14 Educational Websites Students Will Ask to Visit This Summer

The most popular website at my school is Minecraft–hands down, starting in 1st grade (I’m amazed parents let six-year-olds use this sometimes violent game, but they do and students do and the mania starts). Because kids would live in this blocky virtual world 24/7, I only let them play it two lunch periods a week. Those days, my lab is always packed. Kids have no idea they’re learning math (estimation, geometry, shapes), science (geology, rocks, minerals), building, or softer skills like thinking and reasoning, problem solving, hypothesis-testing, risk-taking, and collaboration. They don’t realize they’re exercising that delicate skill called ‘creativity’ or care that Common Sense Media raves that “Minecraft empowers players to exercise their imagination and take pride in their digital creations as they learn basic building concepts.”

16 Memorial Day Websites for Students

Memorial Day is the time we remember all of those soldiers (and anyone in the Armed Forces) who gave their lives in the defense of American freedom. In war and peace, they made the ultimate sacrifice, and because of them we are privileged to live the American Dream.

Once a year, we honor them, their sacrifice, and those they left behind. Here are some activities to help students understand the import of this day:

1. Folding the American flag
2. In Flanders Field–poem
3. Memorial Day Maze
4. Memorial Day Messages, Speeches, Oaths, Poems, Anthems,  and images
5. Memorial Day Poems
6. Memorial Day Poetry–poems
7. Memorial Day Prayer
8. Memorial Day puzzle I
9. Memorial Day Puzzle II
10. Memorial Day Quiz

Weekend Website #127: Brown Bear Typing

Every week, I share a website that inspired my students. Here’s one that I’ve found effective in… Here’s a great website to answer that question.

Weekend Website #126: BrainPop Game Up

Every week, I share a website that inspired my students. Here’s one that I’ve found effective in… Here’s a great website to answer that question.

Weekend Website #125: Starfall Math

Every week, I share a website that inspired my students. Here’s one you may have missed. Starfall is a lot more than reading…

Weekend Website 123: Google Gravity

Inquiring minds don’t always need a purpose. Fun is often inspiration enough. Check out this clever rendition of Google Search:

Tech Tip #44: Clean Your Computer Weekly

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each Tuesday, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: I’m afraid of getting slammed with viruses, malware, all that bad stuff that comes with visiting the internet. What can I do?

A:  If you take reasonable precautions, the chances of being hit are minimized. Here’s what I do:

• Don’t download from music or video sites. They have the greatest amount of malware statistically because the Bad Guys know we-all like getting free music and videos.
• Make sure your firewall is working. Windows comes with a built-in one. Maybe Mac does too. Leave it active. It’s under Control Panel-Administrative Tools
• Do the following every week:

Tech Tip #41: Repair Your Computer With System Restore

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each Tuesday, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: I don’t know what I did, but my computer doesn’t run right anymore. What can I do?

A:  With access to the internet, computer malfunctions have become more prevalent than ever. Sometimes you download a program–or your child mistakenly pushes a button that allows malware on your computer. Suddenly, through no fault of your own, things just aren’t working right anymore.

This is so common that Microsoft has a program called System Restore on every computer with Windows operating system. System Restore is a utility that allows users to restore their Windows configurations to a previous state. While System Restore is often associated with providing recovery when driver or software installations go awry, it can really shine when spyware or other malevolent software compromises user machines. In many situations, this handy utility can roll back afflicted machines to a completely uninfected state. Of course, System Restore can work only when it is turned on and cataloging system states, so make sure it’s enabled on all user machines.

Weekend Website #121: Class Badges

Every week, I share a website that inspired, excited, and/or informed my classes. Here’s one on a popular trend in education–awarding badges:

Great Websites Updated!

Once a year, we update the massive list of great kid’s websites we keep on Ask a Tech Teacher. We collect all of the new websites used by our association of teachers, place them in their proper grade and category, and then share them with Ask a Tech Teacher readers and those who use the K-6 technology curriculum (soon-to-be K-8).

