1. Pearson Education Technologies
www.pearsonedtech.com, pricing per student/year (varies by school/district size)
Concert is designed to incorporate the daily activities of K-12 teachers, parents, administrators and students in one interconnected solution that combines administrative, instruction, curriculum, testing, assessment and collaboration programs.
Secure, online assessments automatically update a teacher’s grade book, and student practice tests are aligned to state standards. Teachers can use word processing to create test items with graphics and give paper tests with online scoring. Students and parents can view state and local standards, select a class and get assignments, or download the online resources chosen by the teacher for help with new skills.
ACCELERATED SCHOOL ADMINISTRATORS PREPARATION PROGRAM
www.asapportal.com, $150 per person per month, or $1,100 a year; $50 per person for individual six weeks access
The Accelerated School Administrators Preparation Program is targeted to aspiring and veteran principals, and offers pre- and in-service teacher development.
Administrators and teachers undergo a personalized professional development program that builds on individual strengths.
ASAP has three- to five-hour learning modules, learning-on-demand mini-modules, an electronic portfolio, media e-library, a scenario case builder and an online management system for running a school.
AOL@SCHOOL NEW CONTENT
This online learning service has added four alliances to increase and strengthen its reading, math and science resources for K-5 students. The new alliances provide interactive lessons and feature early reading activities, phonics lessons, word games and an interactive science lab.
Bill Cosby’s PicturePages helps students develop reading, writing and math skills and assists parents in monitoring their child’s learning and development. Headsprout helps children learn phonics with consistent letters and sounds. ReadNet offers customized exercises to help students master reading skills and become more computer literate. Iknowthat.com provides interactive learning activities in science, math and language arts.
AWS Convergence Technologies
classroom.aws.com, $1,400 first year, $395 each additional year
WeatherNet Classroom is a learning tool that integrates real-time local and national weather data and camera images into science and math lessons for elementary, middle and high school students.
For example, an educator might build a learning activity on wind speed or humidity that automatically integrates the most current conditions from the school’s AWS WeatherNet Weather Station, as well as historical data and live conditions from more than 5,000 other schools that participate in the AWS WeatherNet program.
PROQUEST LEARNING: LITERATURE
The ProQuest Learning: Literature database delivers more than 90,000 original full-text works of literature from more than 1,300 authors. Organized into study units of 300-plus most-studied authors and genres, the material also includes author biographies, contemporary criticism and reviews.
Search tools help students find the information they want, with searches based on keyword, author name, nationality, publication date, literary movement, gender or text strings. Study guides feature plot overviews, character notes, detailed summaries and explanations of literary styles.
This content-rich, multimedia site presents art resources that are applicable to every curriculum area from pre-K through high school. Crayola offers craft and project ideas for each grade level, instruction on art techniques for using different types of media, lesson plans and classroom teaching tips. It includes related content with games, quizzes and an online calendar featuring daily art ideas. The site has several search engines for finding topics easily and hosts an online gallery that is one of the largest collections of student art on the Web.
www.quickmind.net, classroom license $1,199, Lab or library license $3,999, Site license $7,499 (all prices are per year for one-year subscription; discounts for multi-year subscriptions)
QuickMind.net, a K-12 resource, provides teachers, parents and students with 24-hour access to a variety of standardsbased curriculum, interactive homework assignments, project templates, tools, lesson plans, reference materials and online professional development. Access is through a password-protected Web site.
QuickMind.net’s Teacher Admin Center features an online management system allowing educators to create a student roster. Once students are enrolled in the roster, teachers can assign projects, tests or activities to one or more students. Assignments completed by students online are tracked and statistics are stored for the teacher in this area. The product’s Web interface is divided into six main channels: project generators,tool box, Web studio, professional development, complete reference center and curriculum.
Education World is one of the most comprehensive sources of curriculum materials on the Web, offering a safe search of more than 500,000 resources, with original content that is not available elsewhere. This material includes lesson plans, teaching units, curriculum guides, special features tied to the calendar, school reports, site reviews, professional articles and related resources.
