Free and Inexpensive Internet Resources for Regular and Special Educators

Children's Care Hospital & School
Tina Miller, Computer Coordinator/Educator
tina.miller@cchs.org
605-782-2403
 CCHS Assistive Technology Services
www.google.com

Updated April 2011

Art/Photos/Graphics/Creativity

*http://animoto.com/ On-line video creation site. http://animoto.com/education This is where you apply for educator access. 

http://www.artsonia.com/ Largest student art museum in the world.

http://www.crayola.com/ Many coloring pages, craft ideas, games and lesson plans. 

http://gallery.nen.gov.uk/index.php  Free resource to schools containing over 7000 high quality images, all copyright free for use in Education.

http://www.pics4learning.com/ Copyright-friendly image library for teachers and students.

http://www.freefoto.com/index.jsp Large collection of free photographs.

http://www.nga.gov/kids/zone/zone.htm National Gallery of Art.  Create your own art.

http://www.sxc.hu/  Free on-line gallery of photos.

Content Areas

http://www.algebasics.com/ Narrated Algebra tutorials made with Flash.

http://www.arcademicskillbuilders.com/ Fun educational games.

*http://www.arkive.org/ Videos and images of animals, many endangered.

http://www.2learn.ca/ Web site from Alberta, CA that contains many K-12 resources.

http://bensguide.gpo.gov/ Ben's guide to the US government for kids.

http://pbskids.org/rogers/R_house/build.htm#hold Create your own neighborhood scene and print it out.

http://www.childrensuniversity.manchester.ac.uk/ Children's University from the University of Manchester.  Interactive activities that can be used with the Smartboard, mostly science. 

http://e-learningforkids.org/   A non-profit foundation that provides many educational Flash games. 

http://fur.ly/ Shorten multiple URL's into one. Tina's sample fur.ly: http://fur.ly/mtn/

*http://www.gameclassroom.com/ A collection of educational games recommended by educators. For K-6th grade.

http://www.hippocampus.org/   HippoCampus is a project of the Monterey Institute for Technology and Education (MITE). The goal of HippoCampus is to provide high-quality, multimedia content on general education subjects to high school and college students free of charge. Make sure to read the Terms of Use.

http://www.khanacademy.org/about  Thousands of free educational videos mostly for higher level math and science. 

http://kids.aol.com/KOL/1/KOLJrStories  Children's on-line storybooks read aloud.

http://www.kidsknowit.com/interactive-educational-movies/index.php Kids Know It Network, free movies and games.

http://www.teach-nology.com/ Many on-line resources for teachers.

*http://www.jc-schools.net/ppt.html   Jefferson County Schools free PowerPoint collection.

http://www.learner.org/jnorth/   Journey North engages students in a global study of wildlife migration and seasonal change. K-12 students share their own field observations with classmates across North America.

http://www.mathplayground.com/index.html  Math skill practice for elementary and middle school.

*http://kids.nationalgeographic.com/Animals/CreatureFeature  Animal facts, photos, videos, e-cards and fact sheets to print.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/teachers/ NOVA site for teachers with good videos and podcasts.

http://pbskids.org/whiteboard/ Interactive whiteboard games from PBS.

http://www.portaportal.com/  Web based bookmarking utility that lets you store links to your favorite sites on-line.

*http://www.pppst.com/  Pete's PowerPoint Station.  Free PowerPoints in a wide variety of themes and topics.

http://www.nytimes.com/learning/teachers/lessons/archive.html New York Times Teacher Resources. Lesson plans for grades 6-12.

*http://www.region2library.org/ppa.htm Good collection of free PowerPoint activities for content areas.

http://www.starfall.com/ Excellent reading and writing activities for pre-K through second grade.

*http://www.ultimatechase.com/ Stock footage of storms and severe weather.

http://www.fema.gov/kids/  Federal Emergency Management Agency site for kids. Good information on disasters.

http://www.readwritethink.org/student_mat/index.asp ReadWriteThink offers a collection of online student materials to support literacy learning in the K-12 classroom.

http://www.storylineonline.net/ Stories read aloud by the Screen Actor's Guild Foundation.

http://switchzoo.com/ Mix and match animal parts to create your own animal.  Fun animal facts too.

*http://www.teachersdomain.org/  Free digital media resources, need user name and password.

http://www.urbanext.uiuc.edu/woods/01.html  Take a virtual walk in the woods.

