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Virtual Teacher Newsletter April 14th , 2000 No. 3
THE FREE ONLINE FORTNIGHTLY IT TEACHERS' NEWSLETTER
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Subscribe: cathy@virtualteacher.com.au (put 'subscribe' in the subject)
Or visit: http://www.virtualteacher.com.au
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Contact: cathy@virtualteacher.com.au
Website: http://www.virtualteacher.com.au
Newsletter Archives can be found at:-
http://www.virtualteacher.com.au/archives.html
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CONTENTS
1. Welcome
2. Mind Candy
3. Search Engines
4. Sue Unveiled
5. Technical Stuff- downloads.com
6. K-2 Sites
7. Great Sites to Check Out
8. Readers Comments
9. Code of 'Netizens'
10. Tips
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1. Welcome to all our new subscribers. We have passed 200 subscribers
representing 137 different schools and organisations, the newsletter is now
accessible to approx 1,300 teachers. Raissa of Chicago has sent me
information on an interactive Electronic Field Trip intended for grades
K-12. An all day live web broadcast it's incredibly exciting stuff with
loads of student activities and lots of brilliant research material.
Natalie's beartime site is just fantastic for K-3 classes. And...you'll
just love Marianne's excellent recommendation of webhound - what a way to
work the web - wicked. It's great to see so many contributors to this
newsletter from all corners of the globe, keep the contributions coming.
Have a good holiday.
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2. Mind Candy 2
"Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work."
Cindy S.M.
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"Kids need love the most when they're acting most unlovable."
Tamara Schmidt
Technology Coordinator
Sioux Valley Schools
Volga, SD - USA
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Without the rain ... there would be no rainbows!!
Without the lightning ... there would be no ozone!!
Vicki Powell, M.Ed.
Technology Project Coordinator
Neil Armstrong School - USA
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Subject: History of the World
The following is a history of the world from the Egyptians to the beginning
of the First World War, "pasted together from real sentences written by
students on history exams in the U.S." (including the little-known and
rather discomforting suggestion that "Sir Francis Drake circumcised the
world with a 100-foot clipper")... it gets worse, read the rest here:-
http://www.virtualteacher.com.au/history.html
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A solutions to school fire drills - the bomb expert t-shirt
http://www.virtualteacher.com.au/media/advice.jpg
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I am finding your newsletter very helpful.
Thought you might like this, came from a teaching friend in Canada
SPELL CHEQUE
Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.
Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.
As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore too long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.
Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My checker tolled me sew
Regards JR
Thanks JR, I think this would be an excellent activity for students to
correct. Check out the activity sheet I made for it, and download for
classroom use FREE.
http://www.virtualteacher.com.au/spellcheq.pdf
Send in your suggestions.
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3. Search Engines
Everybody has their favourite search engines. Some are more suitable for
student searches than others. I like to place my favourite search engines
in a handy place. This can be in a folder called 'search engines' in your
bookmarks file. On the toolbar of your browser(eg in Netscape, you do this
by using the "edit bookmarks" command and then drop and drag the Icon of the
search engine you want onto your toolbar). Or on your webpage, this is
especially suitable for school sites, preferred search engines can be added
to your website and students can click to use these search engines from the
school's website. I recommend that you choose a couple of search engines
and get to know them really well. The trick with search engines is to ask
a good question, and/or to select relevant descriptive key words. Be
flexible and try a number of alternative descriptions if your first attempt
is fruitless. Make sure you bookmark sites and then edit your bookmarks
into relevant folders so that you can track discovered information.
http://www.yahoo.com.au - optional Australian sites and international sites
also provides a same search click to for : altavista, direct hit, goto,
infoseek, northern light, deja.com,hotbot, etc
http://www.anzwers.com/ - Australian search engine
http://www.yahooligans - search engine for kids, kids sites, educational
sites
http://www.askjeeves - answers questions about any topic.
http://www.ajkids - answers children's questions, children's sites will be
found here, also educational sites.
http://www.google - love the name, quick returns, relevant hits - general
http://www.aaa.com.au/matilda/ - Australian website - waltz onto the web,
education section.
http://www.about.com - general site - with category headings - including
education, and excellent educational resource.
http://www.edna.edu.au/ edna - education network australia - links to
educational sites in Australia.
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There are a lot of great places to learn more about the net and how
individual search engines work try these out:-
http://www.learnthenet.com/english/index.html
Here you can find out about Boolean this and that, advanced searches, meta
searches, Robots, Spiders, Worms, Wanderers, and Other Critters.
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Cool Tip (Netscape users)
Let your browser do the work for you - type in 'Go' then the site you want
into the URL address section and you will find either a unique match or
number of possible sites listed.
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One of our readers recommends this great site:-
I do teacher trainings at my school and I just love this comprehensive site
for using the Internet. Teachers can access it from any convenient location
at any convenient time. It is very simple, and it includes a training
manual.
<http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/webhound/index.html>
Enjoy!