Harcourt Interactive Technology
www.iloli.com, $3,900 per school
This standards-based, online instructional reading assessment system provides instant feedback and immediate test results. It gives students in grades 2-10 test practice, and teachers can measure student performance prior to state tests.
www.hwwilson.com, $250-$2,000, based on size of school (discounts available)
The WilsonWeb electronic reference database features software that provides access to full-text articles and references. This updated service gives administrators more control of user access to the WilsonWeb databases as well as more in-depth evaluation on how they’re being used. Librarians can set unique IP address ranges or user passwords for specific user groups, and track usage by standardized criteria.
GATEWAY PRESENTATION SYSTEM
www.iassessment.com, $5,000 set-up, plus license costs ($4-$15 per user/year)
GPS is a Web portal that helps organize and manage a district’s online resources. With Web-based information, online professional development programs, education applications and administrative tools collected and organized into channels, GPS helps administrators find resources. Administrators can use a newsletter creation application to reach a target audience within the district as opposed to the traditional method of sending all announcements out to all employees.
International Reading Association
This online resource for teachers and students offers standards-based lesson plans, peer-reviewed Web resources and classroom-tested activities for teaching reading and language arts in K-8.
The site provides links to instructional and student Web sites, as well as Web-based student tools such as Venn diagrams, which are used to compare and contrast ideas. The site’s lessons align with national standards.
TEACHER2TEACHER ONLINE RESOURCE LIBRARIES
www.teacher2teacher.com, $30 per library, $55 for bundle of three libraries (server licenses available)
This hands-on resource was designed to complement a district’s current in-house technology professional development program. The libraries include software tutorials, classroom activities and self-paced courses that support popular software programs.
The how-to library instructions help teachers learn specific tasks within a software program, the Viewlet Library combines video and audio to demonstrate the comple tion of specific tasks, and the Activities Library includes lessons and sample projects for technology integration.
www.scholastic.com, $399 per teacher/course (plus fee for facilitator training)
This professional development program aims to improve teacher practice and raise student achievement in reading.
Courses include: interactive simulations and video modeling of research practices; lesson plans, classroom management tools and reproducibles; ideas for working with English-language learners; opportunities to practice teaching strategies; and online support through teacher mentors. Graduate credit is available through NOVA Southeastern University.
Sponsored by the Nemours Foundation, Kids Health provides accurate, doctor-approved, jargon-free health information about children from birth through adolescence. The site offers separate areas for kids, teens and parents. Each section has its own design, ageappropriate content and instructional tone, and offers thousands of original articles, animations, interactive activities, games and resources developed by health experts.
Tom Snyder and America Online
DECISIONS, DECISIONS ONLINE
decisionsonline.school.aol.com, $60 for single user
Decisions, Decisions Online is a subscription service that promotes critical thinking through debate on current events. Designed for grades 5-10, it provides an online forum where students role-play a community leader faced with a difficult decision. Students work cooperatively as they consider options, prioritize goals and cast votes in a national poll. Quizzes, related Web links and other options give follow up activities. The site also features six safe, age-appropriate learning portals.
Tom Snyder Productions and AOL are offering the service jointly.
www.vantagelearning.com, $18 per person unlimited access for math and reading, and $54 per person for math, reading and writing
Learning Access is an integrated solution to create, administer, score and report interactive diagnostic assessments in reading, writing and math. It allows educators to create periodic benchmark assessments, quizzes, homework and prepare exams at the end of a course.
Learning Access gives teachers a way to map out a blueprint for instruction and remediation by assessing student strengths and weaknesses relative to state and national standards.
IEP ONLINE 5.0
www.xperts.com, $20,000-$1 million (varies by number of modules and students)
This online software for special education administration allows teachers to create or update their students’ individualized education plans from any networked computer with a Web browser. Administrators, counselors or other authorized users can also access the database of records. Each district determines whether the records can be viewed from outside the school network or only from an intranet, and four levels of security are available for different user groups.
Records include student demographics, child study, eligibility, IEP processing, 504 documentation and caseload management.
4. THE NEW YORK TIMES LEARNING NETWORK
This is a news-centered multimedia education site for grades 3-12, with up-to-date features that change daily. These include stories and photographs from the newspaper with related activities, guided Web tours on topics such as the presidential cabinet or westward expansion, news summaries and quizzes, and a variety of free question-asking services. The network also maintains an excellent collection of curriculum materials in every content area.