It's a crisp (below freezing) and beautiful morning for exploring MARVEL. And there is actually time, since it is Saturday!
1. I started with using the Britannica Pre-K to 2 edition. My first impression was "hey, where do I type in my search terms?" but then I realized that this is really, really designed for little ones. I clicked on the picture of an elephant to give it a try. Right away, I felt like I was watching a junior version of Nature on PBS...same steady adult male narrator was telling me about this giant mammal. However, since I was now trying to be a wee student on MARVEL, I had some questions. What is a savannah anyway? What is a kilogram and why does he keep giving me measurements in it? It was cool to learn that elephants have new teeth that will grow when theirs wear out and fall out. But what is ivory and why are elephants hunted for it? What does "illegal" mean? My biggest wonder was if male elephants grow up and move away from the herd, how do female elephants keep having babies? Just saying... Gee, I am an obnoxious youngster, but I do have a lot of questions. Maybe if I use this version of MARVEL some more, I'll find out the answers! In a nutshell, elephants live on the savannah and in the forest according to the video. Nothing about the differences in their ears.
2. Wowee! The middle school version of Britannica has 9 pages of information plus video. They still don't explain savannah, but there is detailed info. on trunks and more. Big jump from the K-2 version.
It also has a table of contents on the left and links on the right to additional resources in media, journals, and best websites. Cool. I can save, print, email, or cite the article, too. Go Britannica!
3. On Brit. H.S. I searched for Korea and then chose South Korea. On the right the population and area are listed. In addition:
Expand Your Research:
For my students in 7th grade during the World Tour they design for their fictional rock groups, they will want to find out major cities, weather, any travel alerts, venues at which they would be able to perform, and native foods. Some of these things are readily available in CultureGrams. Are they in Britannica? Let's see. The table of contents does list Daily Life and Customs which would work. Cool.
4. Workspace sounds ideal for a teacher to use to compile info. as a model for their students needing sources...and if research time is lacking, to provide students with a set of materials to use. I like that it can be shared as view only or can be emailed or accessed by a URL. We already use GoogleDocs with all of our students (especially those with laptops), and they will easily muckle on to Workspace for some assignments. This is something I will definitely share with kids and teachers, too.
2b. Very nice to have this up to date so that kids and teachers can have access to current events. Google Translate will be helpful for our ESL students. I will share it with the ESL instructor.
3. Britannica Blog is timely and would be a great resource for having students read and discuss, take notes, or find main ideas, supporting details, etc. in Lang. Arts or Social Studies or Science. Will recommend.
2C. Disappointed to see little about our current presidential debates. Interesting to read the articles on Romney and Obama. Citation styles are handy, esp. for upperclassmen and college kids. Like the World Data Analyst.
3. To create a workspace, you need to enter your name and email. For our kids using GoogleDocs, this should work same as with Britannica Public Library ed. Shared workspace is a great idea. Group projects!
No comments:
Post a Comment