General/Multi-topic

• Smithsonian Education

I’m sure that I’ve shared this before, but this website includes lessons and resources on a wide variety of topics. The newer lessons seem to be more substantial.  Searchable by subject, standard, and grade level.

• Room Recess

Free online educational games with a focus on math and reading.

Language Arts

• Genre/Format Introduction

A blog post from Unleashing Readers which explains how Kellee reviews genre/format at the beginning of each year.

• Authors Share Back to School Memories

A short video posted on Watch-Connect-Read.  We should create one of these with our own EHUE teachers!

Science/Health

• Teaching the Sea from the Land

Blog post from Edutopia with ideas about integrating arts, writing and science to learn about ocean life.

• Striking a Balance Game

I found this as I was exploring the Smithsonian website above.  This seems like a fun game that your students can play to learn about food chains.

• Ant Farm

Having just finished No Monkeys, No Chocolate (see review here) this article caught my attention.  It’s about how cocoa plants in Ghana are becoming susceptible to diseases because of ants.  The language will be above the heads of our students, but I thought that this might be another interesting tie-in to ecology, especially if you were using the aforementioned book.

• Science 360

Free online videos related to science.  Some of these may be a bit over the heads of our students, but overall, a good source.

Information Literacy/Technology

• How to Add Attachments to Google Calendar Events

Blog post from Free Technology for Teachers.  I figured this would be useful for EHUE teachers because so many of us rely on Google calendars.

• A Parent’s Pledge to Raise Responsible Digital Citizens

A fantastic blog post about a pledge, originally posted on SafetyWeb.com, in which a parent acknowledges that technology and social media are a part of our children’s culture.  What’s interesting to me is that this blog post was written in 2010, nearly three years ago! The influence of social media has grown exponentially since then and yet we still are hesitant to allow many of these skills to be taught in schools.

• What Most Schools Don’t Teach

This inspiring video discusses coding as an essential skill that should be taught to all students.  Just watching the video made me want to learn more about coding and how to teach it to our students.  (Plus I really, really want to work in an office like theirs.) Visit code.org to learn more.

Sources of my sources: Richard Byrne(@richardbyrne); #tlelem, Joyce Valenza (@joycevalenza)