Featured: 1-27-2014 The BioDigital Human

The BioDigital Human is a virtual 3-D body that brings thousands of accurate anatomy objects and health conditions to life in an interactive online platform.

 

Students now have a powerful new tool to learn anatomy and health conditions using the latest in 3-D technology.

 

 

Quickly understand the most complex anatomy concepts through the BioDigital Human interactive visuals that make learning fun and intuitive:

• Students engage with materials that are information-rich and highly compelling.
• Difficult concepts are made easier by exceeding the limitations of illustration and video to interact with the human body.
• Customize state-of-the-art 3-D lessons, share them with a few clicks of the mouse, and collaborate with peers.

 

There is no need to download or install anything. An automatic  compatibility test will run when you first visit the site to let you know if the BioDigital Human is supported by your computer. 

 

The virtual body is completely free to explore, over 5,000 anatomical objects and animations are openly available. There is a paid version, which provides access to a suite of interactive tools, including saving and sharing functions.

 Watch a video overview of the BioDigital Human

 

The free BioDigital Human iPad app is available through the iTunes App Store. It does not include all of the features found on the web app, but it does include bookmarking, the snapshot tool, and other unique features.

 

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Featured: 5-8-2013 HealthTeacher [Health]

HealthTeacher is an online resource of tools including lessons, interactive presentations, and other resources to integrate health education into any classroom.

K-12 teachers including classroom teachers, school nurses, guidance counselors and PE teachers can make use of HealthTeacher. Lessons are optimized for classroom integration enabling every teacher to teach health.

Evidence-based HealthTeacher lessons are built by experts: doctors, teachers, learning specialists. Topics include relevant issues kids face today: bullying, obesity, depression. Health lessons are built with real, grade-specific Common Core alignment with authentic informational text evaluations aligned to state and national standards. Measurement is focused on health literacy and behaviors.

Family newsletters connect to parents, and at-home challenges reinforce healthy habits at home.

HealthTeacher can stand alone as a school's comprehensive health education curriculum or it can supplement an existing curriculum.

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Featured: 3/26/2013 GoNoodle [Health]

GoNoodle delivers refreshing brain-break games designed to be played in five minutes or less to your classroom projector or interactive whiteboard.

GoNoodle games are designed to energize and stimulate students in a variety of situations. Kids look forward to GoNoodle brain-breaks because they incorporate the game playing experiences they know and love.

The mix of interactive games and physical activity can help students get more exercise in their day. Practicing just four GoNoodle games a day gives students as much as 20 minutes of physical activity.

Watch a video: Welcome to GoNoodle

GoNoodle is a product of HealthTeacher, an interactive leader in youth health that creates games, apps, and othereducational resources.

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Featured: 2/14/2013 Disaster Hero [Safety]

Disaster Hero is a free online game designed to teach children aged 6-13, parents, and teachers how to prepare for disasters. The overall goals are to ensure that players know what to do before, during, and after a disaster.



Parents and teachers are included in Disaster Hero so that the family and school are familiar with the main concepts of disaster preparedness: make a plan, get a kit, and be informed.

Disaster Hero covers four main topic areas:

1. Basic preparedness steps (get a kit, make a plan, and be informed) to protect the participant and family before, during, and immediately following an emergency.
2. Common disasters (earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and tornadoes), their associated danger signals, typical effects, common injuries, and appropriate responses.
3. Basic quick-care tips and techniques for common injuries.
4. Basic information about geographic-specific disasters.

There are three levels of difficulty in Disaster Hero: Bronze level is recommended for early readers (grades 1 through 3), Silver is recommended for average readers (grades 4 through 6), and Gold is recommended for advanced readers (grades 7 and 8).



Disaster Hero will work with all major web browsers, but you must have the latest version of Adobe Flash installed. This program is  administered by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and FEMA.

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Featured: 1/8/2013 NowGen [Biology]

Nowgen carries out dedicated education work focused on engaging directly with the formal education system – in particular, biology taught in schools.



In the education community, Nowgen strives to ensure that the biology taught in schools incorporates the latest research findings.

Nowgen works with students through hands-on workshops and other opportunities to explore genetics through practical activities and provides teachers with professional development and engaging resources to help students with contemporary biomedicine, especially genetics and genomics.



Nowgen has a wide range of resources suitable for a variety of audiences, such as videos about the influence of genes on common diseases; lesson plans about the role of nature and nurture, and policy documents, such as how and why genomics should be taught in the classroom.



Teacher resources have been designed to either support part of a lesson or be used to create an entire lesson plan. When browsing the resources, the ‘tags’ at the top of the page help narrow down your results.

Nowgen is a center of excellence in the UK in public engagement, education, and professional training in biomedicine.

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Featured: 1/7/2013 PEScholar [Physical Education]

PE Scholar is a new community website for sharing quality physical education teaching resources, lesson plans, discussions, and much more.



PE Scholar is designed to make it possible for the physical education community to share high quality teaching resources, engage in discussion, and access useful information.

