Using Timelines

Teaching kids the proper way to make time lines is like a rite of passage for history teachers. Choosing what increments of time you'll use, how those will be represented (inches? centimeters?) and the trial and error. Sometimes it seems like the whole point of the lesson - to see when events occurred relative to other events, to create a custom time line, or to analyze events - gets lost in what you never intended to be a weak math/art activity. And let's face it - when they're done, they are not too exciting.

Internet to the rescue! Thankfully there are now some easy time line tools that are very accessible on the web, easy for kids to use, and you get what you want - the results for kids to look at, compare, and analyze. Best of all, kids can really bring some creativity to the table with these time lines. They have the opportunity to make sense of historical events in ways they can see, hear, and explain to others. If they made some new connections, or have some new theories, these tools are the ultimate way for them to express this new learning.

But where will they put these beautiful new time lines? Who will see them? Easy - more and more of you are building class blogs and wikis (haven't done this yet? Ask me how and I can help you set one up in less than 5 minutes), so that's where these beauties will go. If your students have their own blogs, they can go right there. One thing you will NOT end up with is a whole bunch of same-same generic time lines. All of them will be unique interpretations of a particular student's understanding and connections of that time.

Here is a time line tool called TimeRime. TimeRime is a nice "starter" time line, in that it looks a lot like what we expect time lines to look like - a line with spaced out increments. BUT TimeRime brings more to the table, like the ability to add pictures and pop-out information. Here's an example of a time line made on TimeRime about the history of immigration (scroll along the bottom)...


Xtimeline is another fun time line tool that is similar to TimeRime - kids can incorporate images and more pop-up information into their time line. A cool feature of xtimeline is viewing it as a scrolling time line by moving the cursor along the bottom - when you click on an event a slide can pop up with more information and pictures. This is an xtimeline of the history of Coca Cola (scroll along the bottom)...



Finally, the rock star of online time line tools - Capzles! Capzles is by far the most creative of the 3 tools presented in this post. Students can choose a background for their time line, build the time line with information, pictures, and NARRATION! Yes - that's what I said - students can record music, text, or their very own voices to guide and narrate this slideshow/timeline. Here's a great one about Paul Revere - it is the history of events in Boston involving Paul Revere. The background is an old map of the area, and the time line pictures and events are guided by a voice narration reading of "The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere". Soooooo many possibilities with this! (Click HERE to see this one).

So let's change up those old boring time lines - make them what we always intended them to be - a learning tool created by students that presents their unique point of view of a history.

Jeopardy Labs - make the boring stuff fun!

I've blogged about this particular site before, but today I dug out Jeopardy Labs again. There are always times when we need to build some basic background information about something, and let's face it - that's not always exciting - but it's no reason it can't be fun!

My 8th grade World Geography students are studying issues about immigration and will be soon be looking specifically at Canada's long and interesting relationship with immigrants, and how that has shaped their country. That's all fine and good, but before I can get near these larger issues, I first want to be sure my students have some basic knowledge about Canada - provinces, regions, population distributions - that kind of thing.

Jeopardy Labs is one great and easy tool to liven these kinds of studies up. I've included a short two minute video below so that you can see how this worked out.

I wanted to make sure they knew how Jeopardy was played, so I showed a short clip from a Teen Jeopardy show on YouTube - you could also just explain it pretty easily.

I divided the class up into two groups (I had a small class today - if I had a larger class I would have done three or even 4 groups). The groups then used their info from the links and created their own Canada Geography Jeopardy game using Jeopardy Labs. We used an overhead to project the game board. Here's how it went...



As you can see - a basic review exercise was turned on its head! I also posted some highlight clips on my class blog for the students to enjoy.

Have students create their own descriptive maps

I have been playing with Scribble Maps off and on throughout the summer with my original plan being that I would somehow use it for map quizzes. Well I haven't been able to do that yet because it always gives the names of places, BUT - I have found a lot of other uses for it in class.

Scribble Maps is a mashup - that just means it's one big application - in this case Google Earth - that is "mashed up" with something else to make another specialized application. I have blogged about these before.

So here is what I am doing with Scribble Maps right now - my 8th grade World Geography students are doing a small project to learn more about economic indicators. After they learned about a few indicators and gathered some data, one of the steps in the project was to represent their data on a map.

Scribble Maps has been great for this - the students use different colors for different countries, they circle a particular country and then use the text box to make buttons for the different economic indicators. They also use the pinpoints to label centers of industry and government within the country, as well as points of recent conflict. It's unbelievably easy to use and there's no registration or sign up for the site.

Their Scribble Maps are just one part of the project - they can then use these maps in an online slide show they are putting together that they will narrate and explain the status of several chosen countries using the economic indicator data they have gathered and illustrated.

Scribble Maps can be saved and emailed, printed, or embedded into a wiki or blog.

Make your students aware of nearby flooding in Eagle!

We in AGSD are devasted by the news of the flooding that has hit Eagle, destroying the old village and wreaking havoc on the nearby community of Eagle. The school has become a haven of sorts - a high ground where many are escaping the devastation and dangerous flood waters.

Although we (adults) are all aware of what is happening in Eagle right now, some of our students are not! Eagle is a neighboring community and part of our school district! Do your students a favor - take a few minutes to bring them up to speed with what has been happening to our neighbors in Eagle.

Here are a few recent news sites that provide the main facts of the story, as well as many pictures (News Miner, another News Miner, APRN, Anchorage Daily News). Ann Millard, the principal at Eagle School, has been interviewed by the News Miner in one of the articles.

Read the National Weather Service updates with your students, and look at Weather Underground forecasts for communities along the Yukon - they give frequent flood warning updates as well as all pertinent weather information.

