Resourceful Web Sites for Educators

Educators are some of the busiest people in the world. Constantly finding and discovering new resources to enrich their students learning. I have taken the time out to help make my fellow educators' life a little easier by providing you with some of the most awesome Web sites for the classroom or just to enhance your teaching experience. These sites are jam packed with resources, lesson plans, and more. You have to see them to believe them.

Education World:

Evaluation of the site: This is an educator's dream Web site. There is an abundance of resources for teachers all around. Teachers can gain access to lesson plans, site reviews, printables, 5 minute fillers, learning games and more. I found it very amusing how they included lessons that you can use with popcorn. Lessons like these will be sure to get the attention of your students. There are great motivational tools to help get students become motivated about participating in school. School Issues was a really great part of the site. This section discusses ways to improve your teaching techniques or issues that may arise for teachers. There was a specific question and answer section titled "No Educator Left Behind." This archive discussed how educator's are given district report cards and what kind of information that they provide. This was very informational, because I was unaware of the U.S. Department of Education compiling a report card for U.S. educators. There is also a section titled Technology Integration where teachers can gain access to ways to integrate technology into their curriculum.

U.S.Department of Education:

Evaluation of the site: I really like this Web site because it provides government approved Web sites for educators. I think that this is very important because the U.S. Department of Education is the center of American schools. This site provides educators with several links to lesson plans, primary documents, and teaching resources provided by the federal government. Educators can access information, lesson plans or Web sites in: Art, Health and P.E., Language Arts, Math, Science, World Studies, U.S. History Topics, and U.S. Time Periods. There are also links on how to organize instruction, improving teacher quality, tools for student success, cancellation and deferment options for teachers pertaining to student loans, and information on the teacher of the year awards. Teachers also have access to finding teacher opportunities, ways to improve student performance, information on student assessment, meeting students' needs, and professional development.

The Learning Web:

Evaluation of this site: This Web site is a great educational resource for educators and students. I really liked how this Web site added resource symbols next to the web links so that the viewer will understand the resources that are available. You will know which sites contain teaching tools, classroom activities, computer lab activities and resources, as well as, if you will have to pay to print pages or use tools on a particular site. There are great information, resources, fun activities for children, lesson plans and more in biology, geography, geology, and water. There is a great wealth of information on several topics and subsections within each of these subjects. Not only are their great resources for students K-12, there are also tons of information for undergraduate students. There are great articles, and even an "Ask A Geologist" link that allows you to receive a personal response to your questions from a USGS scientist. This site offers videos and animation as well as information about careers in science. This is really a great resourceful site.

Hot Chalk:

Evaluation of this site: Hot Chalk is a great site that I happened across. Hot Chalk is a networking site for teachers across the world to share ideas, lessons, and more. There are currently 442,426 teachers and 89,855 schools registered at this site. Teachers have access to book reviews, archives, lesson plans, resources, digital content and more. The list is continually growing. There are global sites in up to 11 different languages (i.e. Arabic, Chinese, German and more). They have some of the best videos to help get kids interested in subjects. One video I particularly observed was a motor bike math video. This is also great because it is free. Teachers and students can sign up for free and do not have to worry about paying out of pocket fees for wonderful resources unless you want a subscription that offers more access and resources. Teachers can manage their curriculum from this site using State Standards, resources, and more. Teachers can post their own lessons to share with other educators or look for lesson plans placed in the database by other educators.

Rubistar:

Evaluation of this site: I really have to say that I love Rubistar's Web site. If you need to make a rubric you can do it extremely fast on this site. I think that this is a great tool for teachers and this page must be bookmarked. The sign up, selecting the subject, and choosing categories were all easy. I loved how the levels per category were already designed and automatically entered into each appropriate box. Great tool, I have used over and over again.

I hope that this article will be of some benefit to you God willing.