Name: ___Lynn ______________ Searching for High Quality Websites

Please reflect and answer each of the questions below. Elaborate.

Characteristics of a High Quality Website

1. Go to the History Made Every Day website and evaluate it on the following criteria:
Is it a personal page? No What domain does it belong to? History.com Who published the page? The History Channel Who wrote the page? Staff editors?

Is there a date in which it was last updated on the page? Is it current? 23 Oct 2011 Does the author have credentials. Yes Are sources documented with footnotes or links? No

Is the information reproduced (from another source), is it complete, not altered, not fake or forged? The information is gathered from other sources because it is historic. It does not appear to be altered, faked or forged.

Are there links to other resources on the topic? Yes

The questions above were modified from: Regents of the University of California, "Evaluating Web Pages: Techniques to Apply & Questions to Ask ." Finding Information on the Internet: A Tutorial . 24 11 2008. UC Berkeley.13May2009<http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/Teachi ngLib/Guides/Internet/Evaluate.html>. *You may want to do this same type of exercise with your students.

2. Evaluate this web resource: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trigonometry using the same

questions above. Do you think this is a valuable resource for use in the classroom? Why or why not? Elaborate. It looks like it is a viable website, however the problem with this site is anyone can edit the information to suite their needs. If I was going to use this site as a teaching resource I would check each one of the facts and footnotes that have been provided.

Finding high quality multimedia resources on the web (audio or video)

1. Where would you go to locate high quality video resources on the web that are suitable
for use in the classroom? Find two sites for audio and three sites for video. Post your links below: Video Site 1: http://streaming.discoveryeducation.com/ Video Site 2: http://www.classroom20.com/profiles/blogs/649749:BlogPost:177332 Audio Site 1:Itunes.com Audio Site 2: http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/audio-video-courses/

2. Go to: http://keepvid.com/ and input the URL to a video that you have found on YouTube
or TeacherTube that you think would be a value added resource in your classroom. Download the video. This is one way you can obtain content valuable resources from the Internet by downloading them onto your local drive. What if your school blocks video resources that are streamed on the web? What could you do to obtain a high quality video for use in your classroom if it is blocked by your schools filter? Submitted a request to unblock the video. 3. Install iTunes onto your computer if it is not already installed (you may need help from IT to do this if you do not have administrative rights to install software onto your computer). iTunes is free software that has an extensive listing of audio and video resources. Podcasts and iTunes University have an extensive listing of free content. Explore both the podcast and iTunes University section of the site. Subscribe to three resources you feel would be valuable to your discipline. You do not need an iPod/iTouch/iPhone/iPad to listen to these resources. Your students do not need one either. However, all content can be transferred to an iPod/iTouch/iPhone if you do have one. List 3 iTunes podcasts/vodcasts, or iTunesU resources that you would find useful in your curricular area. Resource A: Critical Reasoning for Beginners Resource B: Strategy Based Reading Resource C: A Romp through Ethics

Bookmarking Using social bookmarking sites you can leverage the power of those who have rated and found valuable sites such that you find these same sites. Go to delicious.com, one of the most popular social networking sites (a free service that allows you to keep your bookmarks online instead of on your computer). At delicious.com millions of members have listed their favorite sites. The advantage of this is that you can leverage the time they have spent finding these sites to your own advantage. Go to Explore Tags as seen in Figure 1 below. Type in the tag, interactive- no quotes. Note that the sites that have been identified have been tagged interactive by the members. As well, off to the side, you will see how many members have tagged the site.

Figure 1. Delicious website Explore Tags area Next, as in Figure 2 below, type another word in the Type another tag box. This time use the word, algebra- no quotes. At this point you should have located numerous valuable interactive algebra sites that could be used in class with students in a 1:1 classroom.

Figure 2. Delicious website Type another tag ***How do you foresee social bookmarking being used in a 1:1 Classroom?

I like the idea of social book marking but I prefer to use Diigo.com