Online Timeline Tools

Recently, a teacher asked me about a tool that would allow students to create a timeline. I knew that I had used some in the past but had either forgotten about them or had deleted any documentation of their use that may have been on my computer. So, in order to assist the teacher mentioned above, I had to do a little research. Below are the results of that research. At the bottom of this post is an example of a timeline I created on TimeToast.

Read*Write*Think Timeline From site: Creating timelines with this tool becomes an engaging activity for students as they choose from five different units of measure (date, time, event, entry, or other) and add specific descriptions of each entry. Once the entries have been added, students may navigate through any part of the timeline by simply clicking on the appropriate entry. Students may view and edit their draft timeline, then print the finished timeline for reference. This is a handy tool for classroom use that guides students through the process of organizing information in timeline form and results in a polished finished product.

XTimeline is a collaborative time line creation tool. XTimeline gives users the option to include photos, videos, text, and web links within each entry of the timeline. After creating a timeline the creators can invite people to comment on and discuss the timeline. Think of it as Youtube for timelines. Timelines created with XTimeline can be easily embedded into another website like a blog or a wiki for example.


Time Toast is a simple timeline builder. To add events to a timeline simply click on the inconspicuous "add an event" button and a simple event box pops up in which you can enter enter text, place a link, or add a picture. Time Toast does not have the more advanced editing options that X Timeline offers. What it offers instead is ease of use which makes it a suitable choice for students in elementary school or middle school.

Dipity is my favorite online timeline creation tool. It allows users to include not only text for entries, but also images, and videos in their timeline. Dipity also has a mapping feature which allows users to place a Google Maps bookmark that relates to the topic of the event, on to an entry in their timeline Like most Web2.0 tools, Dipity has multiple ways for users to Each entry to a Dipity timeline can include multiple types of media which allows users to add more detail and information than can be included in a traditional timeline.

PicLits.com

Many people, especially those with children, have those little magnetic words that they place on their refrigerator to make phrases. Imagine a website that provides that type of writing experience but also provides a picture to write about. PicLits is a great site to use whether you want students to write a sentence, paragraph, a poem, or even list descriptive words in order to capture the essence or meaning of the picture. Once users select a picture, they have a choice of using the word bank that is provided to create their writing or they can simply go "freestyle" and write what they wish on their own. If the user wants to save a copy of the PicLit they created, they will need to create an account for themselves (its free) or possibly they could sign in under their teacher's account.


See the full PicLit at PicLits.com

Poem Flow

Poem Flow is an App created for the iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad that displays a daily poem line by line to viewers. Everyone can see the same poem on the same day creating an instant, invisible community of simultaneous readers. The poems are from a mix of the greatest poems in English. But, even if you do not have those devices, you can still utilize this poetry resource online. After viewing Poem Flow, I immediately thought about, after students became familiar with it, how cool it would be to have them create their own Poem Flows by using KeyNote. Students could use a photo of of an iPod, iPad, TV, or just about anything, and then create slides or builds with text boxes. Students could export their Flow as a movie file and then share with an audience of their class by using an LCD projector, or with the world, using a Web 2.0 tool that would allow them to embed their video on to a website, blog or wiki.

NBC Learn

NBC Learn provides many of the video resources of NBC to K-12 learners and educators. I found out about these resources when I read a blog post about "Science of NFL Football". I clicked on the link provided to find out more about these videos and lessons centered around football and discovered that NBC Learn, which produces the videos and lessons, has created several video lesson series for K-12 learning. Not all of the videos and lessons are about science. There is a series titled "Finishing the Dream" which contains over one hundred video clips from the civil rights era. NBC Learn also has produced hundreds of mini-documentaries (each two to six minutes in length) that focus on Early American history. These mini documentaries are a part of NBC News Archives on Demand, a subscription service that provides full access to all of their content and lesson materials. You can however register for a 30-day trial, during which you could download content that you want to use. If there is not enough science for you in "Science of NFL Football", then check out "Science of the Winter Olympic Games" which explores the physics, biology, chemistry, and math behind the winter games.

Sumanas Science Animation Gallery

Sumanas Science Animation Gallery provides users with a nice collection of animated tutorials for various science disciplines. Some use Flash, while others are QuickTime movies. Some include audio with captions of what is being said while other contain no audio with explanations of what is being shown to the viewer. While you may not have access to every scientific concept, process, or phase, it is a good collection that will hopefully increase over time.

Conceptua Tools for Teaching Fractions

If you are a math teacher who needs to provide instruction on fractions, then conceptua math may have some tools that would help improve that instruction. There are tools for Concepts to Procedures and well as Higher Order Thinking. Each tool includes a video tutorial, a list of NCTM standards covered, Common Core Standards covered, vocabulary, and some possible IEP Goals. Take a look at the video embedded below to learn more about conceptua math.

President Obama's "Back to School" Speech for 2010

Yesterday afternoon, at about 2:30, I discovered that President Obama had made his second annual "Back to School" speech at 1:00 PM. I was very disappointed because, even though his speech last year was considered controversial because the White House put out a list of discussion questions teachers could use with their students, I found his speech to be uplifting and inspiring last year. I wish I could have let teachers know ahead of time that it was occurring and even arrange to have it broadcast on our television system in the school. But regardless of my disappointment, I missed the boat. Luckily, the White House Website has the video available to those who wish to embed it into their Blog, Wiki, or Webpage. I have embedded it below. Have a look at it. Hopefully, you will want to share it with your students.

