Elementary Education Favorites

Blue Valley Schools:
Elementary Education Links

Note: this list begins with some sites of general interest to elementary educators - further down the list are sites that might be starting places for kids!

General Topics	Social Studies	Communication Arts
Science	Interactive & Kid Sites	Mathematics

General Topic Site Indices:

Blue Web'n: The Blue Web'n site provides links to web sites categorized as tutorials, web-based activities, web-based projects, as well as the more mundane lesson plans and hotlists. Content is available that is suitable for grades k-12.
Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators: This may be the definitive list of sites for educators. Maintained by a full time staff at the Discovery Channel, they do about a good a job of collecting and classifying education web sites as is possible. This may be a good place to start a search for technology-based resources to support a particular lesson.
EduPuppy: Early childhood through grade 2 teachers and students will find resources at this site. Resources are organized in over 50 categories from Activities to Virtual Explorations.
KidsClick: This is a search site designed for elementary age students. It guides them through the complexities of searching for things online (as well as non-web media).
Homework.com: This site provides links to a wide variety of homework helps and research tools for use by the young student.
CyberSurfari: Students can participate in an online hunt for information at this very entertaining site that develops information literacy skills and specific skills with searching for information on the Internet.
Example WebQuests: The strategy created by Bernie Dodge of San Diego State University has generated many quality learning activites. This site is a collection of some of the best learning opportunities on the Internet. Be prepared for materials that are overwhelming in their depth, their use of effective strategies for learning, and their specific application.
Curriculum-Based Educational Telecomputing Projects: This is a collection of web-based activities that fall into several categories of "teleresearch". They serve as excellent lesson ideas, student activities, and seeds to generate more ideas for teaching and learning.
Big 6: How about information about Eisenberg and Berkowitz’s Big Six?
MECC on the Internet: This is the home page for Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium and contains links to their Antartica project (or its latest revision/counterpart), their MayaQuest project, games kids can play online, links for parents and educators, etc.
Classroom Connect: This is the web page for the Classroom Connect magazine and contains links to great web pages in every discipline, for every grade, and for professional educators. While many of their best sites are also accessible from the Blue Valley Intranet Services pages, the site is definitely worth some hours of further browsing. In addition instructional and curricular links, it has links to other schools with web sites.
The Global School Network: The Global School Network is a link to a wide variety of kid oriented projects on the Internet. Check out their alphabetical listing of projects for a complete view. From humble beginnings as a page created by a group of teachers wishing to share resources, it has grown into one of the most respected sources on the Internet - This site is a "must use!"
Lesson Plan Place: This is a clearinghouse with several hundred lesson plans and ideas in a wide variety of subject areas. It also includes links to other sites of interest to teachers and/or students.
TeachNet: This is another site with lesson ideas. They include over 500 projects that have been designed by teachers.
Multimedia Resources Free for the Taking: This is a compilation of pictures, videos, sounds, and other useful componenets that teachers can take from the Internet for multimedia projects.
WebSites and Resources for Teachers: This is a site created by a couple of professors of elementary education at California State University, Northridge.
Communications Arts
The Children's Literature Web Guide: This site contains a wealth of links to information and literature for children. The page also contains links to author, information about award-winning literature, resources for parents, teachers, storytellers, etc.
Children's Literature: This site contains ratings and review of a wide range of children's literature in book or electronic formats. Reviews are grouped according to the topic of the resource.
Global Show and Tell: This site is a place for children to submit (and have displayed) their creations, art, pictures, etc. This site also includes links to other pages which allow for student work to be displayed.
FunBrain.com: This site contains over thirty games in eight different subject areas. The "Math Baseball" game has students answering a math question - correct answers = hits, wrong answers = outs. Score keeping for the ball game becomes the motivation for improved computation al skills. Teachers can use a library of ready-made quizzes, have students take the quizzes online, and the results will be e-mailed to the teacher. Parents can have an e-mail of the child's progress sent to them based on their performance on the educational games.
CBC 4 Kids: The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation hosts this educational and fun site for kids age 8-13. It has a section called "The Lab" where kids can do science experiments, learn how to make a paper airplane, or read about endangered species. The "What’s New" section contains both news for kids and a homework helper section. "Words" includes a book list, word searches, and places for kids to write radio dramas and contribute to a "never ending story". A time machine provides fun facts about what happened on various dates in history.
World Kids Network: This is an extremely entertaining site maintained by children and adults. The site is mainly a volunteer. It features such areas as motivational writing resources, assistance for kids to design web pages, games, competition, stories, art, clip, art, movies, and much more.
NoSweat.com: This site includes Homework Central Jr. for students K-6 and Homework Central for middle and high school students. Encyclopedia Central contains links to research information and there are also links to teacher sites.
Ask Jeeves for Kids: This is a place where kids can type in a question (in "kid language") and Jeeves will respond with sites where the student can find the answers to his/her questions on the Internet.
Yahooligans: This is a kid-version of the famous Yahoo index of the Internet. The subject areas of the index have been matched to the interests and needs of young people.
Ask an Expert: This is another site that allows kids to submit questions or to browse through a catalog of previous questions and answers. The answers to the questions will be sent by e-mail to the student and questions and answers will be added to the searchable database.
KidsCom: This site also provides an interactive opportunity for kids to work on the Internet. In addition to being able to put examples of creation on the Internet, there is a chat room for kids, resources for educators, etc.
4Kids Treehouse: This site provides many educational activities in areas of reading, science, social studies. It has links to age-apporpirate study resources as well as fun and entertaining links.
Carlos' Interactive Coloring Book: This is a page which allows for users to (children, theoretically) create art online. If low on substance, it does show how the Internet may be an interactive tool.
Art Express: This site is designed for use by grades 1-5. It includes age-appropriate art education as well as interactive puzzles and games as kids become familiar with how artists approach their work and examples of notable works of art.
Kinderart: This site has over 160 art projects that can be linked to other curricular areas, multicultural themes, seasonal units, recycling, etc.
Disney: While it is not specifically an education site, kids will probably love it.
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Elementary Science Favorites:

