Take Advantage of the Speed of the World Wide Web to Infuse What's Hot and Relevant into your Classroom
HOT ? now, current, relevent, intense, specific
DIGITAL HOT ? alerts, news, podcasts, RSS feeds, blogs
We all need to keep up-to-date with our subjects and profession. Online producers of information gladly give it away - the challenge is to create a filter so that you receive the quality and quantity you need without being overwhelmed.
Here are some filters
1. Alerts and news headlines delivered to your e-mailbox, or your students' e-mailboxes. Scan and toss.
SAMPLE ALERTS AND NEWSLETTERS YOU CAN SUBSCRIBE TO
2. Subscription to magazines through databases (e.g. Gale, EBSCO - gain access throgh your public or school library). Whole articles are delivered to your mailbox. Digitized already, you can easily paste paragraphs into lessons (with citations). Some databases allow you to e-mail copies of articles to your students.
3. Sites of journals and newspapers you would generally read in print. They often allow you to e-mail an article to yourself or your students.
4. Meta search sites save you a lot of time (e.g. * Internet Public Library, Intute, SD#43 Digital Library (c)Follett, Librarians' Index to the Internet
Here are some general ideas to get your students involved.
(more in Resources by Subject).
1. Assign responsibility for keeping up on the latest - to your students. (E.g. an tsunami crisis for Earth Science, a constitutional debate for Civics, the latest words to come into the English Language for English class, travel advisories for Tourism. Students can keep journals, or report to class.
2. Use themes to infuse currency (e.g. the latest controversy in genetics, fashion.)
3. Have student keep a journal following the development of an issue (e.g. Indian land claims).
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