Thursday, December 30, 2010

Anne Frank


Anne Frank House Online
Here is a site where you can take a virtual tour of Anne Frank's House. You can also see some short movies about what life was like for Anne Frank as well as find out about the people who were living with and near her. As with the item below, I found this from a Tweet, this time from "ShellTerrell" who is a teacher I follow from Germany. Above is the only know video of Anne Frank.

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Neanderthals cooked and ate vegetables


Researchers in the US have found grains of cooked plant material in their teeth.

The study is the first to confirm that the Neanderthal diet was not confined to meat and was more sophisticated than previously thought.

Read on BBC.com


Monday, December 27, 2010

Seven Billion People


This is a great short video by the National Geographic Society that looks at the ramifications of the world having seven billion people by the end of 2011 - from how quickly it has been growing, to the growth of mega-cities to  how much a small minority consume to how many have clean drinking water and toilets

Saturday, December 25, 2010

European Maps Every 100 Years

Here are the maps of Europe from 1 CE through the present with a different one every one hundred years.  Thanks to Larry Ferlazzo for the heads up (and his great Tweets and webpages).

Ancient Greece


LOST TREASURES OF THE ANCIENT WORLD: GREECE PT.1
Uploaded by Top-Notch112. - Arts and animation videos.
Above is a 16 minute "Treasures of the Ancient World" on Greece.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

James Burke's Connections on YouTube


For those of you who have never partaken of these amazing, swirling journeys through time and space, welcome to James Burke's Connections! Almost magically, Burke weaves a story about the history of science that traverses the globe and spans the millenia. To top it off, Burke sports some of the hippest threads of the late 1970s in the first season and also tends to jump into the frame in an unexpected and often wryly humorous fashion.

Although I think the episodes are difficult to place within a single, high school, World History lesson, they may serve as tools for historical thinking or as extracurricular activities.
This is the James Burke Connections YouTube Channel, and here's a brief intro to the series. Also, this is another portal to a full set of YouTubed episodes for all three seasons. They will surely be a treat if you've never seen them before!

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Youtube Blocked At Your School?

I have been using Splicd.com to quickly show only the portion of a youtube video I want in class. It is great for schools where youtube is blocked.  But two others that you can use are ViewPure and SafeShare.tv which also give you a new url which will get you around the block your school may have.  I found these last two at a new blog I follow called "The Pursuit of Education Technology Happiness."

Pythagoras, a math genius? Not by Babylonian standards

Friday, December 17, 2010

Chinese Dynasties

We all like the Chinese Dynasties song, but we need more than that to teach our students.  Here and here are nice webpages giving many of the highlights of the Chinese Dynasties in one easy to use resource.

Edublog Winners

Every year I go here to see the Edublog Winners.  If you haven't done it, you will find some amazing new resources both in blog form as well as Twitter to add to your daily RSS feeds.

Thursday, December 16, 2010

Data dump

The US Census Bureau just released a whole slew of new data.  This link will take you to the New York Times lesson plans site, where you can find a lesson and an interactive map showing the distribution of different racial and ethnic groups.  If you click on the link for the related interactive map, you'll see a map of New York City.  You can use your mouse to drag the map to any part of the US you want to look at.  You can also zoom in and out to pick a smaller or larger area on which to focus.  An excellent tool!

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Great Summary of Online Resources


Super Book Of Web Tools For Educators -
If you are a high school teacher skip to page 36.  There is also a section on ESOL teaching as well as online teaching. It is very definitely worth your time to go through this and see what you can find that is new to you.  Even with my great use of technology, I found it helpful.

Modern History Online Resources

This is a phenomenal resource from Fordham University to help you teach modern World History.  For each era there are a ton of documents that you can use in your classrooms.

Monday, December 13, 2010

History Nerds of the World Unite!

I've been enjoying this blog for the past few weeks or so.  The women who write the blog are published authors of historical fiction (romance and novels, respectively).  I have a passion for historical fiction myself, and so was drawn to the site for obvious reasons.  I particularly enjoyed today's post on Anne Boleyn's shoes.  What caught my attention over the weekend was this post about a bequest left to the Library of Congress.  The LOC received hundreds of photos from the Civil War era and none of them were identified.  There's a link in the post to the album that the LOC posted on Flickr.  Using the photos would be an excellent way to put a face on people from the past - in the end, history is their story (we're still writing ours).  Some of the images are poignant, some are humorous, but they are all familiar.  For our students, perhaps giving history a face would allow them to see the drama of the past.

Sunday, December 5, 2010

Museum Box

Museum Box allows you to create a visual box of elements such as pictures, video, sound, files, links and text.  It would be a nice way for your students to create a box of memories of an era you are studying.

Saturday, December 4, 2010

Age vs. Income Over the Past 200 Years


If this isn't an incentive to your students to strive to do their best in school, I don't know what is.  This is a video showing life expectancy versus income over the last two hundred years. I suppose I should just put a link up to Open Culture since I have used it so much lately.

The Future of Computers


Okay, this is just pure fun - but for those I certainly hope it shows the future of our phones/computers (will there be a difference) and ipads.

Google Maps Mania & Google Earth


Here is a new blog I just found that shows how people around the world are using Google Maps.  I have used it with my students to show their own history and another person in my department uses it for "history trips."  You can add pictures and write about places (both today and historical) that you have your kids "go to."  So if you like using Google Maps, this would be a great new resource. Here is the blog for Google Earth which also would be helpful.  Above is a video explaining how you can use the new Google Earth which I found on the webpage.

Friday, December 3, 2010

History Travel Site


Historvius is a quick alternative to Google Earth for having students create a trip to different places and to find out different information.  You will get an up close look at the place (any era of time) as well as information and even pertinent links.  At the end it even creates a pdf file (say for turning into a teacher!).  Watch the easy to follow short video above to learn more. Thanks for this idea from a Tweet of "dandidie".

Thursday, December 2, 2010

Great Video of the Great Wall


While I'm on it, above is a super video of both the touristy part of the Great Wall as well as footage of a logn section that has never been repaired and yet is largely unvisited by people today.  It is well worth the four minutes of watching to show your students.

China Wall Project

We have a great techie librarian who likes doing webquests for us.  She likes to do it on wix.com.  Here is a great one she did on the Great Wall of China.  It has a word document with questions, links to a virtual tour of the wall, another one on Google Earth, as well as links, images, and even some short articles including that refutes the myth that the Wall of China can be seen from space.

The Titanic Above Water!


Yes, I like "Open Culture" a lot and the video above showing the Titanic in 1911 is one reason why.  It is the only known video of the ship BEFORE it sunk.

Google Translate Goes Audio


I have been using Google Translate to e-mail students' parents who do not speak English.  They usually write me back in their native language and then I tranlate it back to English.  Well now, if you want, you can listen to what was written.  I'm not sure the language teachers will like it, but it is still fairly cool.

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Korean War in Pictures

Incredible Set of Korean War Pictures
I found this from a Tweet from "curosa." If you go here, you can find 60 pictures from the Boston Globe 60 years since the beginning of the war.

History of Europe in the 19th Century - Animated Maps

Animated Maps
I stumbled upon this great resource today. Not only are the maps animated, but they are also narrated. There are a series of maps beginning with the Congress of Vienna. There are also some animated ancient maps. The best part is - they are FREE!

This link (The Map As History) takes you to the actual website which has other helpful resources.