I teach my methods students here at KSU to “constantly think about teaching.” To do this, we always look for things to use even for small parts of lessons. A picture to promote thinking, a quote to start a conversation, a primary source to investigate, all of these are ways to promote learning. I happened to find a website the other night at class at the suggestions of Dr. John Harrington and Ms. Lisa Tabor who were presenting on geography…
Category Archives: geography
Sweet Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic lesson plans and instructional goodies
Are you looking for some sweet Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic instructional goodies? Here’s what I’ve got:
Start with the basics
- Official Olympic site
- Official Sochi 2014 site
- NBC Olympic site. Be sure to check out their viewing guide so that you don’t miss anything. You’ll find links to schedules, TV listings, live streaming videos, and their mobile apps.
- Find out more on the Sochi 2014 Wikipedia page.
- You can’t understand the event without the mental map. Get a quick overview with some Street View looks at Tim the Traveler’s Google Map. Better yet, go a step further with a great Google Earth file from My Reading Mapped. Just download the file, make sure Google Earth is installed, double-click the file, and you’re looking at a very cool visual complete with Wikipedia links to all the venues.
News
Social Media
- Some early Tweets from Sochi here, here and here. (It’s not looking good.)
- #sochi2014
- #sochiwinterolympics
- #GoTeamUSA
- #USOlympic
- #TeamUSA
Mobile Apps
(I’m part of Team Apple so . . . these are iPhone / iPad apps. I did some checking – Google Play and Android also have tons.)
Lesson Plans / Instructional Materials
Have fun!
Five Standards, Three Birds, and One Great Lesson
Travis Hardenburger is a seventh grade Kansas history and geography teacher at Wamego Middle School. He is working on a great presentation for the Kansas Council for History Education’s annual meeting on November 10 and 11 at Derby High School. You are already registered, right?
I don’t want to steal his thunder (he ok’d that I share this) but he developed a creative way to kill a lot of birds with one stone. Don’t turn me in to PETA. Continue reading Five Standards, Three Birds, and One Great Lesson
Opportunities
Colleagues in social studies,
Just want to offer a few things for you to peruse for opportunities for growth and development. The opportunities include information about the Kansas Social Studies Conference, a class on East Asia, and a training session on Dual Encoding – using maps while teaching history.
13 Colonies Narrative Chain
Brain research shows that neurons that fire together wire together. When teaching concepts we want students to remember, it’s important to give them different ways to store those concepts in their long term memory. By using a narrative chain, my students are saying, seeing, and doing the information I want them to remember.
But what does that look like?