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AAM Electronic Newsletter
Published by An Adventure of the American Mind at Mars Hill College
Vol. 8 Issue 32 - May 18, 2007
How Stuff Works
What's a Tweel? Can flour explode? Did you know that three college students are creating a Nintendo Amusement Park? What makes an LED light up? Can you really trade your dollars for gold bullion? How do power grids work? Or hydrogen cars?
If you're the curious type, or you want to keep your students occupied, you might want to visit this fascinating site for answers. Categories like Auto, Communication, Electronics, Entertainment, Health, Home, Money, People, Science, and Travel are chock full of easy-to-grasp explanations of common phenomena under dozens of sub-topics.
Fun and informative!
http://home.howstuffworks.com/
Build it from Scratch
Think Lego building blocks of computer code. Here is a free downloadable program that can get anyone started building interactive programs. This new programming language was developed at the MIT Media Lab to turn "kids from media consumers into media producers, enabling them to create their own interactive stories, games, music, and animation for the Web."
The web description goes on to say, "With this new software, called Scratch, kids can program interactive creations by simply snapping together graphical blocks, much like LEGO® bricks, without any of the obscure punctuation and syntax of traditional programming languages. Children can then share their interactive stories and games on the Web, the same way they share videos on YouTube, engaging with other kids in an online community that provides inspiration and feedback."
Read all about it at
http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2007/resnick-scratch.html.
Then download your own copy at http://scratch.mit.edu/.
FDR Library
The Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library is a great place for research with online exhibitions and a newsletter. They also have a terrific collection of primary source documents and images along with a curriculum guide to help you bring them into your classroom.
Visit the library at http://www.fdrlibrary.marist.edu/.
LBJ Library
Take a (virtual) trip to Texas with President Johnson, his family and the dogs! With online exhibitions, a special kids page and numerous photo archives, even entries from LBJ's diary.
http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/
An Incredible Journey
This article from Edutopia tells the story of high school teachers as they make the transition to project-based learning. It's not always easy, as they "rethink their time-tested curricula in favor of a new way of teaching and learning that takes students outside of the classroom and into the world beyond."
http://www.edutopia.org/node/1145
Google for Educators
Google is all around us. Although you probably use the search engine regularly and know about Google images, there are also videos, news, groups, and e-mail. Even if we are encouraging our students to use other sources than Google, there are some great tools for educators, students -- well, just about everybody. Here are just a few.
Google Maps
Regardless of the privacy issues, I love seeing my house on Google maps. There are plenty of classroom uses for this powerful tool.
We can look at the mountains, view the shoreline, see landforms that are close to home, not just what the textbook shows us. There are also links to featured maps, you can save your own maps and lots more.
While you are there, try this. Ask for directions from NYC to Paris and see what happens at http://maps.google.com/!
Thanks to Wendy Fusco, AAM Director at Montreat College for this fun activity.
Google Notebook
Suppose while you're surfing the web on a topic, you'd like an easy way to keep track of helpful sites found, write some notes on them, save the link, and maybe even snag content as a visual reference.
Google Notebook might be your solution!!
A recent graduate of Google's "Technology Lab," Google Notebook allows you to surf the web, save links, clip images and text straight to the notebook, and add notes. Users can share, search, and read others notebooks, too, as well as have notebooks on different topics. Best of all, every time you need to update your notebook or use it, it will be there on the web waiting for you. Kind of like your own personal pathfinder!
Note: To use Google Notebook, you will need to create a Google account if you don't already have one. Click on this link, then click on the link in the upper right corner to start.
http://labs.google.com/
AAM staffer Liz Lang reports, "It still has slight beta feel but seems to work. I created an account, downloaded it and played around with it
-- seems very handy, especially for teachers!"
GooglePack Essential Software - Free, Useful and Fun!
Google has a suite of free software with many useful (and some
fun!) applications.
GooglePack Essential Software includes:
- Google Earth - 3D Earth browser - Zoom from space to street level, tour the world, find maps, driving directions, hotels, restaurants, and more
- Picasa - Photo Photo organizer - find, edit and share photos, remove red eye
- Google Photos Screensaver - watch slideshows, make a screensaver from a collection of your photos
- Mozilla Firefox browser with Google Toolbar
- Norton Security Scan - with free detection updates and scheduled scanning
- Spyware Doctor Starter Edition - Antispyware utility
And more! Equally, you can uninstall any of these that you no longer user or wish to replace.
Requires Windows XP or Vista with Administrator privileges and Firefox 1.0 + or Internet Explorer 6.0+. Click on the link below for more info and to download the software.
http://pack.google.com/intl/en/pack_installer.html?nopers
Google Apps Goes to School
In this article, you'll see even more ways to use Google in your classroom or your life. You may need to sign in to access the article but it's free.
http://www.techlearning.com/showArticle.php?articleID=196604379
Next Week: 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! I have received some great suggestions, but maybe not yours!
Send them to: 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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