I. TeacherVision.com http://teachervision.com/
This website is a general education site that is part of a larger, multifunctional site, FamilyEducation.com. A teacher can use this site for lesson plan ideas, classroom management advice, resources, quick access to Infoplease search engine, and talking to other teachers. Current issues on the site include the current holidays, a five part series on using rubrics, and a new newsletter entitled “Teaching Notes.” I choose this site because as a general site, TeacherVision gives one many options and you can move from sites for teachers, students, and parents.
II. Blue Web’n http://pomo.kn.pacbell.com/wired/bluewebn/
The Blueweb’n site is a great place to begin when looking for a variety of different things no matter what your content area. The site is broken down into seven different categories, such as activities, lesson plans, and resources, for each of twelve content areas. One can also search the site using keywords or grade level to find appropriate links in the categories. Once in the listings, you can see which sites are new and also those that are “hot.” I stumbled upon this website when searching for an idea for a global lesson plan for another class and was quite impressed by the amount of different things the site has to offer.
III. World Cafe: Future Culture http://www.wcpworld.com/future/culture.htm
The Future Culture site is an awesome place to do research and exploration about other countries. This is an excellent site for social studies, especially when working on cultural themes. From this site, you can click on any country in the world and get tons of information ranging from the culture, climate, political situation, and traveling tips. Also, there are other links for each country for more in-depth research. A teacher could go nuts with the possibilities this site can offer. I like the site because it is easy to use and any student can use it to learn about other countries and cultures.
IV. CNNfyi.com - Teacher Edition http://fyi.cnn.com/fyi/teachers/
This site is a part of the CNN group, all of which have applications for education, especially social studies. Having both a teacher and student section, this site is very current in its articles and stories and even though it has specific subject areas, most of them fall under current events. The site offers a search engine, e-mail options, and even a section on how to incorporate the site into your classroom. I like it for is currentness and the vast resources of CNN that it can draw from.
V. HistoryChannel.com http://www.historychannel.com/index.html
Brought to you by the History Channel, this site is the place
to start searching for just about any history topic. Featuring a
“this day in history” section, a keyword search, and a timeline search,
one can find just about anything and is a good resource for history teachers.
Current issues include the day in history feature (which changes daily...),
origins of the electoral college, a webcast of the groundbreaking ceremony
for the new WWII memorial, and facts about the first Thanksgiving.
Being a history buff and a watcher of the History Channel, this site was
an easy choice for me to put on this list.