Please check out the changes, updates, and the more than 2000 websites on this growing list. Go to this link, find your grade, and see what’s there for you.

• Kindergarten: 154 websites
• 1st Grade: 159 websites
• 2nd Grade: 428 websites
• 3rd Grade: 461 websites
• 4th Grade: 504 websites
• 5th Grade: 462 websites
• 6th Grade: 285 websites

We added many new subcategories. These list all websites across grade. You decide which works for which age group:

• Digital Citizenship: 113 websites
• GIFs: couple hundred
• Holiday websites: 24 websites
• Keyboarding: 35 websites
• Human Body: 67 websites
• Math: 68 websites
• Mouse: 12 websites
• Music: 15 websites
• Research: 32 websites
• Science: 179 websites
• Stories: 44 websites
• Virtual Tours: 16 websites
• Word Study: 60 websites

Top Ten Websites of 2012

Every week, I post a website that my classes found useful, instructive, helpful in integrating technology into classroom lesson plans. Some, you agreed with me about; others not so much. Here, I’ll share with you which sites readers thought were the most helpful in their efforts to weave tech into the classroom experience. Between these ten, they had over 120,000 visitors during the year. See if you agree:

1. Great Kids Websites–this is a list of hundreds, organized by grade and topic. It’s no surprise it came in at #1
2. 20 Great Research Websites for Kids–I suggest you post these sites where students can easily access them. I have them on the internet start page that’s the first site students see when they open the internet. This was #5 last year and inched its way up to #2 this year.
3. 18 Online Keyboard Sites for Kids–Overall, keyboarding websites are the most popular posts I have. In my school, it’s the #1 request from the classroom teachers–that students type faster. There were four more subsets of this theme in the top ten, but those sites are included here, so I skipped them for the purposes of this post.
4. 62 Kindergarten Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons–a collection of my favorite tech ed kindergarten sites
5. Four Online Sites to Teach Mouse Skills–this is geared for youngers. They’re fun and are skills every student must master
6. 31 Human Body Websites for 2nd-5th Grade –Great list although I’ve added to it this year. Stand by for an update in 2013
7. 41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom–a collection of the top websites I’ve found to integrate tech into the elementary classroom
8. 23 Websites to Support Math Automaticity in K-5–these are math websites that focus on speed and accuracy
9. 10 Great Virtual Field Trips–there are some great virtual field trips on this list. Link to it from this list I keep updated
10. 62 First Grade Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons–like the kindergarten list, these are my favorites from first grade

Weekend Website 40: NORAD Santa

It’s the time of year when inquiring young minds want to know–Where’s Santa? Here’s a great website to answer that question.

Track Santa on Xmas Eve

Weekend Website #114: 55 Digital Citizenship Links

Understanding how to use the internet has become a cornerstone issue for students. No longer do they complete their research on projects solely in the library. Now, there is a vast landscape of resources available on the internet.

But with wealth comes responsibility. As soon as children begin to visit the online world, they need the knowledge to do that safely, securely, responsibly. I’ve collected resources here so you can make your choices.

Here’s a list of 55 Digital citizenship links. They cover K-6. I’ve given the list a permanent address here.

Weekend Website #113: Digital Passport

Every week, I share a website that inspired my students. Here’s one that I’ve found effective in covering the myriad branches of the question, How can I be a good digital citizen?

Weekend Website #112: Nanoogo

Are your students visual learners rather than linguistic? If you answered yes, you’ll want to visit this site.

7 Great Labor Day Websites

You’re bbq-ing. Friends are over. Life is good. Summer is ending, but that’s tomorrow. Not today. Today is about fun.

What do you do with the child who got sunburned so badly s/he can’t stay outside? Or those last fifteen minutes when the kids are hungry, tired, and completely disconnected with everything that they’ve been doing? Here’s a list of websites they’ll find irresistible. I’ve pulled out five I think are the best starters, but you can decide:

Do Your Children Need Computers for School?

