Historical Simuations

Hey, history teachers! Do you want to take your students on an online adventure to the Jamestown colony? "The year is 1607. You are the captain of the Jamestown Colony in Virginia in this historical simulation. Will your colony survive and prosper or will it become another "Lost Colony"? This unique game was created by History Globe as a learning activity for elementary and middle school history/social studies students." Learn more about this historical simulation and the simulations for the Oregon Train and the Anglo-Apache Conflicts at the History Globe at  http://www.historyglobe.com.

Freely Available Seismic Data

Interested in tracking seismic activity or visualizing earthquake waves? IRIS – Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology – is a consortium that is funded by the National Science Foundation to operate scientific facilities for the acquisition, management, and distribution of freely available seismic data. 

The Transportable Wave Visualizations enable viewers to watch seismic waves from around the world travel across the United States. 

 The Seismic Monitor lets you monitor earthquake activity in near real time. In addition, there are links to Earthquake Headlines, Last 30 Days Earthquakes, Special Events, Plate Tectonics, and Education Links.

The education resources are also available from the Education and Outreach link on the front page, which includes links to animations, video lectures, lessons and resources, teachable moments, educational software, and seismographs in schools.

Thank you to blogger Karen Brooks who posted the link to the seismic monitor on Facebook.

Google Launches Midterm Election Projection Mapping

Finally a gadget for the social sciences! Check out the 2010 U.S. Election Ratings that Google released this week.  It is an online mapping system that tracks projected winners in a number of federal and state political races. The company says its goal is “to make tracking the blues and reds a little easier for armchair pundits.” Google partnered with four nonpartisan, political analyst sources to launch the service. Users can view House, Senate and governor race projections from Cook, Rothenberg, CQ-Roll Call and RealClearPolitics. The information is presented on a map that’s updated whenever the sources make changes to their data. See the gadget below, or use this link: http://maps.google.com/intl/en_us/2010election/ratings.html


The mapping system is embeddable, Friedman said. The new gadget is powered by Fusion Tables, which directly integrates into Google Maps API v3, the blog post stated, and built on free, commonly available Google technologies.

Operation: Tectonic Fury from the JASON Project

 The latest JASON Curriculum is titled “Operation Tectonic Fury” and focuses on unlocking the Earth’s geologic mysteries and examines how it has changed over the past billion years. The Operation has four missions which includes a complete curriculum, video, digital labs, and interactive games. Mission 1 looks at the Earth’s building blocks where students will learn how to identify rocks and minerals and explain how they are classified by their physical and chemical properties. In Mission 2 students will investigate the Earth’s changing face, weathering, erosion and soils. For Mission 3 students will analyze the evidence by dating and identifying fossils, and understanding geologic time. Mission 4 focuses on the Earth on the move when students study plate tectonics, earthquakes and volcanoes.

 The curriculum is FREE – just register on the JASON website for access to science units on geology, energy, ecology, and weather!

Resources to Study Hurricanes

Get ready to study hurricanes and other weather events. Read about some great resources below. Many of these are from the blog Free Technology For Teachers.

1. Forces of Nature is a film produced by National Geographic designed to educate students about volcanoes, earthquakes, hurricanes, and tornadoes. The Forces of Nature website includes interactive activities, a glossary, complete lesson plans for teachers of students in grades K through 12, and links to resources, like Chasing a Tornado. The movie, Forces of Nature is available at Amazon for $17.00, but the lesson plans and activities can be used even if you don't have the movie.

Free Technology for Teachers also recommends a similar film from National Geographic titled Violent Earth. Violent Earth can be viewed for free on Snag Films.

2. Stop Disasters is a game designed for students to learn about natural disasters, disaster prevention, and city design.

3. In addition to searching around the globe, Google Earth is a good tool that teachers and students can use to track the movement of a hurricane. Click on the link to view a video by Frank Taylor on; using Google Earth to track storms.

4. NOAA has a free nineteen page booklet that explains how hurricanes are formed, the structure of hurricanes, and how hurricanes are observed.

5. Snag Films, is currently hosting a documentary titled Katrina's Children, which explores the impact of Hurricane Katrina on New Orleans through the viewpoints of children from New Orleans.

6. The JASON Project was founded in 1989 by Dr. Robert D. Ballard, the oceanographer and explorer who discovered the shipwreck of RMS Titanic. JASON offers award-winning middle school science curricula. The current curriculum, Operation: Tectonic Fury, investigates the geologic mysteries of the Earth. Previous curricula include Operation: Infinite Potential, Operation: Resilient Planet, and Operation: Monster Storms. The online JASON Mission Center contains student text, videos, games, teacher tools and more. Registration is completely free, for educators and students.

Inquiry-Based Learning for the 21st Century (IBL21)

The purpose of the proposed initiative is to study how the use of instructional technologies to engage students in IBL can support student development of 21st century skills, including science literacy, technological literacy, and global collaboration (see figure below).

 
 
District faculty will have many opportunities to engage in professional learning opportunities for inquiry-based teaching and instructional technology. To jump start the learning, there are several courses being offered in-district for summer 2010. Click here to view the list of courses.

What is the 21st Century Science and Technology Initiative?

Rep. John Hall recently visited students at the James I. O'Neill High School to announce that he secured $800,000 for a 21st Century Science and Technology Initiative for the Highland Falls-Fort Montgomery Central School District. 

The District is dedicated to the pursuit that all students are able to become responsible critical thinkers who are scientifically literate members of the global community. It is the responsibility of the District to provide the resources and staff development through which the teachers and students will implement an exemplary science and technology program that reflects the goals of the New York State Board of Regents Statewide Learning Technology Plan, National Science Education Standards, National Education Technology Standards and Performance Indicators (NETS) for Students, Teachers, and Administrators, as well as the Framework for 21st Century Skills. 

The initiative is developed from a belief, supported by research, that science and technology are critical components in our efforts to prepare our students as learners for the 21st century. In addition to the development of core academic subject knowledge and understanding among our students, we will build the essential skills, through science and technology, for success in today's world: global communication and collaboration, science literacy, critical thinking, and problem solving.