AnswerGarden

AnswerGarden is a great way to get feedback from others. It allows you to post a question on to your webpage, blog, wiki, social network, etc., and viewers to post a response. The more people who visit or see the question, the more responses you'll get. This could be used with just your students as a quick survey tool, or as a means for finding out what they know about a topic. For example: have students list adjectives that describe something. Like, Apples are.... Here is an actual example. Have students estimate how old something is. Like, How long ago was the Great Depression? The possibilities are endless. Take a look at the example below:

How might you use AnswerGarden in your classroom?... at AnswerGarden.ch.

Grammarly

Grammarly is a great tool for students to use prior to passing in writing or research papers. It can act as their own personal proofreader. It is also a great tool for teachers to use to check quickly for writing errors and plagarism. By uploading text to Grammarly, text is checked for grammar, punctuation, and plagarism. The text is checked for over 150 different grammar rules, provides easily understood explanations about the errors found. Grammarly also spots errors in spelling and finds words and phrases inconsistent with context or style of your document. Grammarly also looks for text borrowed from other online sources and provides links to those sources. Grammarly also helps you to write more eloquently by providing context-optimized synonyms that make more of an impact. Grammarly also is a time saver by allowing you to see all your mistakes at a glance without having to scroll through the entire document.

Print What You Like

Times are tough, as well all know, when it comes to school budgets. But did you know that toner and ink for printers is at the top of the list when it comes to cost per ounce.? Something to think about when students do research on the internet is all of the ink and paper that is wasted. They often print unwanted or unnecessary pages, pages cluttered with ads, and other "junk." Print What You Like allows you to select a part of a page and print it easily. You can even install a bookmarklet in your browser to make the process easy. If plan on having students do research involving internet resources, I recommend experimenting with this tool. It might save lots of precious trees and ink!

A Vision of Students Today

Today I put the results of a technology integration self-evaluation into a NoteShare document. I will spend much time going over the results so that I know where to begin helping my colleagues develop the 21st Century Skills of their students. As I started looking, I thought about how much has changed about teaching, information, media, and literacy since I was a kid. Kids today are an entirely different type of animal when it comes to school, information, media, and communication. Teachers who are just entering the profession may be better able to empathize with today's students. But, for the many educators who were not raised using technology, integrating technology into their teaching pedagogy is not as natural. For those of us who are not digital natives, the video embedded below can be a real eye-opener. While this is not my usual type of post (having no tool for you to use) it could be a good discussion starter with students, between teachers on a team, or during collaboration between teachers of the same content area.

10 Incredibly Inspirational Videos on YouTube

YouTube can be a powerful tool to use in the classroom regardless of what subject area you teach. If you teach Social Studies, then this resource may be of particular interest to you. The newssite Mashable has collected ten videos of some of man's most inspirational moments caught on film ranging from the late 1800's to 2008. These videos could make for some interesting and inspirational lessons. It would be interesting to create a video timeline using these videos possibly using an online timeline maker like Dipity. You may even want to turn all ten videos into one long film using the tool Dragontape.
I have embedded one of the videos below:

Readability

This morning, Kim Cowperthwaite and Paula Eppich did a Language Arts presentation for the staff. One tool that Kim shared with her colleagues was Readability. Readability is a tool that allows you to read and print articles online more easily by removing the clutter of graphics, adds, and other distracting items found on a website. The Readability website provides instructions for setting up your browser to make use of this tool. There is also a FireFox Readability Add-on that can be installed. This tool can make it a little easier to keep students focused on the text at hand.

Another staff member asked me to share the tool QuietTube which can be used to display a YouTube video without all of the other distracting clutter on the page. Click here to read my post about QuietTube.

Wall Wisher: Online Sticky Board

Yesterday, the principal passed out paper to the teachers in the first staff meeting of the year. He then asked people to generate lists of their favorite pedagogical practices to use in the classroom. Teachers were then to find out what others at their table listed and then select one practice they had never used before to try out during the year. As we did this, I was thinking about how we could have used a Web 2.0 tool to complete this task and collaborate not just with the people at their table, but all of the colleagues in the room. I then recalled the site WallWisher.com which allows a user/presenter to create a blank wall, give access to participants, and then participants can then place sticky notes on the board. Once the presenter and parents click Refresh, they can then display/see all of the posted sticky notes. WallWisher is a great tool to use for brainstorming in class, or for back-channeling. Below is a slideshow about WallWisher, created by Tom Barrett, as a part of his Interesting Ways Series.

Back to School

If you are returning to teachers technology toolbox, welcome back! If this is your first time visiting my blog welcome. Throughout the course of the school year I hope to post several times a week to this blog, some of the dynamic online tools that are available to educators that will help students develop some of their 21st century skills. I would love for those who read/subscribe to my blog to provide feedback about these tools after they have used them, or if they have used them before, so that we can all benefit from your experiences with using them in a classroom. As I write this, realize that some of you may not know how to "subscribe" to this blog. If this is you, take a look at the video below: