History Articles - 12 Essentials for Technology Integration

12 Essentials for Technology Integration

Here is a great booklet put together to help you set up an online class for your students. While I am in a county that pays for Blackboard.com, remember you can have your students put everthing up for free - your assignments and the work for the kids. If you want to know how, check on this Free Technology for Teachers site. This site tells you how to set up Google folders, have cool slide shows, podcasts, create student webpages, get clips of films, get videos on Teacher Tube and more. About the only site I'd add is Moodle.com which allows teachers to set up folders for classes. 

History Articles - Game Templates

Game Templates

This comes from FreeTech4Teachers. I love using review games for my students and here are templates from Jeopardy, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Wheel of Fortune, $25,000 Pyramid and more.

History Articles - Transcribe Your Voice Into a Student Text Message

 
Transcribe Your Voice Into a Student Text Message

Yes, you heard it. You can use this free service to record a message for your students which will then be converted into a text message. If your parents are wary of giving a phone number to this site, you can always use the post a couple of days ago where I showed you how to e-mail a text message (and for that matter students can text you back to your e-mail!).

History Articles - Guns, Germs and Steel

Guns, Germs and Steel

Based on my summer assignments link (see links on the right of this post) for AP students, "Guns, Germs and Steel" is one of the books most often used. Well, go here and your students can read it for free (I believe even on their phones - how's that for a creative use of phones for school work?) or you can embed it as I have done it above on a webpage if you have one. 

History Articles - Text Your Students with E-mail

Text Your Students with E-mail

I always get my students' e-mails and will occasionally send them a message. It is frustrating that half of them never check. In fact even after they e-mail me, they don't look for a reply. But here is a way to use cell phones, but not in the classroom. You could set up a database with their cell phone numbers and then add the code below depending on their cell phone and then they will receive a text. Certainly this way the kids will get the message. (Obviously this is one you'd want to check with the parents first to make sure they don't mind)

Sprint:

[10DigitNumber]@messaging.sprintpcs.com

T-Mobile:

[10DigitNumber]@tmomail.net

Verizon:

[10DigitNumber]@vtext.com

AT&T:

[10DigitNumber]@mobile.mycingular.com

Just replace [10DigitNumber] with the ten digit phone number you are trying to reach (area+ local number).

History Articles - How Stuff Works

Japan's Attack At Pearl Harbor

How Stuff Works

This is a great site for many reasons, mostly because they have hundreds of short videos (on many things beyond the classroom). I have found it very good for both US and world history. Above, for example is the bombing of Pearl Harbor. The coolest thing is that the movies are 3-1o minutes, so if a student misses class, he/she can still see what you watched!

History Articles - Text Your Students with E-mail

Text Your Students with E-mail

I always get my students' e-mails and will occasionally send them a message. It is frustrating that half of them never check. In fact even after they e-mail me, they don't look for a reply. But here is a way to use cell phones, but not in the classroom. You could set up a database with their cell phone numbers and then add the code below depending on their cell phone and then they will receive a text. Certainly this way the kids will get the message. (Obviously this is one you'd want to check with the parents first to make sure they don't mind)

Sprint:

[10DigitNumber]@messaging.sprintpcs.com

T-Mobile:

[10DigitNumber]@tmomail.net

Verizon:

[10DigitNumber]@vtext.com

AT&T:

[10DigitNumber]@mobile.mycingular.com

Just replace [10DigitNumber] with the ten digit phone number you are trying to reach (area+ local number).

History Articles - Empirical Support for Cell Phone Usage in the Classroom

Empirical Support for Cell Phone Usage in the Classroom

I have put some of my ideas for cell phone usage on a list serve and have gotten some flak saying 1)our rules prohibit 2)the kids will abuse it if we have it. I really believe as with passing paper notes when I was a young teacher, that good teachers will 1) find a way to get kids not to look at cell phones (interactive teaching and interesting material) and over time will find good uses. At any rate International Society for Technology Education (ISTE) has a report out that looks at technological use in the classroom. Since I have a Ph.D., I am all about support (and for that matter questioning what you read), but this report cites empirical research that states the obvious. 1) we have always known that the best way to teach is to be interactive and to use tools that kids enjoy 2) that tool today is technology. As the study states (money pages are 6-8) , 10-17 year olds spend an average of 3:45 a day on cell phones and that 87% of 12-17 year olds are online EVERY DAY. Right now, unlike online activities, ideas for cell phones in the class are certainly limited, but that will change over time (see my next post for another idea for cell phones). So I am only advocating limited use and certainly NEVER to text friends.

Just in case you need more convincing, here is Sec of Education Arne Duncan advocating the use of cell phones.

History Articles - Map Site Traces Famous Voyages

Map Site Traces Famous Voyages

If you want to show your students the voyages of Magellan, Columbus, Lindbergh's flight to Paris, DeSoto, the Silk Road, Marco Polo and others, this site is a great one. It also includes pictures and descriptions which you can see as you make the follow the voyages. By the way, I found it on a Delicious.com site. Delicious allow you to bookmark online so you can get to your links from any computer and it also shows you what others who have bookmarked the same sites are looking at.

History Articles - Watch Know Video Library

Watch Know Video Library

Here is a collection of short videos which can be used to study ancient world history. Topics include Egypt, Greece, Rome, Incans, Mayans, pre-historic, Ottomans and more. If you are like me, you are picking your way through all the videos I have put on this site and choosing some to use in class. If you have a student webpage, you can easily then have absent students view them on their time. Above is on of the videos, this one on Plato.

History Articles - Cell Phones Uses - Podcasting

Cell Phones Uses - Podcasting

Go here to see a presentation on ways to use cell phones in class. The video takes you through each step and could easily be followed by you or your students. It is quite lengthy so I have put the highlights. But if you want to use the cellphone this is really an excellent how to video. All of the examples could be done at home if your school won't allow cell phones. Here is what is covered in the video

1. Record video or audio. You can use www.gabcast.com; www.gcast.com; www.hipcost.com; www.evoca.com (all of which are free). These sites also allow students to use landlines to make the podcasts. Gabcast will allow you make a podcast of up to one hour for each entry. It will also give you html which can then be put in your blog. Uses would include

a. getting authors to read their works

b. having students explain concepts that you are teaching

c. read poems

d. put clips from famous speeches and have kids explain them

e. radio broadcasts

f. audio interviews

g. sound clips from trips

h. ESOL students working on their language skills and integrating it with subject matter.

2. A second use of free phone conferencing is www.freeconference.com which actually allows you to have a conference call of up to 200 people! The advantage of using a cell phone is that you will not be charged long distance charges. Another is www.talkshoe.com

3. You can have free online voice mail which are at privatephone.com and jangl.com. These will give you your own phone number and for those who don't want to give out your own number, this is perfect and better yet you can get the messages via your cell phone or online.

4. Audio e-mail are found at jott.com and mindjot.com. These allow you to speak your message and it will be transcribed into a text message and even be set as an audio.com

5. Taking Movies: go.blogger.com Using bubbleshare.com you can use your phone to make pictures and then bubbleshare.com will allow you to make a slideshow. You can have all the students in one class send pictures to the same site or have invidual sites for each student. You can edit the pictures, record audio which would allow you to make a digital storybook. You can then e-mail the slideshow, add it to a blog or even to download it. Imagine going on a field trip and having an instant slideshow created by the kids.

6. If you want kids to make movies, you can use the free site of eyespot.com. They allow you to take movie clips with a phone and immediately upload it to the sites where you can edit the fim online and then publish it to a blog page.

7. This video also goes through audacity.com

8. Sending free textmessages. textforfree allows you to send free text messages.

9. To create surveys you can go to mobiode.com

10.

History Articles - Smart History

This is a great website that helps us learn and teach Art History. The topics covered range from prehistory (cave art) all the way up to modern art. This site is great for students to explore in class since it provides maps, pictures, and detailed explanations of different art trends and how they relate to art history. This is especially helpful for World History since the SOLs and AP exam seem to be adding images every year. http://www.smarthistory.org/

History Articles - The Mysteries of Catalhoyuk

This is a great website that allows students to complete some simple Pre-historic activities, such as creating a neolithic dinner. Its a fun way for students in World History I or AP World History to explore the world of the Neolithic individual, how they survived, what they ate, and where they lived. Great as a whole class or explored by individual students.

History Articles - The Lascaux Cave

The French Government has sponsored a phenomenal website which gives users a virtual tour of the Lascaux cave, including descriptions of each drawing, its importance and meaning, as well as individual breakdowns of specific parts of each drawing. A really cool site that students can explore individually or that you can look at as a class.

Classzone Maps

 
Classzone Maps

Why pay for the expensive hanging maps when you can show these on your television or LCD. This has US and world maps and has them in political and physical ones. You can also move the maps around and zoom in and out. When you get to the site, you will need to click on your state and subject and then look for the "Rand McNally" link at the top in the middle and click on it.

Chinese History in 2 Minutes

Chinese History in 2 Minutes

This is the last sixty years of Chinese history which I found on FreeTech4Teachers.com

Italian and German Unifications

Italian and German Unifications

Okay, so this is not a professional movie, but it is a nice idea to have your students do in MovieMaker and so this is a great example of what you might expect of them.

The French Revolution in 10 Parts

The French Revolution in 10 Parts

Each of these movies are under nine minutes and weave movie scenes with scholars (who speak only short parts at a time so the kids will be able to stay with it. Part one is above.

Chinese Dynasty Song

Chinese Dynasty Song

My wife is amazing in that she remembers virtually every song she hears which is why she still remembers the periodic table as she learned it to a song. Above is one class (not mine) singing their song to remember the Chinese dynasties. It may work in your class or you may want to come up with your own as an assignment.

 

NOVA Series on "Becoming Human"

 
NOVA Series on "Becoming Human"

This is an excellent (based on the first part) sthree part eries on human development. It starts with apes and goes through the neanderthals. You can already watch the first part on line and have it in full screen (in case you wanted to show it in class) and the others will be up as they show. Go to the link above for the show times.