More Than 5,000 Historical Maps for Teachers and Students

Florida's Educational Technology Clearinghouse has a collection of more than 5,000 historical maps. The maps are licensed for free download and reuse by teachers and students. The collection is organized by continent and country. The US category is further broken down and organized by state and by historical theme.

Some of the maps in this collection are excellent maps to download and layer over Google Earth and Google Maps for the purpose of showing current maps and historic maps in the same screen. Learn how to do that during Tuesday's webinar about Google Earth, Google Maps, and virtual tour creator.

Applications for Education
Historical maps can be very useful in helping students to get a better sense of an entire historical event or story. These maps could be used as a supplement to a history lesson or as the beginning of an inquiry-based lesson. These maps could also be used as overlay images in Google Earth files that students develop.

Promethean Grant - Win an Interactive Whiteboard for Your Classroom

If you have desired to get an interactive whiteboard for your classroom, but budget has kept that wish from becoming reality then you should check out Promethean's "grant" program. Promethean calls it a grant program even though it seems more like a contest. To be eligible to be awarded a Promethean ActivPanel interactive whiteboard you must create a video that demonstrates your need for an interactive whiteboard and the impact that it would have on teaching and learning in your classroom. Entries will be judged based on creativity, need, and potential classroom impact.

Applications for Promethean's grant program will be accepted August 1st through November 1st. Teachers are encouraged to include students in the creation and production of their grant application videos. The complete program details can be found here. 

SciShow Kids Answers "Why Do Animals Have Tails?"

My daughters and my dogs' tails have a close relationship. Sometimes that relationship is tested by a quick grab of a tail and sometimes tested by a swishing tail to the face. But no matter what, my dogs always wag their tails when we come home. That, of course, begs the question, "why do animals have tails?" SciShow Kids has the answer to that question in their latest video. The video explains how some animals use their tails to communicate and some use them for balance. The video also explains why humans don't need tails.

Join Me on Tuesday at 4pm for a Webinar on Google Earth, Maps, and VR Tours

Tomorrow, July 24th, at 4pm Eastern Time I am hosting a Practical Ed Tech webinar all about Google Earth, Google Maps, and Google's VR Tour Creator.

During Tuesday's webinar you will learn:
1. How to create multimedia maps.
2. How to build virtual tours.
3. How to collaboratively create multimedia maps.
4. How to map data.
5. Options for multimedia mapping with students who don’t have email or Google accounts.

Click here to register!

About this post: The sale of my professional development online courses and my on-site professional development services provides the funding to keep Free Technology for Teachers running. The resources that I feature in my online courses and webinars are free. However, there is a significant cost associated with creating, hosting, and managing the courses and webinars which is why I am not able to provide them for free.