Reach Out Reporter is a free service that provides science stories for elementary school students. The site is updated weekly with videos, articles, and graphics. There is a section in Reach Out Reporter called Fact Pack. In the fact pack section you will find sets of short videos and or images arranged around a central topic.
Applications for Education
All sections of Reach Out Reporter include discussion question suggestions for teachers.
A quick note of clarification: Reach Out Reporter is based in the U.K. therefore dates on articles are formatted with the day before the month.
Even in the most tech-laden schools you can still walk into almost any classroom and find a dry-erase marker and whiteboard. Whether it's to write a reminder for your students or to spell out a key term, it's quick and easy to scribble on whiteboard. But what is in those dry-erase markers we use? And how do they work? The answers to those questions and more are offered in the following episode of Ingredients on National Geographic's YouTube channel.
Applications for Education
When I have shared previous episodes in this series I have suggested having students attempt to re-create and or improve on the formula. I'm not sure that is a good idea in the case of dry-erase markers. Instead, I'll suggest using a tool like Vizia to create a flipped lesson based on the video.
Thanks in part to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer some children don't believe that reindeer (caribou) are real animals. SciShow Kids seeks to remedy that in their latest video 4 Facts to Know About Reindeer. Through the video kids can learn why reindeer are called caribou in North America. The lesson also teaches students how reindeer have adapted to find food and stay warm in cold weather. The video concludes with an explanation of why reindeer migrate.
To create a flipped lesson based on this video try using Vizia or EDPuzzle.
Good evening from Woodstock, Maine where we were treated to a beautiful sunset over the mountains. While it was a cold day, it was still a nice day to go look for a Christmas tree on my land. The search for a Christmas tree was abandoned when my dogs decided to run off in pursuit of a secret dog agenda. They came back. We'll look for a tree again tomorrow. Wherever you are this weekend, I hope that you had time for something fun too.
Online whiteboards that let students communicate in realtime either by voice or text can be powerful tools to create a mathematics tutorial, create a diagram, or to brainstorm ideas for a project. The following three whiteboard tools can all be used by students for free.
NoteBookCast is a free whiteboard tool that will work in the web browser on a laptop, iPad, Android tablet, and Windows tablet. NoteBookCast is a collaborative whiteboard tool. You can invite others to join your whiteboard by entering the code assigned to your whiteboard. You can chat while drawing on NoteBookCast whiteboards. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how to use NoteBookCast.
Web Whiteboard makes it easy to include a whiteboard in your Google+ Hangout. In the video embedded below I demonstrate how easy it is to use Web Whiteboard in a Google+ Hangout.
Stoodle is a free collaborative whiteboard tool hosted by the CK12 Foundation. You can use text chat while sharing your whiteboard. Registration is not required in order to use Stoodle. In the video embedded below I demonstrate the features of Stoodle.