PE Scholar provides a selection of high quality, innovative PE articles and resources that can be shared by educators involved with teaching physical education and coaching sports.

PE Scholar resources cover a range of topics including specific sports such as swimming, netball, hockey, athletics, basketball, fitness. You can find classroom materials like lesson plans, resource cards, worksheets, unit plans, ideas, and journal articles.



PE Scholar offers articles, resources, and discussion forums, where anything can be viewed, downloaded, shared, and discussed.

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Featured: 11/20/2012 Neoroscience for Kids [Science]

Students and teachers who would like to learn about the human nervous system can find a wealth of information at Neuroscience for Kids.

Visitors to Neuroscience for Kids can discover the fascinating world of the brain, spinal cord, neurons, and the senses. Learn about the nervous system through experiments, activities, and games. And, there are lots of links to related websites to facilitate further exploration.

What you can do at Neuroscience for Kids:

• Search the web site and the questions/answers page.
• Keep up-to-date on new discoveries in brain research with Neuroscience in the News.
• Sign up for the Neuroscience for Kids Newsletter.
• Watch BrainWorks, a 30-minute TV show about the brain.

Portions of Neuroscience for Kids are available in a variety of languages including Spanish, Chinese, Portugese, Russian, and more.

Neuroscience for Kids is maintained by Eric H. Chudler and was supported by a Science Education Partnership Award from the National Center for Research Resources.

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COD - 4/16/2012 - Innerbody [Biology]

Innerbody is an online guide to human anatomy where you can learn about human physiology as you study anatomical charts and models of every system in the human body.

Innerbody lets visitors view detailed human anatomy charts and gather in-depth anatomy information by clicking on any of ten human body systems: skeletal, muscular, digestive, lymphatic, endocrine, nervous, cardiovascular, male and female reproductive, and urinary.

The Innerbody mission is to "provide high quality educational content through low bandwidth Internet access to children, parents and schools worldwide."

The Inner sites have become part of the curriculum at many schools worldwide with more than 4,000 sites linked to them. Monthly, they serve about half a million people with about 12 million page impressions.

The Innerbody website uses Java. Your browser must support Java and it must be enabled.

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COD - 2/23/2012 - NIEHS Kids' Pages [Science]

NIEHS Kids' Pages is an informational and educational resource for all ages to learn about environmental health.

NIEHS Kids' Pages is a government website designed to teach children about the connections between their health and the environment; to encourage children to pursue careers in health, science, and the environment; and to assist children in learning to read and master mathematics and science.

NIEHS Kids' Pages is organized into a few main sections with sub-categories in each:

• Discover and Explore-environment and healthy living, recycling, pollution, the natural world, and how science works
• Scientific Kids-kids' viewpoint, experiments, activities, and quizzes
• Fun & Games-games and puzzles, coloring activities, songs, jokes, illusions, and riddles and brainteasers

What's that Word is a glossary of relevant vocabulary. There is also a Parents & Teachers area with lesson plans and activities, fact sheets, links, and more.

NIEHS Kids' Pages is produced by The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) which is part of the National Institutes of Health.

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Is a "Wandering Mind" a Bad Thing?

 

I get some of my best ideas when I wake up early and can lie in bed for a time and just let my mind roam freely. I've been this way for as long as I can remember. Are you like this? When do you get your best ideas?

Yesterday, I read a very interesting TIME magazine piece by Annie Murphy Paul, "Why Morning Routines Are Creativity Killers" that explained why this happens. Murphy cites research that suggests "that imaginative insights are most likely to come to us when we’re groggy and unfocused. The mental processes that inhibit distracting or irrelevant thoughts are at their weakest in these moments, allowing unexpected and sometimes inspired connections to be made."

She points out that this research seems to indicate the discursive attentional focus of sleepy people may cause them to subconsciously broaden their search of their personal knowledge base, thus leading to an increase in creative problem solving.

You can, and should, read the entire article here.

I wonder if there are implications here regarding the effect that working with a background distraction, such as music softly playing or the ambient noises of a coffee shop, may stimulate creativity in certain individuals. Personally, I seem to be more creative in circumstances like those than I am when working in a totally quiet environment. And, if so, what does this mean for teaching and learning?

BTW, I have enjoyed many of  Annie Murphy Paul's TIME articles and would strongly recommend you consider following her on Twitter at @anniemurphypaul.

 

Catch of The Day - NASPE Teaching Tools - 9/1/2011

A variety of Teaching Tools and guidance documents from the National Association for Sport and Physical Education help you “engage with your students, implement best practices, educate parents, and motivate children to engage in a lifetime of physical activity.”

Download K-12 activity ideas, classroom resources, and physical activity calendars from the monthly NASPETeacher Toolbox. Available in both English and Spanish. You can even submit your own lesson ideas to the Teacher Toolbox.