*http://www.watchknow.org/default.aspx Large collection of educational videos.

http://www.wordle.net/  Create your own word clouds and print them, like a collage.

http://youtubedownload.altervista.org/ Download and convert videos from You Tube for free.

Night At the Museum Unit

Teddy Roosevelt

http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/

http://www.npg.si.edu/exh/roosevelt/

http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/tr26.html

Dinosaurs/Prehistoric Life

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sn/prehistoric_life/

http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/dinosaurs/

http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/dinosaurplanet/dinosaurplanet.html

Ancient Egypt

http://www.ancientegypt.co.uk/

http://egypt.mrdonn.org/

Ancient Rome

http://rome.mrdonn.org/index.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/romans/

Sacajawea

http://sacajawea.idahostatesman.com/index.htm

http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people/

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nwa/sacajawea.html

Lewis and Clark

http://www.pbs.org/lewisandclark/

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/lewisandclark/

Christopher Columbus

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/famouspeople/standard/columbus/index.shtml#focus

http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9109621/Christopher-Columbus

Music/Sound

http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ Free sound editing program.

*www.freeplaymusic.com Free music for school use. Make sure to read Terms of Use under Licensing, there are some restrictions. 

News For Students

http://www.cnn.com/studentnews/  CNN Student News.

http://theweekinrap.com/  A weekly summary of news headlines in the form of a rap video. 

Presentation Tools

*http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/photostory/default.mspx  Photostory 3 from Microsoft, make photo presentations.

Productivity

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/typing/ Dance Mat typing tutor.

*http://camstudio.org/ CamStudio, free screen recording software.

*http://www.harmonyhollow.net/cool_timer.shtml  Cool Timer. Freeware timer to put on your computer.

Special Needs

www.ace-centre.org.uk/ Large Mouse Pointers.

http://fullmeasure.co.uk/powertalk/  Automatic Speech for PowerPoint presentations.

http://www.fxc.btinternet.co.uk/ FX Free and Assistive Software.

*www.qwertystudios.com  Inexpensive talking word processor for Windows.

http://www.tex-edit.com/ Inexpensive word processor for Macintosh that will read text aloud.

http://www.do2learn.com/ Resources for individuals with special needs. 

http://www.feat.org/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=GoxGKXfRDrg=&tabid=78&mid=614  Ipad, Iphone and Ipod touch apps for Special Education. This is a PDF so it takes a few seconds to download. 

http://www.rsc-ne-scotland.ac.uk/eduapps/accessapps.php Portable apps for writing, reading and planning as well as sensory, cognitive and physical difficulties.

http://www.sensorysoftware.com/bigcalculator.html Free large calculator for Windows.

http://www.senteacher.org/Home/  Free Resources for Teaching Special Needs.

http://www.cfs-technologies.com/home/?id=1.4  Speakonia. Speaks aloud text. 

*http://www.stevefoxover.com/readtome/index.aspx Inexpensive program for reading Web pages aloud.

Fun and well, some are just plain weird!

http://blabberize.com/ Make pictures blabber!

*http://www.idodogtricks.com/index_flash.html  Type in dog tricks and see what happens.

http://www.miketheheadlesschicken.org/ This is the weird one. Could be an interesting class discussion!

Web sites that collect excellent Educational Web sites

*http://faculty.usiouxfalls.edu/arpeterson/ Dr. Arlys E. Peterson's Web site, Education and Technology professor at the University of Sioux Falls. Excellent, extensive collection of web sites for education.

https://sites.google.com/site/bawollak/  Barb Wollack's web site.  Contains excellent sources for use of Web 2.0 technology and free internet sources for reading, writing, and communication. On the right side of the page click on Link to References underneath listed presentations. 

*http://www.paec.org/fdlrstech/handouts/exploringnewterritories2010.pdf  Exploring New Territories PDF, Teacher Resources by David Davis.

*http://paulhami.edublogs.org/ Paul Hamilton's Blog of Free Resources from the Net (good for both regular and special education).

Web 2.0

*http://www.ictineducation.org/free-stuff/   The Amazing Web 2.0 Project Book (free PDF download)

https://sites.google.com/site/bawollak/  Barb Wollack's web site.  Contains excellent sources for use of Web 2.0 technology and free internet sources for reading, writing, and communication. On the right side of the page click on Link to References underneath listed presentations.