5.Tolerance.org:  Tolerance.org makes my short list because I believe so strongly in tolerance education...  This site offers many free videos and lesson plans that can be easily incorporated into language arts or social studies classrooms.  There are resources for primary and secondary classrooms. 
4.Lulu:  Lulu makes my short list because I believe to give students authentic writing experiences, publication should be included.  Whether students publish their own writing, or I combine their work into one larger work, this is a great site to take their work to a final product. 
3.Pageflakes (or netvibes)  Okay, this is a relatively new RSS find for me...  I like the way that you can set up a feed for so many resources in one spot--visually organizing.  I create Document Based Questions periodically through the year, and this site could be used to collect documents--print and non-print for students to read and respond.  Some of the features that I like are the capability to view several websites on one desktop, the capability to list favorite links, the capability to post assignments, the capability to post text or pictures, and the capability to view video (i.e. through Youtube or another source). 
2.Wetpaint (or wikispaces)  I like Wetpaint for a wiki space because I like the different design options, and intuitively it works well for me--but any wiki site ranks high on my lists of must-haves in the classroom...  Students working collaboratively should be a priority.  All students should have experience working on a wiki... Wikis can be used to tap and build background knowledge, or to create an entire unit of instruction around--a 21st century learning tool to be sure!
1.  21classes.com My all time favorite.  I started on 21Publish.com, but then they created this site.  You can set up a classroom portal--a community of bloggers with privacy and no advertisements.  It is safe and provides teacher moderation... It is my number one pick for student blogging because it is teacher friendly--parents appreciate this!

So, there they are... The 5 most important sites, in my opinion, for September 2008!



 


Comments

Mark
09/15/2008 00:15

I like Netvibes better than Pageflakes. Jusst a personal preference. I will take a look at 21 classes. I want to staart blogging with my 9th graders this year so this looks like a good one to bgin with.

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