Into the Great Sort of-Known

If you are anything like me, you love using the Web to search for anything and everything; answers to completely random questions, the name of that actor you know you’ve seen in something else, recipes, coupons, and most relevant to this blog – a multitude of stuff to help you be a great teacher! There is an endless supply of educational resources online for both students and educators. Lessons plans, games, educational research, kid-friendly search engines, teacher blogs, free printable materials, and so much more. No doubt we’ve all had the same experience when searching the great big World Wide Web. You want to find something specific whether it’s a great idea for a lesson plan or an appropriate resource website for students, but when you search you come up with more of what you don’t want than what you actually do. The Internet is a useful tool that can help you find very valuable resources and information. Just like with any tool, however, you must know how to use it properly and efficiently if you don’t want to spend hours sorting through, let’s face it, garbage.

It was with all of this in mind that I embarked on what I hoped would be a productive search through cyberspace to see what splendors it held for educators and students alike. Here are the discoveries that I’ve made.

1.    1.  It’s much easier and efficient to find some good quality teacher sites that you can bookmark than to perform a Google search (no matter how broad or specific your search) every time you want to find a free printable or a lesson plan. I have spent countless hours searching through links in my search results when I probably could have found something just as appropriate by going to a site like A To Z Teacher Stuff. You won’t be able to find everything from just one or two sites, but taking time to build up a bookmark library of the sites that will be of most frequent use to you is totally worthwhile. Also, don't forget to take a look at each sites Terms of Use and other policies. Just because you find a great site with loads of materials doesn't necessarily mean you're free to use them however you want. Copyright infringement=illegal. Since you want to teach your students to be good global and digital citizens, you should practice what you preach.

2.    2.  Don’t be so skeptical of kid-related sites if they do not immediately appear to be of educational value. Take, for example, Yahooligans. My first thought when I began browsing through it was, “Wow! Pretty cool, but is this the kind of site I would promote my students going to at school?” After all, Yahooligans, or Yahoo for Kids is full of cartoon show clips, video game trailers, and games that are not necessarily created with learning in mind. I decided to look a little harder and lo and behold, the site has a whole area devoted to school complete with a kid-friendly search engine, a reference category, educational video clips and much more. By now I’m thinking, “This is even cooler than I thought!” So to reiterate my point, don’t be judgmental of a site simply because it has kid-related content. As long as there is nothing inappropriate for your students, and there is plenty of beneficial material that is school-friendly, then don’t be afraid to embrace it.

3.    3.  Whether you are searching for yourself or teaching your students how to use their own, kid-friendly search engines, be aware of the universal operators for refining your search. This can save you time if you’re using a search engine instead of that nifty list of bookmarks you’ve made. My course textbook lists some Boolean operators, which are just special ways of narrowing your search. Some of these can be found at this page. Search engines such as Google include their own operators, which can become lengthy and complicated in my opinion. You can see Google’s site specific ones here.

4.    4.  Explore what you thought you already knew. What do I mean by that? I use Google for everything, but I fail to routinely check to see what exciting new tools and innovations they have come up with. Checking out Google For Educators, I found some really neat tools that I did not know existed, like GoogleSky. If you don’t know what that is, click on the link to Tools for Your Classroom while on the site. I’m not saying I thought the entire site was well-developed or anything like that. There’s a lot of ways it could be improved upon. I do, however, now know that Google For Educators is available and what it is. You don’t know what’s out there until you look.

5.    5.  While going to your state’s DOE (Dept. of Education) site doesn’t exactly sound like a fun time, there is a lot of helpful and necessary information available there. Florida’s site has a section for news, the state standards, links to district resources, and a great deal of important information for families. Florida may not have the most visually appealing or well-organized state site, but it actually has a surprising amount of information. The Orange County Public Schools page is one I visit often in search of jobs. It is organized quite well, but there are not a lot of good resources for students except those preparing for the FCAT and for college. The site certainly does not seem to have a wealth of useful tools for teachers either. But again, necessary information is present.

6.     6. Don’t forget to check your alma mater’s College or Department of Education website. My very own UCF College of Education site has information on TEACH grants,  a “work-in-progress” page for educational societies, organizations, and journals, and a link to the Curriculum Materials Center where any UCF student can find great materials and books for teaching and for their own classes. 

As you can see, a simple class assignment to explore some professional resources turned into quite the learning experience. These suggestions are simply that – suggestions.  As the great Lavar Burton said, “you don’t have to take my word for it.” Try these out, and perhaps even conduct your own web exploration. Let me know if you come up with anything I can add to my list!