Get your students on GoogleEarth and have them locate and trace the course of the Yukon River. Have them locate the communities of Eagle, Circle, and Fort Yukon. Use the data you find on the National Weather Service and Weather Underground and have students keep an eye on the news so as to be apprised of what may be happening next.

This kind of flooding has not happened in Eagle since early in the 1900's - a combination of heavy snow over the winter and extremely warm weather is mostly to blame for the extreme flooding that Eagle is experiencing.

Teachers - contact Ann Millard, Marlys House, or Marge McElfresh, our colleagues at Eagle School - ask them if there is anything we can do to help or get the word out about what is happening in Eagle.

Involve your students!

Quick Geography Quizes and Skillbuilders

In the past when I've taught World Geography, one of the things I do daily is a map quiz. I've done these in a lot of different ways, from quizzing on major countries, to bodies of water, to islands, to major landforms. I did these for years because the positive side of these daily quizes was the quick familiarization that my classes get with the globe - knowing where something is in relation to something else ceases to be a barrier to learning about the geography of a place. The downside was the actual physical work of these quizes for me - creating the lists, printing them out, printing the maps, correcting them, returning them. Although they are quick, it was still an extra 15 minutes each day on average to do the administrative work that went with these quizes.

There are two web-based geography "games" I am particularly enamored with right now that address this very skill in a quick, yet challenging and fun way. I am looking forward to using both the next time I teach World Geography.

The first is called Find Country. Find Country will really challenge those who have a pretty good idea about the geography of the world, because the biggest challenge to the game is the absence of political boundary lines on the world map. It is a little frustrating, because it may name some obscure (to me anyway) country in Africa - I know approximately where it is, and click on a wide-open map of Africa. I get the question wrong and am literally millimeters away from the correct country. The good part is I get the instant feedback which shows me how close I really was. The bad part is I get no points for being just "close". Find Country is very challenging and the feedback is instant.

The second one I am getting quite addicted to is the Traveler IQ Challenge. In this game, you can select the whole globe or just parts. Your challenges may vary from famous places, to capital cities, to obscure cities, to landforms, or whatever. Any geography question goes in this game and the levels increase in difficulty. The best part about Traveler IQ Challenge is that you DO get points for being close. It will list a location, you click on the map, and it tells you where the actual location is and how close you were in kilometers. You get more points for being close so you can play longer. The game changes constantly so the chances of you getting the exact same questions is very low.

Both of these are great interactives for junior high and high school students who need some quick daily geography practice. There is no sign-in or registration, and both are very self-explanatory. Students can literally go to the sites and begin play. I have no question that these games can easily do as much or more for building a good general geography knowledge than my work intensive quizes ever could.

A different way for students to view the U.S.

SHOW USA is an online tool launched by Mapping Worlds. The website offers users a new way to look at the world by resizing countries on the map according to a series of global issues.

SHOW USA is ready to use - just select a subject from the top menu (People, Planet, Politics, Business, Living and their subcategories) and watch the states on the map change their size. Instead of land mass, the size of each state will represent the data for that subject--both its share of the total and absolute value. Roll you mouse over each state for a quick pop-up of state by state data. Underneath the map is a short explanation of the results, as well as a link to at least one book related to that subject.
After you select the subject and sub-category of interest the map immediately begins to change. For example, when I selected the Living category and the sub-category of Bigfoot Sightings, the map interestingly morphed to this;
Washington has the most Bigfoot sightings? Who knew?

SHOW USA can be a great way for teachers to visually show students data when studying ideas in geography, economics, current events, the environment, etc. It can easily integrate into any subject area as a useful and infomational supplement.

Students could certainly find SHOW USA a useful resource for research - each new map has an option to download or embed into a blog or website.

Young students beginning the study of U.S. geography often find it difficult to grasp the concept that Alaska is the largest, yet the smallest state. A quick click on the People tab and choosing Demographics very quickly morphs the country in front of your eyes - Alaska shrinks, while geographically tiny Connecticut dwarfs it. What better way for young students to really get this concept? Older students using SHOW USA as a research tool would find many ways to use these maps for comparison/contrast studies.

Lots of possibilities here - worth a quick trial run. Easy to play with, no registration or sign-in. Next to the title of this page is also a link to their other site SHOW WORLD, which offers a similar tool for viewing the world map.

Math and Google Earth is the Real Deal!

Wow! That is all I can say about this mash-up resource, so I'll say it again - WOW! Real World Math is a truly awesome website for math teachers grades 5-12 who want to push their math teaching beyond the text. Google Earth is the tool used to accomplish this.

Real World Math's collection of concept lessons uses Google Earth to present math topics like rates or scientific notation in unique ways. The collection of project based learning activities has lessons that requires students to work collaboratively in pairs or groups. The measurement lessons have students using the measurement tool in Google Earth to complete problem solving activities. There are also exploratory lessons which include non-traditional math topics like fractals, topography, or modern geometry.

Real World Math uses Google Earth which is interactive and 3-D. Students can add placemarks, annotations, photos and models, as well as measure distances and draw paths.

This growing collection of lessons (you can contribute lessons too) encourages higher level thinking skills, creativity, technology, and social learning.

Real World Math is very accessible for teachers and students - no registration required.

MetaCarta maps current events

MetaCarta is one of the new "mashup" sites that combines RSS feeds from Associated Press and Reuters with Google Maps to show current news on a map. On the left screen you'll see the most current headlines from AP and Reuters. A click will show the article and a map with all of the places referenced in the article. This is a handy way for history/geography/current events classes to do their reading and comparison activities that teach the interconnectivity of these events.