Explore Russia With the Russian Street View Gallery

Earlier this week Google added Street View imagery of Russia to Google Maps. Now you can explore historic landmarks in Moscow and St. Petersburg from a ground level perspective. Using the Google Maps API, Keir Clarke at Google Maps Mania has pulled together many of the Street View images to create the Russian Street View Gallery.

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Applications for Education
Just as with other Street View images, the Russian Street View Gallery is a step or two better than having students just look at static pictures of the places that they're learning about. The next time you're teaching a lesson about the Russian Revolution use the Street View imagery to them explore the grounds of the Winter Palace.

The Spangler Effect - Experiments and Explanations

The Spangler Effect is a new YouTube channel from Steve Spangler Science. Unlike his popular Sick Science videos which are no more than short demonstrations of science experiments students and parents can do at home, The Spangler Effect videos offer longer (15 minutes or so) explanations of science experiments. The Spangler Effect videos explain the science of do-it-yourself experiments and how you can recreate those experiments at home or in your classroom.

Below you can see the Newton's Pendulum episode of The Spangler Effect.


Applications for Education
If you're looking for some science experiments that students can do at home with their parents, The Spangler Effect and Sick Science videos offer some good ideas to pass along.

Collaborize Classroom Offers an iOS App

Collaborize Classroom is a free service that host websites for teachers that I wrote about last spring. I recently revisited Collaborize Classroom and learned that they now offer an iPad and iPhone app for teachers and students. The app provides access to the discussion features, assignment posts, other elements that teachers add to their Collaborize Classroom websites.

Applications for Education
The Collaborize Classroom iOS app could be a handy app for students to use to access important course information and activities. If a student has multiple teachers that use Collaborize Classroom he or she can access all of those teachers' sites through one app.

LearnZillion Math Videos Now Available in Mastery Connect

Disclosure: Mastery Connect is an advertiser on Free Technology for Teachers.

Among other things related to Common Core standards Mastery Connect hosts an active community of teachers who are sharing lesson ideas built around the Common Core standards. Now you can also find more than 300 LearnZillion videos in the Mastery Connect community. LearnZillion videos provide math lessons tied to Common Core standards for grades three through nine.

Applications for Education
If you would like to include a video element to your classroom lessons, take a look at the LearnZillion videos found in the Mastery Connect community. If you're not familiar with the Mastery Connect community, here are a few highlights: As a member of the community you can browse and download the materials shared by other educators. As a member of the community you can share your own materials. All materials found on Mastery Connect are tied to specific Common Core standards. You can also follow and have threaded Twitter-style discussions with other members of the community.

Watchily - Search Multiple Video Providers With One Click

If you've ever been searching for a movie or television show that you want to show in school or watch at home, but you have been frustrated by performing the same search on multiple sites, try Watchily next time.

Watchily is a search engine that pulls results from popular movie and television show providers. Enter your search in Watchily and get results from Hulu, Netflix, Vudu, HBOGo, iTunes, Amazon, MaxGo, Comcast XFINITY, Redbox, and Showtime Anytime. Watchily results can be refined according to movie/ television content rating, price, duration of video, genre, and hosting service.

Applications for Education
Watchily is not going to change the way we teach or the way that students learn, but it could save you time the next time you're looking for a video that you want to use in your classroom.