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The ABC's of Using the Internet in Grades PreK-3 Compiled by Julie Coiro, Software and Curriculum Specialist

A

Ask Jeeves for Kids A search engine designed for kids to use by asking questions in complete sentences. It helps them narrow down the topic with more fine-tuned questions and guarantees website results that are safe for children. http://ajkids.com/

Almanac from Infoplease.com Kids Almanac Access great maps, statistics and almanac type facts through this page designed for kids. The reading is a little harder but the information is appropriate, if you're searching for this type of stuff. http://kids.infoplease.com/

Alfy in the Classroom Good site for Kindergarten and first grade skills. ALFY's games, stories, and activities are grouped according to conceptual themes of ABC's, 123's, Animals and there are dozens of ideas for web-linked classroom activities based on these themes and added lesson plans that were gathered from all over the Internet. http://www.alfy.com/Teachers/Classroom/classroom.htm
 

B

Billy Bear's Playground Home of lots of great clip art, fun little games for young children, and holiday activities. Beware of The Chicken Dance! http://216.90.96.108/

C

Classroom Connect: One of the most well known resources for teachers using the Internet. Includes links to Classroom Today (weekly themed activities) and Connected Teachers (lessons, discussion groups) http://www.classroom.net/home.asp

Craft's From Aunt Annie Includes tons of crafts, with highlights being a Craft Exchange, over 100 folktale puppets, 40 games from around the world, flowers, seasonal craft ideas and much more. http://www.auntannie.com/

CyberSurfari: An interactive online adventure for K-12 students. This year's adventure runs from October 21-March 15. Play with your whole class, students can play at home with parents, or students can play in teams. http://www.cybersurfari.org/

D

Discovery Kids Incredible, online interactive adventures handpicked by each individual child depending on self-described interests and hobbies. http://www.discoverykids.com/KIDS/

E

Enchanted Learning for Little Explorers Very kid friendly website designed for little ones. Fact and fictional information can be found here as well as links to online games and computer software. Includes talking dictionary, Zoom School, and much more. http://www.littleexplorers.com/

F

Fun with Math Stories: Over 2,000 math word problems at many grade levels. Also links to math stories that coorelate with primary elementary children's literature. http://WWW.Mathstories.com/

G

Global Schoolhouse Online Project Index The first place to go when looking to get your class involved in an online project. Join ones already created or develop your own and post it online for others to join. Can search by grade level or topic. http://www.gsn.org/project/index.html

H

The Holiday Zone Links to crafts, games, language activities, poems, coloring pages, songs and rhymes about many of the major holidays celebrated in the United States. http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Troy/9087/

Homework Helper by B.J. Pinchbeck Not just for elementary school students, but you'll be able to access sites that may help enhance certain units, help keep your brighter students challenged, or help you bruch up on your own knowledge on certain topics. http://www.bjpinchbeck.com/

I

Index to Children's Authors and Illustrators: An extensive list of links to author and illustrator homepages, teaching units and biographies, listed in alphabetical order. http://falcon.jmu.edu/~ramseyil/biochildhome.htm

J

Java Applets for Kids: Fun little games you don't need to download to play. Some may require the Shockwave plug-in to play.

Sanford Online Art Adventures: Includes Leonardo's Workshop, Color Theory and Portraits from the Past http://www.sanford- artedventures.com/play/play.html

Java Jigsaws (Scramble photos), Trading Ones & Tens, Math Facts, Publishing Writing, and more http://www.edbydesign.com/scr_kids.html

Rainy Day Playhouse Create and send really cool electronic post cards and play online games. http://www.pen-web.com/rainyday/

K

KidzSing Garden of Songs Bring along your singing voice to sing along to instruments that play many popular children's songs and include the lyrics. The sound files require RealPlayer, but run very quickly. http://members.home.com/veeceet/index.html

L

Literature Lessons with SCORE An awesome and very user friendly list of teacher lesson plans tied to state standards, involving the Internet, and revolving around popular literature titles on most schools' list of books to read.
http://www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/score/cyberguide.html

(Visit the Homepage of San Diego County of Education to find similar SCORE links and other great Internet resources for all other content areas) http://www.sdcoe.k12.ca.us/resources/resframe.html

M

My Weekly Reader Home of many things related to My Weekly Reader, including an interactive writing project that prompts individuals or classes to write in and post their responses to typical age-appropriate problems. http://www.weeklyreader.com/