What do your students need?

This is a question I get from parents all the time. Most parents want to get what their child needs as affordably as possible, and don’t want to save a few bucks at the expense of their child. If that sounds like you,

Here are my suggestions:

1. Start by talking to the classroom teacher. What are their expectations of the child? If they’re like the ones in my school, they will want him/her to have access to basic software and the internet for research, maybe email. That’s it.
2. You’re wondering whether a desktop is good for your child, or do they need a laptop? There are lots of reasons why a laptop might be a good decision for your particular family dynamics, but in general terms, a desktop is fine for a younger child (K-5). They don’t need to take it to friend’s house for group projects much until they reach middle school, and I would not suggest gearing a more-expensive laptop decision around an occasional project. I guarantee, the teacher won’t.
3. There are other reasons why a desktop is a good decision. It is more durable (it isn’t carried around, so can’t be dropped). If the monitor breaks, you don’t have to replace the entire computer–just the monitor. Because it’s cheaper, it can be replaced if your child somehow destroys it or part of it (this should be expected of new users). And, a desktop has a larger hard drive, more memory and more drives/ports for input devices. That makes it more adaptable to unexpected needs.
4. Now you need to select which level of desktop your child requires. Does s/he need the basic $350 on sale version or the everything-in-it upgrade? My suggestion is to start simple. Basic. See what the child uses, what else he needs before making an expensive decision. Most kids are fine with the lower end of productivity. Some, though, want the works. You’ll know by the time you’re ready for an upgrade.

Back to School–Tech Makes it Easy to Stay On Top of Everything

Tech for back to school

If you’re sending your child back to school, technology can be intimidating. Should your elementary-age child have a computer? If so, what should you buy? And how do you keep it safe?

Here’s what I tell my K-5 parents about how to handle the stress of equipping the 21st century tech kid:

By third grade, children need a computer. Here’s why:

• There’s a good chance your child’s class has a website. All of my school’s classes from kindergarten up do. On those webpages, teachers list what happened during class, homework, resources, extensions, expectations and more. You’ll want to access those to stay up to date.
• It’s hard for you as a parent to keep in touch with all the ancillary teachers your child sees during the day AS WELL AS  the classroom teacher. I’m talking about the art teacher, the PE teacher, language B teacher, technology teacher. A good way is to access their school webpages. My profile at school links to my class technology page. All of our Specials (the teachers who cover subjects outside of the classroom) have their own webpages. This is likely true in your school, too.
• A lot of teachers choose to communicate with parents via blogs or twitter. Here’s my professional blog. It’s a great way to casually keep parents and students up to date on class activities. I have one at school, too, but non-students are locked out of it.
• Much classwork integrates information from the internet. If your child is excited about something shown in class, s/he’ll want to revisit at home. That’s as simple as an internet connection and the website (probably posted on the class webpage). In tech class, students have a class internet start page and a class wiki (I’ve linked to my fifth grade wiki) that track everything done in class for follow-up at home. All are accessible from one location on my class webpage to make it easier on parents and students.

Weekend Website #100: CybraryMan Math

Every Friday, I’ll send you a wonderful website (or more) that my classes and my parents love. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of your students as they are of mine.

Not warm and fuzzy, just useful

Address:

How to Teach Internet Safety in K-6

The Internet is a wonderful resource for kids for researching school reports, communicating with teachers, staying in touch with friends, and entertaining themselves. They can literally hit a few keystrokes and

Click poster to purchase

find out about culture in China, the history of Europe, or take a tour of the American White House.

But with that access comes risks, even if you’re careful. For example, in our class project on life cycles, we never allow the students to search “chicks”, rather they must type “baby chickens” to avoid the problems the former carries.

The digital natives we are educating don’t want to hide from these sorts of problems, though. They want to learn to manage them. What we as teachers must do is show them how to avoid the internet’s bad neighborhoods so they can benefit from the good. Here’s my year-by-year teaching run-down:

Kindergarten

I mix internet safety lessons in with other teaching during my 45-minutes-per-week lesson. I spread it out throughout the year, repeating if necessary, which doesn’t bother kindergartners.

