Inspiring+examples

At Mira's suggestion, and also because it's the best part of this course, let's collect some links to examples of teachers using technologies in ways we really like. If we put the links here, we can talk to them on the second Voicethread (since I really don't want to be having to go to the Voicethread to retrieve the links when I'm looking to use them in anger!).

This is an excellent simulation of Thomson's experiment to measure the charge on the electron. Simulation alone isn't interesting enough - check out my comments on the Voicethread to hear how the teacher I saw used it to make it a collaborative learning experience.

Here are the details about the program where students can operate the Parkes radiotelescope. This is authenticity at its best - doing actual science work with actual scientists, made possible by technology.

I like some of these ideas for using a blog - particularly previewing work that's coming up and inviting speculation and comment, as well as publishing work and online tutorials. I think recording some of our more intense direct instruction sessions and posting them on a blog would be very beneficial.

Thanks to Mira's tip, checked out some of the vast number of resources available on [|2sparkley's blog]. Of interest were several free online **quiz** maker, for example: [|eQuizzer], which even students can use to design their own quizzes. I think this could be a powerful way of getting students to design their own revision material or as a collaborative project for students to set revision tasks for each other. Having a collection of quizzes for different learning units could be a fun way to break out in a lesson or for students who finish other tasks early. [|Quizlet] is also impressive, and already houses a big collection of ready-made flashcards made for the sciences. Perfect for revision. [|Kubbu] is very cool - it has a collection of crosswords, quizzes and other games... or you can create your own for your class! [|YacaPaca] also provides free ready-made quizzes, which you can search based on your country's curriculum - however I couldn't see much in there for the sciences There are other quiz tools on sparkley's site but many of them an annual fee.