A Multimedia Timeline of WWII in the Pacific

As any good student of history can tell you, the Pacific theater of World War II was just as complicated as the European theater. National Geographic has a multimedia timeline that can help students understand the sequence and significance of events in the Pacific theater.

World War II in the Pacific is a timeline that features dozens of events in text, image, and video form. Maps are included in many of the events to provide students with a better context in which to understand the events. The timeline begins in 1931 with Japan's occupation of Manchuria and moves through the bombing of Pearl Harbor and eventually to surrender in 1945.

This timeline was created by using Timeline JS. Timeline JS is one of the tools featured in my professional development course, Teaching History With Technology. 

Free Wall Maps for Your Classroom

Like good manners and flannel shirts, wall maps never go out of style. If you need some new maps to put on the walls of your classroom, take a look at the free maps that National Geographic offers. Nat Geo Map Maker kits provide teachers with files for printing wall maps, table top maps, and mega maps that might only fit on the floor of your classroom. All of the maps print in sections on standard size printer paper. You and your students will have to assemble the pieces of the maps.

There are eleven Nat Geo Map Maker kits. The kits offer United States political and physical maps, world political and physical maps, maps of Asia, Africa, Europe, North and South America, Australia and Oceania, polar region maps, and maps of New England.

Applications for Education
Looking at big maps on the walls of my classrooms is one of my favorite memories of elementary school. Looking at those maps sparked my curiosity about many things. I know those maps, complete with the borders of the late Cold War era in which I grew up, played a part in me eventually becoming a social studies teacher. Perhaps assembling some of the maps from the Nat Geo Map Maker kits will help you spark a student's interest in geography.

Join the 2018 Practical Ed Tech Coaching Group

Throughout the year I host at least two professional development webinars every month. For 2018 I am making it easy for you to register for all of them in one fell swoop. Enroll in the the 2018 Practical Ed Tech Coaching Group and you will be registered for 24 webinars plus an additional live Q&A session every month. That Q&A is only available to group members. Learn more about the live Q&A sessions in this video.


The 2018 Practical Ed Tech Coaching Group is for teachers, technology coaches, and teacher-librarians who desire to improve their knowledge of and skill in using educational technology.

This coaching group is designed to give you more than just webinars. Throughout the year you will be encouraged to try new things and to share your experiences with other group members. I’ll be here the whole time to answer your questions, give you feedback, and help you implement new ideas in your school.

Cost?
As I always say, the tools featured in my webinars are free, but my time for teaching is not free (and I'm sure you like to get paid for teaching too). The membership fee for the 2018 Practical Ed Tech Coaching Group is $247 if you register online by December 31st. There are also options for paying by purchase order, by check, or in quarterly installments. Click here for details on all registration options.

Another Neat Feature of Zoho Notebook

On Sunday I featured Zoho Notebook as an alternative to using Evernote or Google Keep. In that post I listed many of the features of Zoho Notebook including the options to draw notes and to record audio notes. One feature that I missed because I didn't discover it until today is the option to save entire PDFs into your Zoho Notebooks.

I discovered this feature today while doing some research on a mutual fund that I am thinking of adding to my IRA. When I opened the PDF in my web browser, Zoho Notebook automatically suggested saving it into one of my notebooks.

Applications for Education
Zoho Notebook's web clipper is an excellent tool for students to use to organize their findings into convenient notebooks. The option to add full PDFs into those notebooks could be used to students who need to reference whitepapers, journal articles, and other lengthy writings in their own research papers.

Cool Fellowships for Teachers

One of the coolest professional development opportunities that I know of is the Grosvenor Teacher Fellow Program. It is an annual program administered by National Geographic. This unique professional development program, open to teachers in the U.S. and Canada takes teachers on field work expeditions to interesting places all over the world. Some of the places teachers could go through the program include Antarctica, the Galapagos Islands, Iceland, Greenland, and Norway.


Applications are now being accepted. Your complete application is due by January 5th. The application process is not one that you can complete at the last minute. You need reference letters and you need to make a video. So if you think that you are interested, get started on your application today.