The Yuckiest Site on the Internet: The"Yuckiest Site on the Internet" contains science information for elementary school students as well as links to other resources provided by the New Jersey Ed. department. It has received many awards as a fantastic science resource.
KidsHealth: This site is a good source of health information targeted at toward kids, parents and educators. It includes both hard information and games and health tips.
Volcano World: This site is a great resource for students of all ages who wish to study volcanos. It is a creation of NASA and maintains up-to-date information about volcanic activity around the world. Historical information is also contained at this site.
Hurricane: This site is maintained by the University of Miami and the Miami Museum of Science. It contains information for elementary students and teachers about hurricanes and their effects on society.
GulfNet: This site is also of interest by following its education links. It is maintained by the EPA at a computer at the Stennis Space Center (NASA) in Mississippi. It provides information about the Gulf ecosystem and links to both governmental and commercial concerns monitoring ecology in this region.
The Bears Den: This is a resource with information about various varieties of bears around the world. It includes grizzly bears, black bears, polar bears, and evan pandas (to name a few).
Rainforest Walk: Here is a site that is a self-guided tour through the rainforest in Costa Rica. It is an appropriate site for upper elementary, middle school, and beyond.
Titanic: This is a 3D rendering of the original HMS Titanic.
Cool Science: The Howard Hughes Medical Institute maintains this site designed to teach students important concepts of biology via hands on activities that are either web based or can be completed at home.
The Adventures of Herman: The University of Illinois at Urbana Champagne created this "autobiography of Herman the earthworm" to teach children about worms.
The Great Plant Escape: A site for 4th and 5th graders to study plants in a fun, interactive manner. The site was created by the University of Illinois Extension.
Natural Resources, the Environment, and Ecosystems: Here are lesson guides for teachers from the University of Illinois Extension for grades 1-5 dealing with the topics of the title of the site.
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Elementary Math Links
Mathematics OnLine Index: This index (maintained by University of Kansas) has links to lesson ideas, web pages, and suggested resources for topics ranging from Number Sense, basic operations, fractions, decimals, ratios and percents, etc. Teachers looking for ideas for how to introduce or reinforce concepts may find some good ideas here.
King's Math Activities: An elementary math teacher created this excellent set of links to a wide range of topics covered in the K-6 curriculum. The site is both extensive and well catalogued.
Internet Mathematics Library (The Math Forum): This index has links to materials appropriate for math students from Kindergarten through graduate school -choose appropriately! There are also links to information about math education, teaching strategies, and current issues.
Harcourt Animated Glossary: This glossary of math terms includes some definitions with animated examples. If you are looking for a way to demonstrate a concept, this page may give ideas, or could be used for students to research and make presentations to their peers.
Rectangle Pattern Challenges: This is a puzzle page that can be used to generate several higher-order questions. Students can analzye and recognize patterns, generate hypotheses, and test solutions with their own drawings. Teachers could vary the difficulty level by creating a simpler drawing, too.
Base Ten Block Activities: This is an interactive page that uses Java scripts so students can assemble geometric shapes using unit blocks, 10-unit blocks, and 100 unit blocks. The site includes lesson ideas to teach such concepts as place value, area, multiplication, division, grouping/addition, etc.
Megamaths Tables: The BBC created this site to help students practice learning their multiplication tables. The site includes a variety of interactive games to provide drill and practice.
No Matter What Shape Your Fractions are In: Students use a hexagon, trapezoid, parallelogram, and equilateral trinagle to investigate a variety of fraction concepts. The site includes an interactive Java applet to explore the topics and printable pages to create paper cut-outs for students to try the activities without a computer.
Math Activities for Grade K-6: This site contains a variety of activities linking math and aeronautics using resources from NASA. Topics range from predicting speeds of various objects (with the SR-71 as the fastest airplane), symmetry in aeronautics, latitude and longitude for coordinate geometry and subtraction practice, etc. Activities are also available for grades 7-8 and 9-12.
Sample Math WebQuests: This page was from a presentation at the NCTM national meeting in 1999. It includes basic information about WebQuests and several samples by the presenter (Leah P. McCoy). Topics included were Best Weather City, National Park Vacation, Most Thrilling Roller Coaster Ride, World Shopping Spree, and Baseball Prediction.
Pascal's Triangle: This geometric shape can be a study in patterns, mathematical sequences, and even algebra. The site (at the Math Forum) includes lesson ideas and links to standards for K-4, 5-8, and 9-12 applications for the Pascal's Triangle page.
A+ Math: The A Plus Math site includes games, a homework helper section, and advanced problems. Games include "Matho" (a form of Bingo for either addition, multiplication, subtraction or division) and Concentration (available for addition or multiplication). There is an interactive homework helper - students enter a calculation problem and their answer and will be told if their answer is correct.
FunBrain.com: The "Math Baseball" game at this site has students answering a math question - correct answers = hits, wrong answers = outs. Score keeping for the ball game becomes the motivation for improved computation al skills. .
MegaMath: This is a project of the Los Alamos National Laboratory that brings profound mathematical concepts to an elementary level. "Discrete Math" activities (circuits & paths, topology, etc.) are featured along with geometry and number sense. There are also links to science with a look at machines.

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