• First time students access the internet, I provide an overview. What is it? Where does it go? What will they see once they’ve clicked a link? How should they safely use a link? How do they NOT click on the ads (and what are ‘ads’)?
• We visit age-appropriate videos that teach online safety
  • Surf Swell Island
  • Clicky’s Quest–internet safety
  • Clicky’s Web World–What to do
  • Princess who knew how to UYN–video
  • Webonauts
  • Garfield–internet safety
  • Webville Outlaws–internet safety
  • My Online Neighborhood–video
  • Internet safety video–a day in a digital citizen’s life
  • Safe surfing ebook—read or read to you
  • Internet Safety Site –Disney

• Have sufficient adult assistance that student activities can be corrected immediately so learning is seamless and students aren’t confused

First Grade

Apps for Education

Kids love iPads

Kids love using iPads. All those fun activities that can be accessed quickly via the pad format are both stimulating and

addictive. I’m all for giving kids what they want in the way of educational tools, but there-in lies the rub:

How do you find those apps?

When my school asked me to come up with a collection to use on our new class-set of ipads (to cycle through grades 3-8), I thought it would be easy.

It wasn’t.

What Every Parent Should Know About Computers and the Internet

How do parents protect kids from the internet

Technology, the internet, computers, are words that confuse–even frighten–many parents. In my blog, Ask a Tech Teacher, I post lots of tips, tricks,, a list of hundreds of kid-friendly websites, self-help articles on how to address this in your

homeschooled child’s education. Every week, I get lots of questions from parents about the right way to address access to technology. Most want suggestions on how to make computer use a positive experience for their little ones.

After fifteen years of teaching technology in a classroom and online, I can tell you without a doubt that educating your child can be done more efficiently and with better results in the world of computers. I don’t mean ONLY on computers. I mean using technology to extend your scholastic reach:

• Research–whether your child’s in second grade or seventh– from a computer is more productive. With training on how to use search skills, students can find the information they want from the comfort of their home or the library and fill in the blanks on the topic you’re covering, be it landforms, the Civil War, or photosynthesis.
• Communication within your homeschool group is much easier using the new collaborative tools available. These include wikis, Google Tools, and more. These allow multiple students to collaborate on a project at once, then embed the result into a digital portfolio (like a wiki page) for all to see
• Finding out what‘s going on in your community so you can use local resources to extend the reach of your homeschool. Most towns have pages sharing what’s going on in the neighborhood, as do local museums, libraries, and more. Once students have learned to search, it can be their responsibility to find and organize.
• Using Web 2.0 tools to bring traditional topics into the child’s world. For example, use Twitter to teach writing skills (click the link to see how)

So how do you make sure your child‘s internet experience is positive? Here are a few simple rules to help you maneuver that minefield:

Weekend Website #89: Rubrics for Web 2.0 Tools

Drop by every Friday to discover what wonderful website my classes and parents loved this week. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of yours as they are of mine.

Great Websites Updated!

Once a year, we update the massive list of great kid’s websites we keep on Ask a Tech Teacher. We collect all of the new websites used by our association of teachers, place them in their proper grade and category, and then share them with Ask a Tech Teacher readers and those who use the K-6 technology curriculum.

Please check out the changes, updates, and the more than 1500 websites on this growing list. We have also divided the list by grade so you don’t have to scroll down … forever… to reach your grade level. Just select it off the menu list.

• Kindergarten: 90 websites
• 1st Grade: 100 websites
• 2nd Grade: 293 websites
• 3rd Grade: 383 websites
• 4th Grade: 363 websites
• 5th Grade: 309 websites

Help Students Stay Organized with Wikis

This is the last in a series on classroom management through wikis. Here are links for wikis I’ve created for grades K-5.

