Solar System Explorer

I've written before about two of my favourite IWB programs - Celestia and Stellarium - both for astronomy. But these are downloaded programs and you may not have permission to install them onto school computers (it depends on where you work).

I've just stumbled across a fantastic interactive website called SolarSystemScope - not only does it show the solar system in 3D like Celestia, but also from a panoramic from the Earth surface.

Lots of controls to manipulate and view. so you can represent the system as either real size and distances or an easy to understand schematic.

My jaw dropped when I saw this and it is definitely one of my new demonstration sites for when I demonstrate how to use technology in the classroom.

Free Virtual Pop Up Book Maker

I just came across ZooBurst. A free and paid for service that lets you make virtual pop up storybooks and they even have an augmented reality browser for it as well.

There are teacher and student sign ons so you can set up your whole class to make their own pop up book.

This is a great language activity as well as for languages other than English.

The free version lets you put together 10 pages on unlimited books and will let you upload your own art work or you can use the open clip art they have linked to.

Check out my book below - took about 3 mins

Google Sketchup Teacher Resources.

I'm always amazed at how many teachers don't know about Google Sketchup. when I go to schools it is one of the first programs I show that work brilliantly on an interactive whiteboard.

In case you don't know - google sketchup is a free 3D drawing program from google that makes 3D drawing simple and easy. Great for Maths, Design and technology and even S+E.

Well it seems I'm not the only one - I just stumbled across this website.
3Dvinci

This is a teacher guide to using sketch up in the classroom with PDF lessons, Tutorials and sample files.

Primary Science Conference

For the last two days I have been at the primary science conference organised by STAWA (Science Teachers Association of Western Australia).

I really look forward to the science conferences - these conferences are really hands on stuff and they pull out all the stops to make it fun and engaging.

I was lucky enough to be asked to present a workshop about integrating IT into the primary science classroom. I brought along Visualisers, microscope cameras, data loggers and and IWB to show how these pieces of hardware could be used to extend primary science.

I wish I had of seen this before going in...

Makeuseof.com - one of my favourite websites has this great article listing/linking a bunch of environmental science games and activities on the web... I could have based my whole talk on that.

Free eBooks and Asimov

You can blame Asimov for my science fiction collection of toys, books and props. If it wasn't for Foundation and the Robot Stories I don't think I would be the owner of a Darth Vader helmet or a replica light sabre.

You have to admit the guy could see into our near future - have a look at this video and see what I mean- the first few seconds are important.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZmFEFO72gA

As one of the commenter's on YouTube said - Kahn Academy! (see post below).

I can think of many more examples. And this leads nicely onto this RSA animate.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U


Then there has been the explosion in my state of the use of iPads in education and the "need" for eBooks or more importantly eTextbooks. Publishers are scrambling to figure out how to make money from this but they are going to find it hard with the e-books directory.

Khan Acadamy - upgraded

A couple of years ago I talked about the Khan Acadamy and how this Salman Khan had put together a huge amount of instructional videos just using his brain and a wacom tablet and made them free for the world via YouTube...

Well you should see his organisation now. With a new TED talk where he explains how it all started and what you can do now with classes and as a teacher - this has to be one of the revolutions of education.

His tracking software and the re imagining of school classrooms one of the great synergies of technology in eduction. This is what technology is for.

To have a look, set yourself up and to get a little brain food - head over to http://www.khanacademy.org/

Where have you been?????

Why haven't I been blogging? - Good question.

Well for one I needed a break from the job - I was worried that I was forcing the issue and thought that a bit of a break was needed. I have also been working on a secret project at home and haven't had the time to actively look for new and exciting educational technology stuff.

So I'm back, the project is almost finished and I have some time to reflect on it and what I'm doing for the rest of this year.

So here are a few things I found that might be of interest to science teachers -

If you are doing airfoils and aeronautics then this applet from NASA might be useful to you.
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/foil3.html

If you are after quality educational videos you can't go past the Public Broadcasting collection at http://www.teachersdomain.org/

You can collect and share your series of choices with other teachers and educators.