ThingLink and Pic-Collage

This will be my last post of the 2015-2016 school year.  Good luck on your exams and have a great summer.  I will be posting again in September.

A couple of years ago I posted about ThingLink.  It is a free app that allows you to use your  device to make interactive pictures by placing pins on the photo.  When you mouse of the pin it will pop open to show another picture or video or a map or whatever else you can embed.  I have posted below example from math from Mary Kate Brennan's webpage.  The frog dissection was from a student contest on ThingLinks web page.  Also a collage with links to youtube like the one below could be done for science or art very easily using Pic-Collage and ThingLink.  Donna Baumbach made a Creative Commons slide show entitled "88+ Interesting Ways to Use ThingLink in the Classroom.  To see the slide show click here.

Online Personal Finance Game

Last week I posted about a site "What's up in finance".  To see that click here.  Today I am posting about an interactive game site that has two games to help students with personal finance.  To see the website click here.

Teaching With Infographics - The New York Times

You have to love the NY Times.  They have a ton of material for educators on the Learning Network.

Here are a bunch of articles that they have online on Infographics.  This was brought to my attention from The Big House Library .  Click on the topics below.

1) A Student Project Model

2) Places to Start

3) Social Studies, History and Economics

4) Language Arts, Fine Arts and Entertainment

5) From Article to Infographic: Translating information about "Sneakerheads"

6) Telling Stories With Data

7) All NY Times articles tagged with "Infographic"

You can have your students make their on infographs at piktochart.com

Art Project powered by Google

I have posted several times about Art Project by Google.  Through high resolution photos you can view a ton of museums and artists works.  To see Art Project click here.  One exhibit I wanted to highlight was a photo collection of  street art in Melbourne Australia.  There are two exhibits.  The Yorkshire Breweries and Fragments of Melbourne.

40 Maps that explain the Middle East

This site has some maps that would your students understand the Middle East. If your classes are studying current events or history or religion this might be a site you want to look at.  To see the website click here.

DNA from the Beginning

This animated tutorial website is broken down into 3 categories: Classical Genetics, Molecules of Genetics and Genetic Organization & Control.  There are 75 experiments each with The Concept, an Animation, a Gallery, Videos, a Bio, a Problem and Links.  To see this site, click here.

Countdown Timer for your class

Yeah I know Google has its time and place.  Not sure if I mention this before but if you need a countdown timer in your classroom for when your students, say have a little break or some other reason you can use Google.  Just type in something like "set timer for 10 seconds"  or whatever and it will beep when done.  Below is a Screencastomatic video I made of this.

Europeana - an online resource of cultural heritage

Europeana is a place to explore millions of items from a range of Europe's leading galleries libraries, archives and museums, all online.  To check it out, click here.

CNN and Current Events

One last site that you might want to use for current events.  CNN Student News has a 10 minute video everyday about whats in the news. This could be used as a bell ringing activity in your Current Events class.   You can also put in the comment section the name of your school, City and State ( or Country ) and during the broadcast they will post a few schools during their Roll Call.  Only one per school please.  To see the website click here.

Purdue's Online Writing Lab - OWL

The Online Writing Lab or OWL is a free resource with information on writing.  This site covers all aspects of writing and could be used as a reference for writing assignments and papers.  Look at either of the two links to see the site in two different views.  Click here or here.

Science of the NHL

I had previously posted about the Science of the NFL from NBC Learn.  The also have a video collection from the NHL.  Topics include:

1) Newton's Three Laws of Motion

2) Kinematics

3) Geometry

4) Vectors

5) Statistics & Averages

6) Mass, Volume and Density

7) Work, Energy and Power

8) Force, Impulse and Collisions

9) Reflexes and Reaction Time

10) Projectile Motion

To see the videos click here.

Slide Hunter

Last month I made several posts on slides and presentations.  Here is another site to get free PowerPoint templates.  Just set up a free account or give them a shout out or vote on twitter or google+ to get the free download.  In fact I just clicked on the twitter icon and then closed the pop up box to login and was then able to click the download box without even signing in as I do not tweet.  The slides are easy to edit.  To see the site click here.  This is a picture of a template that I altered to use for my track and field team.

Whats up in Finanace?

Here is a  great websites for students (and teachers) to learn practical money skills. It includes games, videos and resources.  Click here to see the website.   

