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AAM Electronic Newsletter
Published by An Adventure of the American Mind at Mars Hill College
Vol. 8 Issue 31 - May 11, 2007
More Free Stuff
Continuing our free resources for teachers theme, here are a few more.
Essay Map
From ReadWriteThink, the web portal from the International Reading Association and the National Council of Teachers of English, there is an online tool that might just help your students learn to write better. Expository writing is an increasingly important skill for elementary, middle, and high school students to master. This interactive graphic organizer helps students develop an outline that includes an introductory statement, main ideas they want to discuss or describe, supporting details, and a conclusion that summarizes the main ideas. The tool offers multiple ways to navigate information, including a graphic in the upper right-hand corner that allows students to move around the map without having to work in a linear fashion. Students can also click the Review My Map link and preview what they have written, return to the map for revisions, or print the completed map. Visit this interactive tool at http://www.readwritethink.org/materials/essaymap/.
There are also a number of ReadWriteThink Lessons that use this tool, but most teachers will be able to just start using it.
Carl Sandburg Home
With connections to Illinois -- particularly the "'City with Big Shoulders" -- and North Carolina, Carl Sandburg's poetry has touched the lives of many Americans. Both his first home in Galesburg, IL, and his last home, Connemara in Flat Rock, NC, are museums with supporting websites. If you are interested in teaching and learning about the "Poet for the People," visit the Sandburg Birthplace and Museum at http://www.sandburg.org.
The National Park Service now operates Connemara. Click on Imagine It for activities for the younger students.
http://www.nps.gov/carl/
Literary Traveler
To learn more about authors and the context they wrote in, check out Literary Traveler. With three levels (open, free registration and open membership), you'll find articles about Beatrix Potter (a pioneer in saving small farms from development), Walter Mosley (equally proud of his African American and Jewish backgrounds), P.L.
Travers (the real Mary Poppins), and lots more. Great site for teachers and older students.
http://www.literarytraveler.com/default.aspx
The Smithsonian Institution
The Smithsonian portal for educators has great teaching resources and links to even more in areas of Art and Design, Science and Technology, History and Culture, and Language Arts. Browse or search at http://www.smithsonianeducation.org.
Thanks to Brenda Phetteplace, South Toe Elementary Librarian, Yancey County, NC
Freebies for Teachers
Click around the site below to find some goodies you might not know about. You may find some new ideas and different approaches that can work in your classroom.
http://freebies.about.com/cs/teacherfreebies/a/teacherfreebies.htm
Kids Click Here - Endlessly!
The Ramapo Catskill Library System (Middleton, NY) has something special for you. Created by librarians, this is an easy to use catalog of links to high quality sites for kids on curriculum-based topics. The links were hand-picked especially for relative content and their ability to engage young learners.
At this site, you'll find links to 15 topics and
100+ subtopics like Literature - Stories, Poetry, Humor,
Individual Authors; Machines and Transportation - Cars, Inventions, Trains, Robots, etc.; Religion and Mythology; and the Arts
- Drawing, Coloring, Museums, Art by Children, Home and Household, and much, much more.
Very handy, fun, and faster than Google! And pre-screened!
http://www.kidsclick.org/
Yuckiest Site on the Internet!
For some warm weather fun and learning, send your students to Discovery Kids' Yuckiest Site on the Internet. Enter Roach World and learn about roach anatomy, read Ralph Roach's diary, and some amazing roach facts. Explore the human body with Wendell Worm and Dora and learn about gross body sounds and parts and why they're important.
Cook up some goofy "edu-mischief" in the Yucky Labs with experiments while you Make Abe Lincoln Turn Green, explore Eggs and Funny Bones, read your Horrorscope, try Reincarnating Raisins and lots more!
To begin wiggling your way through, click on http://yucky.discovery.com/flash/.
Copyright on the Web
The Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and Society is taking a look at Fair Use. That is the policy that allows individuals, and especially educators, to use limited amounts of copyrighted works of others. The "Fair Use Project" was founded in 2006 to "provide legal support to a range of projects designed to clarify, and extend, the boundaries of 'fair use' in order to enhance creative freedom." Learn about it at http://cyberlaw.stanford.edu/node/3136.
NPR's Morning Edition recently did a story on the Fair Use Project.
Listen at
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=10040628.
Submitted by Karin Hedberg, AAM Assistant Director
Sharing Resources
For those of us who teach with primary sources, May has been declared Free Stuff Month!
Send me your links to free resources you like and that other teachers might want to know about and use. Many museums, libraries and foundations have materials that they want to get in the hands of teachers. Share what you have found and we'll pass it along to other teachers who read this newsletter.
Send it to the AAM Newsletter staff at awalter@mhc.edu. I'll pass it along in upcoming issues.
Summer Reading Issue
If you have books to share with your colleagues, send me your suggestions for our annual summer reading issue. We take fiction, non-fiction, children's literature, and unadulterated trash!
Send me your suggestions at awalter@mhc.edu.
Spread the Word!
If the teachers in your school or AAM program are not receiving this newsletter, please send me their names and e-mail addresses. Also, feel free to share this newsletter with a colleague. And we encourage new readers to get their own subscription.
More input + greater diversity = better newsletter. Be part of the equation! Thanks to everyone who has sent submissions to me. Please continue to send your favorite resources and successes to your either of your editors, Liz Lang at elang@mhc.edu, or AnneMarie Walter at awalter@mhc.edu. I will feature them in coming newsletters and on the AAM program Web site.
Don't forget to contribute your favorite links to the Useful Links section!
Contact aam-teachers@aweber.com to be added to the mailing list.
AnneMarie Walter
AAM Associate Director
Mars Hill College
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