Learning: Tips for the Wired Classroom
Music for the Young on the Web

Music educator Fred Koch heartily recommends the Children's Music Web site as a great source of children's music, music education, and musicians.

Kids Get the Beat
The Children's Music Web at http://www.childrensmusic.org is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing information to teachers (and parents) about meaningful and age-appropriate children's music, music education issues, and children's music artists.

A community of partner sites, the Children's Music Web includes www.BestChildrensMusic.com (recommendations and reviews of mine), Music for Young Children (a wealth of information for teachers/parents interested in music integration), Radio Refrigerator (Internet radio shows for kids) and www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/browse/-/
music/173425/002-7003692-3034454 (a database and concert calendar of children's music artists).

Please stop by and take a look!

Fred Koch
K-4 Music teacher
Lake Forest, Illinois
Fred@bestchildrensmusic.com

Help for Math Teachers
I've put together on my home page a collection of math and science Internet lessons for grades 5-9 for new (and not so new) math teachers.

These 22 lessons can be downloaded with Acrobat Reader. Most of this work I did while on sabbatical. Visit http://newmathteacher.com and click on math and science Internet lessons.

Terri Husted
Eighth grade math teacher
Ithaca, New York
terri@clarityconnect.com

Check the Weather
Our first graders extended their study of weather to include recording of weather conditions in five "Spring Lake" communities (New Jersey, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, and North Carolina) for one week. Information was collected from an Internet weather site (accessed from our classroom Web site) and recorded in a table.

Students created several math questions about this information. Questions were presented to the whole class on PowerPoint slides using a large screen monitor. To answer some of their classmates' questions, each student created his/her own bar graph chart using Microsoft Excel. Our class also sent and received E-mail from four meteorologists to see how professionals use math to learn about weather.

This project can be viewed on the National Math Trail Web site: www.nationalmathtrail.org.

Additional examples of our first grade student work with Internet projects are on our class Web site, http://familyeducation.com/nj/mcgowan.

This site also highlights special activities, student work, upcoming events for our class, and interesting Web sites for parents, children, and visitors. There are numerous examples of student work on Internet projects. We have had over 27,000 home page visits in our first year and hosted a Fall Poetry Project with 63 classes from USA, Canada, and South Africa contributing poems.

Marci McGowan
First grade teacher
Spring Lake, New Jersey
marcimcg@aol.com

Running Favorite
Of course, my favorite Web site is mine: www.kidsrunning.com. It's all about kids, running, learning, writing, reading, math, and more, and it's developed by me for our kids.

Carol Goodrow
First grade teacher
Tolland, Connecticut
carol.kids@rodale.com

Bytes for Beginners

Our school is looking at making an investment in handheld devices--Palm Pilots, I think--instead of laptop computers. Is this a good idea?

Anyone looking at the near- and long-term requirements of technology for their classroom/students should definitely be paying attention to the significant changes in the way we use traditional "desktop computers." Your school sounds like it's doing just that!

Today, many of us are using our desktop computers as more of a "selection and filtering" device to determine where, when, and how we want to receive our information.

This trend is being fueled by sophisticated technologies such as wireless, Web-enabled cell phones and PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants--like Palm Pilots).

Eventually, we'll move away from our dependence on bulky desktop or laptop computers. Instead we'll rely on devices that are easier to transport, lighter in weight, and multifunctional.

Palm Pilots are just one example of technology that is leading the trend to what's known as "pervasive computing.'' These devices are best known for their calendar and address book functions. However, PDAs like Palm Pilots, HandSpring's Visor series, and a host of other products can make very powerful teaching and learning tools.

These devices support a number of applications, including limited support for Microsoft Word and Excel files, and database applications that support grade and attendance programs. To see what you can do with one of these nifty tools, visit any PDA-maker's Web site, such as www.handspring.com/software, and follow available software links.

My Favorite Website

My favorite Web site is my own. I set it up to help students find information for their social studies classes. It is used not only in my school system, but all over the nation and the world. Check it out and see what you think! Go to http://members.aol.com/HoseyHT/index.html.

Ned Hostetler
Government teacher
Orrville High School
Orrville, Ohio