online learning
Resources for STEM teachers
Submitted by blsams on Wed, 02/18/2009 - 10:33The Applied Math and Science Education Repository (AMSER) provides educational resources for those in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics fields. AMSER is funded by the NSF and the National Science Digital Library, created to compile and direct users to quality resources for people teaching and working in STEM fields. The AMSER website is easy to navigate and its resources are appropriately catalogued.
Digital Storytelling
Submitted by blsams on Wed, 02/04/2009 - 10:52When I taught English, I loved to tell stories to my students about the lives of the poets and authors we were studying. I liked reading literary biographies anyway, so I figured I could add some depth to the curriculum. For example, when we studied Modern Poetry and figures such as Wallace Stevens, Hart Crane, and E.A. Robinson, I ended (or began…or both!) each day with a little tale from William Pritchard’s Lives of the Modern Poets.
Creat(ing) Writing using PicLits
Submitted by blsams on Sat, 01/24/2009 - 13:39When I was a high school English teacher, I often tried to incorporate creative writing into study of contemporary poetry. I think creative writing is an important end-in-itself, but I also believe that as students struggle with and enjoy crafting poetry or short stories, they might attend with more care and appreciation to the details of other textual landscapes. Good reading assists good writing, but the reverse is true too.
SimplyBox
Submitted by blsams on Wed, 01/14/2009 - 09:59If you’re a teacher looking for great resources to improve the quality of your teaching, help you integrate technology into the classroom, or spice up your lesson plans visit Instructify. I did last week and read a blog entry by Jerry Swiatek on SimplyBox. This technology is an easy way for teachers to organize online material for student learning.
Community Spark
Submitted by blsams on Fri, 12/26/2008 - 15:45I recently discovered a site well worth checking out. Community Spark: Building Online Communities is a helpful, no nonsense resource for those wanting to design, build and maintain online learning communities. The resources on this site can be used for a variety of domains. The articles aren’t geared for a particular niche – like small business mangers, educators, or lovers of literature – but are generic enough to cut across these areas of inquiry.
Early experiences with online learning: reflections and new directions for thinking
Submitted by blsams on Tue, 12/16/2008 - 19:20The summer before my junior year of high school (in the late 90s), I took an online Algebra 2 course sponsored by a major state university (not in North Carolina). I soon discovered that I was my only resource! I took online exams/quizzes and submitted any question I had to an anonymous ‘system administrator’ – and usually no one responded with helpful feedback. There was absolutely no human element. The online supplemental worksheets provided repetition instead of clarifying potentially troubling concepts. Most times, it seemed like just me and the textbook.
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