Flocabulary and Current Events

Here is my third installment on Current Events in the last month.  To see the other two click here and here.  Flocabulary has a weekly video called "The Week In Rap".  It is pretty cool and also includes an activity and quiz if you have a subscription.  The subscription is a bit pricey at $96 US per year but some teachers pay the price and show their videos weekly.   You can't see the video if you do not have a subscription either  but what you can do is have your students enter their weekly contest.  To see the contest page click here.

The Writer's Workshop

If you would like to use short video's for your writing class try this Ted Ed playlist called "The Writers Workshop".  There are 22 videos in total.  You can see these videos by clicking here.

Science of the NFL

NBC Learn has posted 10 videos on the Science of the NFL.  Topics are:
1) Pythagorean Theorem
2) Torque and Center of Mass
3) Newton's 1st Law
4) Newton's 2nd Law
5) Newton's 3rd Law
6) Geometric Shapes
7) Kinematics
8) Vectors
9) Projectile Motion and Parabolas
10) Nutrition, Hydration and Health
To see the website click here.

An Alternative to Clipping Magic - Background Burner

I posted about Clipping Magic on September 27 2013.  To see the post click here.  Clipping Magic allows you to upload a picture and then easily remove the background.  Unfortunately it is no longer a free site.  I found a site that does a very similar job and almost as good.  It is called Background Burner.  To see the website click here.  Here is a picture I uploaded in my post in 2013.

After uploading the above picture into Background Burner, this is what I got.

None of these were perfect.  I picked the third picture and clicked on the Touch Up button.  Now pick the Touch Up button again in the lower right corner.  See the arrow below.

Now use the red highlighter to mark the background that you do not want and use the green highlighter to keep what you want.  This is what I got.  Not that great but this is the first one that was not very good.  My son and I used it all weekend on his project and it did work very well.   Choose png for file type if you want a transparent background.

Now we found another way that uses Clipping Magic but not having to pay for it.  Use Clipping Magic as normal.  Don't download the picture if you don't have a subscription.  I now would screen shot the picture on the right in "paint" or some other software and save the picture.

We now need to remove the checkered background.  This can be done in Powerpoint easily.  I only have Powerpoint 2007 at home so I had to do the above step in Clipping Magic.  In PP 2007 you delete the two text boxes that appear and put the picture in the slide by selecting Insert.  Next left click on your picture and  choose Format on the top right handside  then Color on the top left handside and then from the drop down list select set transparent color  (note I am using PP 2013 for this write up as I am at school).

After selecting this move your cursor to the checker board background and click on it.  The background should go away.  Right click on the picture and select "Save as Picture".  Choose png if you want transparent background and not white.

Now if you have Powerpoint 2013 you can bypass the Clipping Magic.  Just take your picture and put it in Powerpoint 2013.  Click on the picture and select Format on the top right handside. Then select Remove Background from the top left handside.  Your background should turn purple.  You might have to use the green and red buttons at the top as you would in Clipping Magic.  I still think Clipping Magic is a great program.  For simple objects Background Burner is very good.

Forgiveness for a defender of Apartheid

If you are teaching a unit about Nelson Mandela,  South Africa and Apartheid you might want to include this PBS NEWSHOUR video that highlights the former Minister in charge of violently upholding Apartheid.  He is no asking for forgiveness.  Ask your students to write a paragraph or two if he deserves forgiveness.  The video is almost 9 minutes long.

If you would like more information about Nelson Mandela, go to Larry Ferlazzo's great website.  He has a ton of links about Mandela.  Click here.

Teaching Current Events with PBS Newshour Extra

Last week I posted on teaching Current Events with The New York Times.  You can see that post be clicking here.  This site can be used in a cross curricular way as you can peruse news items by Subject Area.  They also have Lesson Plans for teachers and Student Voices which are articles written by  students.  Take a look at this website by clicking here.

Free Comic Book Day

Everyone likes free stuff.  Your students might be interested in free comics this weekend.  I know my son likes this day.  To see the website click here.   To find the store nearest you that is participating in this make sure to click on the store locator in the top right hand corner.

Math Doctor Bob

 

Many students use Khan Academy when searching for help with math.  Here is an alternative that you may find helpful.  Robert Donley uses his white board to explain many topics that are well organized by course and topic. To see his website click here.