N

NetMom This website is created by the authors of The Internet Kids & Family Yellow Pages. Great kid safe links and surfing tips for families with young children. http://www.netmom.com/

O

Ooodles of Lesson Plans

Kiddyhouse.com Links to lessons and activities about lots of animals, various childhood thematic units and resources for parents and teachers. http://www.kiddyhouse.com/

Homework Central Lesson Plans for Teachers http://www.homeworkcentral.com/teachers/vsl_index.htp

P

Poetry Pals Collaborative Writing: Students in grades K-12 are given monthly poetry genres to write about. Post, revise, and reflect with others around the world. http://www.geocities.com/EnchantedForest/5165/index1.html

Q

Question of the Day / Week:

Guided Classroom Inquiry: Have children drop questions into a box; pull one once a week, search and explore together and record findings to compile into a class book of Things We Learned Using the Internet

Math Problem of the Week http://forum.swarthmore.edu/pow/

Word of the Day from Merrium Webster: Also a great resource for word meanings and word experiments. http://www.wordcentral.com/

R

Rebus Rhymes from Enchanted Learning You'll never be at a loss for rhymes to share during Circle Time or at a learning center. http://www.enchantedlearning.com
 

S

Scholastic Newszone A friendly, interactive means of enriching the Scholastic weekly flyers that many teachers already subscribe for your class. Lots of fun if you don't have access to the offline texts too! http://teacher.scholastic.com/newszone/index.asp

Search Engines for Kids Explore the Internet safely with your children by your side. Learn more by visiting this site. http://www.learn.k12.ct.us/julie/kidsearch.htm

T

Titanic Photos

Teacher Listservs / Discussion Lists Link to many different listservs for teachers from this main page.
http://www.indiana.edu/~eric_rec/comatt/nwsgrps.html

Teachersweb.com A place for K-12 teachers to collaborate, learn and explore the resources of the Internet for their students. http://www.teachersweb.com/

Teachers.net More online chats, live chats with nationally known experts, mailrings, and even a place to create your own class website. http://www.teachers.net/

A World of Kindergartens Early childhood teachers from around the world have joined together to provide curriculum support to each other and anyone who needs ideas. The information found at this site has come from a discussion list composed of kindergarten, pher and record findings to compile into a class book of Things We Learned Using the Internet

Trackstar Here's a real easy way to compile all your links about a topic or access the links that another teacher located. http://scrtec.org/track/
 

U

Universe Exploration with StarChild and NASA Interactive Activities for Kids http://www.nasa.gov/cool.html (scroll down this NASA page until you find StarChild under Educational and Interactive Sites)

V

Venturing Into Unknown Worlds with Yahooligans Kids Almanac http://www.yahooligans.com/content/ka/index.html

W

Web Pages from Elementary Classes Pocantico Hills School in Sleepy Hollow, New York. Includes very informative and well designed web pages created by 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th grade classes. Great reading material for you students or ideas for inspiring you to create your own class web page and publish what they've learned on the Internet. http://www2.lhric.org/pocantico/pocantic.html

Where on the Globe is Roger? Travel around the world with Roger and his wife and experience the people and culture of many lands through their interactive journal entries and photographs. The site has been successful for a number of years. http://www.gsn.org/roger/index.html

WebQuests for Students in Grades K-3 The famous WebQuest, originally designed by Bernie Dodge, has many online projects designed for primary students. http://edweb.sdsu.edu/webquest/K-3matrix.html

X

Pitsco's Ask an eXpert Send students here to find answers to hundreds of questions kids their own age ask about many school age topics. If the answer is nowhere to be found, then student's can type in their question for a particular expert and receive an answer back. http://askanexpert.com

Y

Yahooligans A spin off of the search engine Yahoo.com designed for younger children. Sites listed are safe and appropriate for chidlren and there's some neat ideas for teachers here too. http://www.yahooligans.com/

Yuckiest Site on the Internet For all those kids who love bugs, science, or really gross things, they'll really love this site! http://www.yucky.com/

Z

Zoo Animal Picture Archive Includes an easy search engine and a link to the Electronic Zoo Animal Image Collection. Just type in any kind of animal you can think of and immediately have access to beautiful up-close, full color photographs that your students can view. http://www.best5.net/animal/

Animal Encyclopedia Sponsored by the Lycos search engine, this great animal database search by index, habitats, continents and classes. http://versaware.animalszone.lycos.com/

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