• Kindergarten wiki
• First grade wiki
• Second grade wiki
• Third Grade Wiki
• Fourth Grade Wiki

This one is Fifth Grade:

Click here to visit my fifth grade class wiki

Top Ten Websites of 2011

Every week, I post a website that my classes found useful, instructive, helpful in integrating technology into classroom lesson plans. Some, you agreed with me about; others not so much. Here, I’ll share with you

Top Ten Websites of 2011

which sites readers thought were the most helpful in their efforts to weave tech into the classroom experience. Between these ten, they had over 80,000 visitors during the year. See if you agree:

1. Great Kids Websites–this is a list of hundreds, organized by grade and topic. It’s no surprise it came in at #1
2. 20 Great Research Websites for Kids–I suggest you post these sites where students can easily access them. I have them on the internet start page that’s the first site students see when they open the internet. This was #5 last year and inched its way up to #2 this year.
3. 18 Online Keyboard Sites for Kids–Overall, keyboarding websites are the most popular posts I have. In my school, it’s the #1 request from the classroom teachers–that students type faster. There were four more subsets of this theme in the top ten, but those sites are included here, so I skipped them for the purposes of this post.
4. 41 Websites for Teachers to Integrate Tech into Your Classroom–a collection of the top websites I’ve found to integrate tech into the elementary classroom
5. 20 Websites to Learn Everything About Landforms–lots of information, games and virtual visits to our world’s landforms
6. Four Online Sites to Teach Mouse Skills–this is geared for youngers. They’re fun and are skills every student must master
7. 4 FREE Online Keyboarding Programs for K, 1–great starter keyboarding sites for our youngest students. They’ll think they’re playing games while they learn the keyboard
8. 23 Websites to Support Math Automaticity in K-5–Websites that encourage the accomplishment of mental math skills
9. Nineteen Ways to Use Spare Classroom Time–websites to fill those 5-10 extra minutes before lunch/end of the day, for early finishers, or anywhere you have a few minutes you don’t want to waste
10. 31 Human Body Websites for 2nd-5th Grade –Great list although I’ve added to it this year. Stand by for an update in 2012
    

Weekend Website 40: NORAD Santa

It’s the time of year when inquiring young minds want to know–Where’s Santa? Here’s a great website to answer that question.

Track Santa on Xmas Eve

Tech Tip #97: How to Add Zip to Your Slow Computer

As a working technology teacher, I get hundreds of questions from parents about their home computers, how to do stuff, how to solve problems. Each Tuesday, I’ll share one of those with you. They’re always brief and always focused. Enjoy!

Q: I have a small netbook which is incredibly slow at starting up. My son seemed to think I could go to the start up menu. Not sure where that is or what to do when I get there! Can you help please?

A: I got this post from an efriend over at my writer’s blog. Here’s what I told her:

There are several steps to this fix. Here are the first few. If they don’t work, let me know and we’ll go to the next level:

1. Run defrag, which is under start button (lower left corner), type ‘defrag’ into the search bar. It’ll come up with a ‘defrag’ program. Run it. This helps put your ducks back in a row.
   
2. Run malware programs like Spybot and Adaware. If you don’t have those two free programs, download them from Download.com
3. Uninstall unnecessary programs. Go to Start button, Control Panel, Programs and Features. Uninstall those pesky toolbars and other programs that get on your computer when your virtual back is turned.

Organize Your Teaching With Wikis

This is the fifth in a series on classroom management through wikis. Here are links for wikis I’ve created for grades K-5.

• Kindergarten wiki
• First grade wiki
• Second grade wiki
• Third Grade Wiki
• Fifth Grade Wiki

This one is Fourth Grade:

Click here to visit my fourth grade class wiki

Unlocking Social Networking for Schools

Please join me in welcoming my guest, Brent Thurrell. Brent is the CEO of Scholabo Ltd a company he founded to help his children’s school reduce their reliance on paper and move their communications strategy into the 21st century. What started as a small project rapidly developed into a passion to help strengthen the relationship between schools and parents everywhere. Before Scholabo, Brent worked in the world of information security and identity management across multiple projects in sectors from global finance through to government and defence.

