as far as an online dictionary and thesaurus goes, but its real shining point exists in the assistance it provides for creative writing tasks or research papers. The site features a robust rhyming dictionary to help find the perfect word to close up a couplet, and the synonym and antonym feature brings up a variety of words to use when avoiding redundancy is key.

Simplifying some of the more complex components of a research paper or creative writing assignment using the educational tools presented above can help any student get a step ahead in English class.

Springnote is an free full-featured virtual notebook sure to inspire students and educators to greater levels of task and time organization, which in turns enhances learning. Anyone can create a Springnote account with a minimum of information.

The site allows members to enter a unique name which will then become a personalized URL. For example, “your name” would become http://www.yourname.springnote.com. At these personalized URLs a member’s notebooks are viewable to the individuals selected. Notebooks can either be private, shared with selected people, or entirely public. Each notebook can also contain numerous pages which can be assigned individual sharing rights.

A student could use one Springnote notebook to keep a detailed to do list of tasks for both home and school and make this list private while collaborating with a friend on a separate notebook page for a science project. Teacher’s could also use the service in a similar fashion and create virtual notebook pages for each school subject taught and provide a handy online assignment list for each course. The contents of these subject pages could be shared with the entire class with a few clicks of the mouse.

If a multitude of notebook pages exist, then the Springnote tagging feature will help ease clutter. Users can assign specialized tags to each notebook page to group like materials together. An additional organizational feature sure to help out is the ability to link any item on a list or notebook page to another page within Springnote. A general class assignment, like a term paper, would appear on the English class assignment list and can link to a “Term Paper” notebook page full of additional requirements or preliminary notes.

Springnote users can also accomplish several other necessary tasks like attaching videos, pictures, or files to a specific notebook page with a couple of clicks. Formatted tables, equations, and maps can also be inserted in a snap from the notebook page header.

When any assignment or task is completed the notebook owner can either strike-through the entry, highlight it in a variety of colors, or simply use the delete or backspace key - any option will work. Springnote is full of unique options for students and teachers. The site can easily become a virtual notebook, agenda, and planning desk in a matter of minutes for any user.