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/show/what/warmup1.html
-- Marianne Hart Bishop Ludden Jr/Sr High Technology Coordinator ========================================================== 4. SUE UNVEILED May 17, 2000 An interactive Electronic Field Trip intended for grades K-12 All day broadcast Sue is the real thing. If you let your imagination wander back to a moment in time 67 million years ago, you can almost hear the echoing roar of an ancient beast. Back then, the 7-ton, 42 foot-long Tyrannosaurus rex was ruler of its domain. Now Sue, the largest, most complete and best preserved Tyrannosaurus rex ever found, will reign once again -- this time at The Field Museum in Chicago! This site has great resources as well. http://ali.apple.com/events/field Raissa A. Jose Project Coordinator, Educational Media e-mail: rjose@fmnh.org More on this next newsletter. ========================================================== 5. Technical Stuff Download 'Eudora 4.3' - this excellant email program is free, provided you're prepared to put up with a few adds and deal with multiple personaltities. Quite frankly I love the personalities this is a great plus for me. The email program works as smooth as silk, and provides for a number of downloads from various addresses with 'checkmail' command, and also the multiple personalties, a real plus. These allow you to have more than one 'from' address availabe for outgoing mail at the click of a button - very cool. The address book in this program is getting better and better; I love it, especaillay at this price - FREE. http://eudora-survey.qualcomm.com/live/download for both MAC and Windows ========================================================== 6. Great K- 2 site This site is fantastic for K-2 classes on the net. There are stories and poems to read, printouts, and songs, all beautifully illustrated. The site uses big print, and some animated gifs. Have a bear day with your K-2 class and use this site as one of the activities http://www.beartime.com/ Natalie@BearTime.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- This is an interesting site with some good colour matching activities. http://www.funschool.com/ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- Lots of Links to sites for various age groups K-6 http://www.kidinfo.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- This site has good photos and information on actual farm animals as well as a narration by a child. http://www.kidsfarm.com/farm.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- Also the zoom farm animals site is worth a look, this is such a great site with printables and loads of accessible information. http://www.EnchantedLearning.com/coloring/farm.shtml ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- I love this site - clues are given if you have patience. More suitable for Year 2. http://www.kidscom.com/orakc/Games/Tangram/game1/tangram01.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- Try this site for disguises - Year K-2 will love this site. Great for language development and lots of laughs. http://www.kidscom.com/orakc/Games/Disguises/index.html
Choose your Jigsaw from a 6 piece puzzle to more complex versions. http://www.jigzone.com/ All these links are on the ALL NEW K-2 page - Use them in your classroom from there. http://members.optusnet.com.au/~comfilm1/YearK2.html ========================================================== 7. Great Sites to Check Out Using Computers in the Primary Classrooms - Great site with lots of good ideas and How toos. http://www.ozxpress.com.au/~dmorgan/textpages/
Here's some fantastic classic Maths Puzzles for upper primary and secondary students from our very own 'Questacon' . Needs Shockwave. http://www.questacon.edu.au/body_puzzles.html
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders site. Has excellent reference list of text and stories for K-12. This site also has an fantastic links page. http://www.acsa.edu.au/indigenous/index.htm
Library Site - this would have to be the definitive library site - filled with amazing resources. http://www.libraryspot.com/
Some great suggestions for maths games in the classroom ages 5-11 http://www.teachingideas.co.uk/maths/contents.htm
This is a great links site for teacher tools and includes a lot of educational links. http://www.lane.k12.or.us/districts/pleasanthill/Schools/High/teacher_tools. htm
Check out these excellent Teacher resources sent in by Linda at Teacher tidbytes. these will keep you busy all through the holidays http://www.teachertidbytes.com ========================================================== 8. Readers Comments Hello Cathy! I enjoy your newsletter Linda,Webmaster
Dear Kathy, Kudos to your excellent newsletter and web site! It's just the sort of thing I would have wished for ......... Natalie Lintner
The Mind Candy on the chicken crossing the road convinced me. Nora Boekhout boekhout@moody.bc.ca ========================================================== Next Issue Virtual Teacher will take a look at ESL and LOTE resources on the web. Some wags have said I need a page of links for these folks, so I will set one up for the next issue. If you have any good ideas send them along. I am also looking to review some great school sites, so if your school has a good site send along the URL and I will review it here. I have had requests for more information about the contributors to this newsletter. In future I will publish your name, school/organisation and email address along with your contribution - unless otherwise requested - so please include them. This should be great, and should get everyone connected. Should you not wish your name published just let me know, and I will credit your contribution to anon. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------- 9. Code of the 'Netizens' This Newsletter is not free, despite the misleading advertising above. The Fee is now due. Each week you must help one colleague on the internet who has less knowledge than you. Help that person even if you have to visit their classroom or do a little research and get back to them. Trust me, this will help a lot of people get their computer classrooms running better. OK I'm trusting you!!! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------- 10. TIPS 1. Double click on highlighted URLS to open in browser. 2. Send in your Questions, Questions will be published with Answers, send in your Answers, if you have expertise to share. 3. Nominate a brilliant site for review and inclusion in this newsletter. 4. Nominate a fantastic school site for review and inclusion in this newsletter. 5. Make contact with other schools using fantastic programs. 6. Prepare and innovative article for this newsletter. 7. Tell 2 colleagues about this newsletter. ========================================================== The opinions expressed here are purely those of the editor, Cathy Brown. All other small print clauses apply. Such as: Use at your own risk. Nothing in life is guaranteed. If it doesn't work for you send me an email. Editor: cathy brown mailto:comfilm1@optusnet.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------- Delivered FREE to your e-mail box every week. Online Lesson Plans, Great Sites, Free Stuff, Tips, Time savers, and templates. Computer Solutions for Primary School Teachers. Subscribe today! It's totally Free! Just type subscribe in the subject and send it to me. cathy@virtualteacher.com.au ========================================================== Reach a growing audience of teachers, by advertising in the Virtual Teacher Newsletter or on the Virtual Teacher site. For more information contact, cathy@virtualteacher.com.au ==========================================================
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