Brent saw an article I wrote for Innovate My School entitled How to integrate Web 2.0 tools into the classroom and contacted me to chat about social networks in schools. When I heard his thoughts, I asked if he’d share his vision with my readers. Here are his thoughts:

Unlocking Social Networking for Schools

If you read the title of this article and the blood in your veins runs cold at the mere mention of ‘social networking’, chances are you’re probably a teacher. Don’t worry though– this is a very common reaction and this article has been written to ease your now elevated heart rate and, hopefully, give you a new perspective about how the ‘principles’ of social networking can be applied to positive effect in your school.

To start with, we are not going to be talking here about social networking involving any form of pupil participation – that should have you relaxing already! Instead we will be focussing upon exploring the role it can play to support Parental Engagement initiatives and bridge the growing communications gap between Schools and today’s Parents.

Weekend Website #65: Noodle

Every Friday I’ll send you a wonderful website that my classes and my parents love. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of your students as they are of mine.

Search for the perfect school with Noodle

Age:

K-12

Topic:

Educational resources

Address:

Noodle

Review:

According to its YouTube video (see below), Noodle is a work-oriented social network intranet for organizations. It includes personal profiles and a user directory so people can find expertise within their company that suits their requirements. It also includes communication resources such as blogs, shared calendars, discussion forums, and document collaboration. You can sign up for a free 30-day trial before deciding. Check out the video:

Classroom Management 101: Use Wikis

This is the fourth in a series on classroom management through wikis. Here are links for grades K-5.

• Kindergarten wiki
• First grade wiki
• Second grade wiki
• Fourth Grade Wiki
• Fifth Grade Wiki

This one is Third Grade:

Click here to visit my third grade class wiki

Weekend Website #71: 5 Great FREE Programs for Kids

Every Friday I’ll send you a wonderful website that my classes and my parents love. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of your students as they are of mine.

Age:

Kindergarten, 1st, 2nd

Topic:

Overall

Review:

When I started as a tech teacher, I pushed my administration for lots of software. I wanted a different one for each theme–human body, space, math. Now, they’re all on the internet–for FREE–which means we can use our tech budget for doc scanners, Dragon Speak… Wait–we have no budget. Good thing I’m addicted to FREE.

Tech Tip #88: 20 Techie Problems Every Student Can Fix

Kids can solve tech problems

There are about twenty problems that cause eighty percent of the tech stoppages. I’m going to tell you what those are and how to solve them. Trust me. They’re easier than you think to solve. I routinely teach them to third, fourth and fifth graders, and then they teach their parents.

I’ll tell you the problem first, then why it generally occurs and the most common solution to fix it:

Deleted a file

Why? By accident or changed my mind          

What to do: Open Recycle Bin; right-click—restore

Can’t exit a program                                      

Why: Can’t find the X or Quit tool. This happens with young children’s programs and those pesky internet ads that marketers don’t want you to be able to exit

What to do: Alt+F4 works 95% of the time. Try that.

Can’t find Word                                             

Why: Shortcut moved, was deleted by accident or became inactive        

What to do: Right-click on desktop—select ‘New’—“Word Document”

Back to School–Tech Makes it Easy to Stay On Top of Everything

If you’re sending your child back to school, technology can be intimidating. Should your elementary-age child have a computer? If so, what should you buy? And how do you keep it safe?

