Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

Promote environmental citizenship through this site's "green learning" units. The curriculum ranges from examining how electricity works, understanding the balance of ecosystems, to a high school unit on sustainable futures. Enjoy the interactive wind turbine and carbon calculator. The animation for grades 4 - 7 is engaging, and the video presentations for high school students on sustainability is powerful. Green Learning provides educators with an array of hands-on activities, online learning opportunities, printable materials, assessment tools, and valuable resources such as environmental experts to contact. Each environmental concept taught provides opportunities for real world learning, encourages social action, and advocacy. Teacher friendly planning tools can help meet instructional time constraints, students learning styles, and promote cross-curricular connections. The site is free but requires registration. Membership provides access to additional educational materials and a monthly newsletter. This program comes to us from Canada.

tag(s): climate (95), climate change (112), conservation (109), ecosystems (105), electricity (62), energy (139), environment (253), natural resources (33), OER (51), persuasive writing (50), solar energy (35), sustainability (54)

At this site you will find free interactive listening activities, reading exercises, quizzes, and more. Though developed with the ESL/ELL teacher and student in mind, any language arts teacher will find activities here to help differentiate language skills in your classroom. This is an extensive site with several levels in each language arts strand. Every strand and level also has numerous activities to choose from.
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tag(s): grammar (139), listening (117), reading comprehension (146), vocabulary (251)

Join the fun of rhymes and music in the Mother Goose Club. Videos, songs, printables, games, crafts and activities accompany the rhymes. Videos can be watched on YouTube, Amazon, Netflix, Kidoodle, Tubi, Highbrow, and Sensical. Get the App in the Google Play or Apple Store.
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tag(s): nursery rhymes (10), phonics (53), preK (322)

This site, created by the Kennedy Center, offers a wealth of interactive lesson plans for grades K-12 dealing with a variety of topics, all with an "arts" spin. Search by subject, keyword, or grade level (K-4, 5-8, or 9-12). Some examples of topics include Native Americans, Civil War, Shakespeare, myths, melodrama, adjectives, monsters, baseball, and countless others! Be sure to check out the category "Our Best Resources Organized by Subject." After that click on the the top menu for Education and get even more resources. There are many interactive lessons: some with video, audio, or slideshows. The lessons provide an estimate of time required and complete, step-by-step instructions. There are printables included with some of the lessons.
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tag(s): african american (130), baseball (28), civil war (146), comics and cartoons (61), dance (42), folktales (35), greece (47), habitats (104), immigration (85), literature (215), mexico (68), musical instruments (59), myths and legends (44), native americans (129), painting (49), surrealism (2)

Create the letters of the alphabet with folded paper. The animated video instructions are easy to follow and successfully guide you through creating origami. The trip to the local craft store for origami paper is unnecessary because the Origami Club also provides free printable, decorative paper.

tag(s): alphabet (46)

This blog teaches English to international students by offering a "phrase a day." Common words and phrases are explained in context; several examples of each usage make the meaning clear. Many of the situations described are those experienced by adults or older teens, not children, such as giving a speech or shopping alone. Of course, this site could also be used in a regular classroom to teach speech/language or grammar. Students can look at the site or have a phrase emailed to them every day. Phrases include commonly used groups of words, idioms, and other typical language of both casual and formal English. To find a list of all phrases in the system, students can click on "Learning Tools." In addition to an index, this section offers explanations of basic grammar terms like parts of speech, stress, and other conversation techniques. Students can also make comments and read the comments of others. No email address is required to comment on the blog posts. (Our reviewers found no objectionable comments from the public, but teachers should always preview.)

tag(s): idioms (29), phrases (5), slang (16)

Look no further for holiday activities for your ESL and ELL students (or for reading/listening comprehension activities you can use with all learners! This site lists conventional and unusual holidays by month. Click the holiday you would like to feature to find a complete lesson including a tape script, an oral recording of the script, and a variety of review exercises. The printable activities include matching, several varieties of fill-in-the-blank, word choices, spelling, reordering events and sentences from the holiday information, and writing activities. An online clickable reading activity presents parts of sentences, so students must select which sentence part comes first. The screen changes when the correct part comes up, and students select the next part.

tag(s): holidays (283)

Find yourself stumped by all the strange questions students have? Are you looking for somewhere to go where adults can find the answers? Use this site to ask your question. Just type your question into the text box and several options for answers appear. The site was created for use by parents with young children, but it can really appeal to any age. Answers are written by site experts and by users themselves. Talk about the "source" of information as you share this site with your students! Registration is not necessary to ask questions. In order to add comments or an answer to another question, you must register. Registering requires use of an email address. If you choose to register your class, here is a tip: rather than using your personal or work email, create a free Gmail account to use for memberships. If you plan to have students register individually, you may want to create your own Gmail account with up to 20 subaccounts for each group of students (by code name or number) within your classes. Here is a blog post that tells how to set up GMail subaccounts to use for any online membership service.

Once registered, your Whyzz are kept as a record for review later. Site members can also comment on Whyzz answers which are offered by many professionals. Each answer also features a section called "exploration" where additional learning can take place as well as "related Whyzz." Check the spotlight, browse categories, and look at a featured answer.

tag(s): inquiry (35)

This is a teacher-created lesson trying to get upper elementary students interested in poetry by involving them in groups. It is simple and easily adapted to different grade levels.

tag(s): poetry (196)

If you are looking for recent children's literature award winning books, this is the site for you. Reading Rockets has an excellent compilation of major awards such as Caldecott Medal and Newbery Awards along with other less known but note-worthy recognitions. In addition, many "best of" lists are included from recent years. This is an excellent resource for classroom teachers, library/media specialists, and parents. Schools without media specialists may find this especially useful as a resource for the newest and most highly-regarded literature. Be sure to also check out the many other resources offered on this site such as Reading Guides, Classroom Strategies, and the many videos available about reading.
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tag(s): book lists (161), book reports (26), guided reading (31), independent reading (83), literacy (124), literature (215)