ZooBurst

ZooBurst is a new website that allows users to create 3D pop-up books using nothing more than public domain clip art and ZooBurst's web-based editing tools. Anyone can view the books already created, but to create your own you must submit a short request form to have your account created.

In the very near future ZooBurst will be releasing a "class management" feature that will allow teachers to set up classes, create assignments and set up usernames & passwords for your students. In the interim you can always log into ZooBurst on behalf of your students. ZooBurst will allow you to access your account from multiple computers at the same time, so if you are in a computer lab simply log into the site for each student and have them create their own books.

Below is a sample of a 3D pop-book.

Ask500People.com - Public Opinion Polls

http://www.ask500people.com/

Ask500People to is a great site to take a poll on current event questions by gathering input and opinion data in minutes from around the world. After you create a free account, you simply type in your poll question and possible answers and await the results. You can also take part in any of the numerous poll questions already submitted from other teachers and students.

Panoramio - Photos of the World

Panaromio, a geolocation-oriented photo sharing website, is one the of the easiest sites I've used to locate pictures from just about any location in the world. Just to test it out, I searched for images from several small towns (some so small they aren't even considered to be a town) and found pictures for all but one. Your search results include the site's location on a Google Earth map. I would consider this site a must-use for any social studies class.


Uploading and sharing your own pictures is also very easy. If you already have a google account, you only be asked to create a Panoramio user name before you upload your pictures. I then uploaded a picture I had taken on my iPhone and mapped it exactly where it was taken several weeks ealier. If it is not the correct location, you can use the Google Earth map to designate the proper spot.

Wallwisher

Wallwisher is an online notice board maker.

For those who have never tried Wallwisher before, it is very easy to use. To get started simply go to Wallwisher.com and click "build a wall." Then title your wall, choose a URL for your wall, enter your name and email, and start adding sticky notes to the wall. Sticky notes added to a Wallwisher wall can contain up to 160 characters of text plus links to images and videos. You can choose to make your wall private or public. If you choose the public option anyone can quickly add sticky notes to your wall. If you want to approve additions to the wall before they appear, that's an option too. Choosing the public settings is allows for the quickest set-up and use of Wallwisher as you only need to give students the URL of your wall in order for them to add notes to the wall.

Check out these interesting ways to use Wallwisher in the classroom.
http://docs.google.com/present/view?id=dhn2vcv5_436f8kscmdc

Tagxedo - Tag Clouds with Style

http://www.tagxedo.com/

Tagxedo allows you to create word clouds much like Wordle, or Tagul, but it allows you to customize the design of your word clouds. You can select from a variety of shapes in which to display words or you can design your shape for your word cloud. You can enter text into the word cloud generator manually or simply enter a url from which Tagxedo will generate a word cloud. As with other word cloud generators you also have options for excluding words from your word clouds.

Tagxedo gives you eighteen options for saving your word clouds as png or jpeg files.

The creator, Hardy Leung, really seems interested in getting feedback from teachers about how Tagxedo can be improved for educational use.

DuckDuckGo - A Simplified Search Engine

http://duckduckgo.com/

Duck Duck Go is a creative and simple to use search engine. When you enter a search term that can have multiple meanings, Duck Duck Go alerts you to that and asks you what you really want to search for. For example, if you enter the search term "titan," Duck Duck Go will tell you that "titan" could mean different things such as:





Duck Duck Go also provides brief information summaries when you search for topics. This is handy if you're not really looking for a lot of information about a topic, but are just in need of a quick synopsis of a topic.
And for real fun, click the I'm feeling Ducky icon

to get a random selection choice of the word you entered.

Freeology - Free Printables for Teachers

Freeology is a site that provides dozens of printable forms teachers. Freeology offers dozens of free graphic organizer forms, calendars, awards forms, and coloring pages. Teachers can also take advantage of Freeology's free math worksheet creator and free wordsearch generator. All of the forms on Freeology can be downloaded as PDFs.