Here’s what I tell my K-5 parents about how to handle the stress of equipping the 21st century tech kid:

By third grade, children need a computer. Here’s why:

• There’s a good chance your child’s class has a website. All of my school’s classes from kindergarten up do. On those webpages, teachers list what happened during class, homework, resources, extensions, expectations and more. You’ll want to access those to stay up to date.
• It’s hard for you as a parent to keep in touch with all the ancillary teachers your child sees during the day AS WELL AS  the classroom teacher. I’m talking about the art teacher, the PE teacher, language B teacher, technology teacher. A good way is to access their school webpages. Here’s my profile, which, if you were a parent, would link to my class technology page. All of our Specials (the teachers who cover subjects outside of the classroom) have their own webpages. This is likely true in your school, too.
• A lot of teachers choose to communicate with parents via blogs or twitter. Here’s my blog. It’s a great way to casually keep parents and students up to date on class activities. I haven’t re-started mine for the new school year, so don’t expect much today. Check back in a month!
• Much classwork integrates information from the internet. If your child is excited about something shown in class, s/he’ll want to revisit at home. That’s as simple as an internet connection and the website (probably posted on the class webpage). In tech class, students have a class internet start page and a class wiki (I’ve linked to my fifth grade wiki) that track everything done in class for follow-up at home. All are accessible from one location on my class webpage to make it easier on parents and students.

5 Great Labor Day Websites

You’re bbq-ing. Friends are over. Life is good. Summer is ending, but that’s tomorrow. Not today. Today is about fun.

What do you do with the child who got sunburned so badly s/he can’t stay outside? Or those last fifteen minutes when the kids are hungry, tired, and completely disconnected with everything that they’ve been doing? Here’s a list of websites they’ll find irresistible. I’ve pulled out five I think are the best starters, but you can decide:

School’s Back–Do Your Children Need Computers?

This is a question I get from parents all the time. Most parents want to get what their child needs as affordably as possible, but they don’t want to save a few bucks at the expense of their child. If that sounds like you,

Photo credit: microcomputers.com

here are my suggestions:

1. Start by talking to the classroom teacher. What are their expectations of the child? If they’re like the ones in my school, they will want him/her to have access to basic software and the internet for research, maybe email. That’s it.
2. You’re wondering whether a desktop is good for your child, or do they need a laptop? There are lots of reasons why a laptop might be a good decision for your particular family dynamics, but in general terms, a desktop is fine for a younger child (K-5). They don’t need to take it to friend’s house for group projects much until they reach middle school, and I would not suggest gearing a more-expensive laptop decision around an occasional project. I guarantee, the teacher won’t.
3. There are other reasons why a desktop is a good decision. It is more durable (it isn’t carried around, so can’t be dropped). If the monitor breaks, you don’t have to replace the entire computer–just the monitor. Because it’s cheaper, it can be replaced if your child somehow destroys it or part of it (this should be expected of new users). And, a desktop has a larger hard drive, more memory and more drives/ports for input devices. That makes it more adaptable to unexpected needs.
4. Now you need to select which level of desktop your child requires. Does s/he need the basic $350 on sale version or the everything-in-it upgrade? My suggestion is to start simple. Basic. See what the child uses, what else he needs before making an expensive decision. Most kids are fine with the lower end of productivity. Some, though, want the works. You’ll know by the time you’re ready for an upgrade.

Weekend Websites #79: 57 Kindergarten Websites That Tie into Classroom Lessons

Every Friday I’ll send you a wonderful website that my classes and my parents love. I think you’ll find they’ll be a favorite of your students as they are of mine.

Here's my internet start page for kindergarten--you'll see the websites we focused on at the end of this school year

Weekend Website #55: Science for Fifth Graders

This list covers all sorts of science from nature to geology. Like with the math websites, for my

students, occasionally I put a list on the internet start page and let students go there during sponge time (click the link and see what’s up this month, so close to the end of the school year):

1. Breathing earth–the environment
2. Dynamic Earth–interactive
3. Earth Science Digital Library
4. Electric Circuits Game
5. Forest Life
6. Forests
7. Geologic history
8. Geologic movies–great and fun
9. Human Body Games
10. Moon around
11. Moon—We Choose the Moon

Dr. Seuss Discusses Packet Pockets

If you haven’t read this poem, you have a treat in store. Written by Gene Ziegler, he duplicates the simplicity and rhythm of Dr. Seuss to discuss the oh-so-complicated problems of technology. Enjoy!

If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,