Website of the Week # 11-Classtools.net

http://www.classtools.net/

The Basics: This site has games, graphic organizers, and widgets that can be used online and embedded in a website.

Examples: (You can interact with these examples right here in this page.)

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Test Kitchen: I used this sight extensively this week with my class.  There are about 15 different tools that they offer and the tools are interactive for the students.  Basically you create a template and the students fill it out.  The students can keep their work by embedding it into a personal webpage of some sort.  I use google sites because it is free, easy, and the kids at my school already have secure usernames and passwords.  The students created a portfolio and have been embedding their creation from this site all week.  They loved it!  I've shown 5 examples here and there is much more.  This would be great for just about any subject.

5 Free and Easy Sites

Here are 5 sites that you might want to check out:

http://www.classtools.net/- This site has a variety of templates for teachers and students to use.  It has a timer and a name selector, a venn diagram, a fishbone diagram, games, and other features.  It is free and easy to use.  All of your creations can be embedded or linked.

http://www.vocaroo.com/- This is a very easy site to create podcasts.  You can record your voice for as long as you want and then link or embed the recording.  There are a lot of podcasting tools but, this one is the most simple one that I have seen.

http://www.authorstream.com/- This is a program where you can upload powerpoint presentations so that students can access them.  The uploaded version keeps all of the features of the orginal version.  They can also be link or embedded.

http://www.jaycut.com/- This is a movie making program that is completely online.  You don't have to download anything.  It is similar to moviemaker and your movies can be linked, embedded, or uploaded to youtube.

http://www.litesum.com/- This is a site that creates a more simple version of a wikipedia entry.  All you have to do is enter a topic and it will give you a short summary of a wikipedia article.  This is great for students who have a hard time navigating or reading longer articles.

Website of the Week #10-Big Huge Labs

http://www.bighugelabs.com/

Basics: This is a site where you can do cool things to pictures.  You can create things like billboards, trading cards, magazine covers, collages, motivational posters, etc.

Examples:

Test Kitchen: I tried this with my students during our propaganda techniques unit.  They made companies and then they each created a poster, billboard, or trading card to advertize their product.  It was easy and the kids loved it.  All they had to do was select a picture, write what was going to be on the poster, and click create now.  It is one of the easiest things that I have done this year and they enjoyed the chance to create a poster.  They can do all of this without logging in.  They just need somewhere to save their creation.  I had them all post theirs to a google wiki.

Classroom Applications: This site could be used in any class.  They are a lot of possibilities with this site.  You could have students create projects to show what they know, define things, illustrate a concept.  You can also use these posters and things to add a little spice to your lessons.  Create a set of motivational posters that define key vocab words.  Create trading cards of historical figures and then let the kids trade them.