More of the NASPE Teaching Tools:

• Two supplemental Issues of Strategies with the themes of "Fitness Education and Assessment in Physical Education" and "Sport and School Programs”
• Guidance documents on a wide variety of sport and physical education topics
• Surveys on quality physical education and physical activity
• Tools to assess the quality of your school’s physical education program

NASPE Teaching Tools for higher education provide lesson plans, student activities, presentations, and a course syllabus for teacher preparation faculty to help educate future professionals about NASPE and what it means to be a professional.

The National Association for Sport and Physical Education is the professional membership association that sets the standard for best practices in physical education and sport.

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Catch of The Day - BAM! Body and Mind - 8/23/2011

BAM! Body and Mind is a site designed for kids 9-13 years old to provide the information they need to make healthy lifestyle choices.

The site is focused on topics that BAM! has learned are important to kids — such as stress and physical fitness. The site uses kid-friendly language, graphics, games, quizzes, and other interactive features.

Some features of BAM! Body and Mind:

• KABAM is a comic creator that helps kids resolve conflicts and stressful situations with the help of the cartoon BAM! bunch
• An exercise personality quiz that leads to a custom activity list for each user
• The BAM! Game Room includes interactive games to help kids learn about issues like bullying, advertising, peer pressure, and more

BAM! can also be useful to teachers, providing them with interactive, educational, and fun activities linked to the national education standards for science and health.

BAM! Body and Mind is from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an agency of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

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Catch of the Day - Honeytomes.com - 6/17/2011

Honeytomes.com is a website where you may explore educational materials addressing "issues of wellness and our shared human experience-to care for self and others."

The Honeytomes.comWellness Products for Children of all ages may be used in many educational settings such as mainstream classrooms, ESL, bilingual, special education, and gifted classrooms.

These materials may also be useful in guidance programs and to educators of acutely and chronically ill or hospital-bound kids.

Honeytomes.com is the official home of GP’s Honey Tomes, LLC, based in Bronx, New York.

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Catch of the Day - N-Squad - 6/3/2011

N-Squad is another Web Adventure serious game from the Rice University Center for Technology in Teaching and Learning with the goal of increasing students' science and health knowledge.

In N-Squad, middle school students (ages 11-14) work with forensic scientists to solve an alcohol-related crime, while learning about alcohol's interaction in different body systems: digestive, circulatory, and nervous.

The game consists of three consecutive 30-45 minute episodes with a continuous storyline:

• EPISODE 1 — Misconceptions about alcohol, medical examination, role of the digestive system in processing alcohol, liver histology.
• EPISODE 2 — Alcohol metabolism, role of the circulatory system in processing alcohol, blood alcohol concentration (BAC), headspace gas chromatography.
• EPISODE 3 — Alcohol’s effects on the brain, brain plasticity, brain parts, neurotransmission, addiction, withdrawal, factors influencing alcohol use, drunk driving.

N-Squad and its companion materials are all free. This project was supported by a grant from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

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Catch of the Day - PE Central - 3/8/2011

PE Central is a website for PreK-12 physical education teachers, students, and parents providing the latest information about developmentally appropriate physical education programs for children.

Teachers can submit their innovative programs and ideas on PE Central where they will be shared and recognized. Submit a PE video and, if it's published, receive a $50 gift certificate. PE Central also offers a free e-mail newsletter to help users keep up with the newest information about physical education and health education.

Some of the resources on PE Central include:

• over 2000 ready-to-use PreK-12 health, physical education, and integrated lesson ideas
• downloadable ready-to-print assessments
• a store featuring the latest books, DVDs, and music for PE teachers
• adapted and preschool PE information
• programs that allow kids to log their physical activity and motivate them to continue being active
• ideas for creating and maintaining a positive learning environment
• free job announcements

The primary mission of PE Central is "to assist teachers, parents, and others who work with youngsters to guide them in the process of becoming physically active and healthy for a lifetime".

PE Central originated in the fall of 1995, with Dr. George Graham and the doctoral students in Virginia Tech's Health and Physical Education Program.

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Catch of the Day - PE Central - 3/8/2011

 

PE Central is a website for PreK-12 physical education teachers, students, and parents providing the latest information about developmentally appropriate physical education programs for children.

Teachers can submit their innovative programs and ideas on PE Central where they will be shared and recognized. Submit a PE video and, if it's published, receive a $50 gift certificate. PE Central also offers a free e-mail newsletter to help users keep up with the newest information about physical education and health education.

Some of the resources on PE Central include:

• over 2000 ready-to-use PreK-12 health, physical education, and integrated lesson ideas
• downloadable ready-to-print assessments
• a store featuring the latest books, DVDs, and music for PE teachers
• adapted and preschool PE information
• programs that allow kids to log their physical activity and motivate them to continue being active
• ideas for creating and maintaining a positive learning environment
• free job announcements

The primary mission of PE Central is "to assist teachers, parents, and others who work with youngsters to guide them in the process of becoming physically active and healthy for a lifetime".

PE Central originated in the fall of 1995, with Dr. George Graham and the doctoral students in Virginia Tech's Health and Physical Education Program.

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