As a trainee Secondary Teacher the magnitude of online help and tips is fantastic. The only problem is finding it! Here is a small insight into the great resources that you can tap into to improve your teaching experience and teaching practice.
eduClipper is very similar to Pinterest but it is more education focused with all of the content on there being directly related to education tips and statistics. There are innovative ideas for classroom participation that you could use and explore for your own teaching practice.
Many people who post interesting content on to eduClipper have links to their personal blogs which also hold some key tips and hints for teachers and trainees. Tapping into this free online resource can mean that you can learn and research about teaching concepts which may not be explored in detail within your University seminars and lectures. You don’t have to post your own items onto eduClipper to be involved with the website, just sign up and start searching.
iPads are increasingly popular in the classroom and it would be advisable to acquaint yourself with the tools Apple can offer to your classroom engagement. There are lots of free apps on the iTunes site that are easy to use by both teachers and students. If you’re used to working with Microsoft Office tools then adapting to Apple can take a while to get your head around, but familiarising yourself before entering into the classroom would be a great way to get ahead of the game. Also, using apps is often cheaper than buying hard copies of books, video content, games etc. as you only need to buy one copy and upload them onto all of the iPad devices. This means that each child has access to a copy but you’ve only paid for one, and electronic copies are much more difficult to sabotage or rip – bonus.
We would also recommend looking at the STEM website; it includes loads of resources and links to STEM subjects (Science, D&T, Computing and Maths).
Classroom Alternatives to YouTube
There is no denying the amount of fantastic content on YouTube, however many schools have a limited access to the site due to some of the unsavoury content that can get onto the system. To avoid being disappointed about not being able to play a video from YouTube in the classroom, why not try one of these other outlets:
- True Tube Videos, Lesson Plans & Assemblies for RE, PSHE & Citizenship.
- Academic Earth aims to “provide everyone with the opportunity to earn a world-class education by offering free online classes and online learning tools. Whether you’re looking to advance your career or take classes that interest you, Academic Earth can connect you to the world’s top universities and scholars”.
- Future Learn a UK based platform for MOOCs
Here are some links that we recommend for partnership students:
The Institute of Education Science in the United States. ERIC is a comprehensive education database covering research and professional practice. Many resources are available as free full-text.
Aims to provide information and original source material relating to the development of England’s school system. It contains the full texts of almost 400 important documents, including Reports, Official Papers and Acts of Parliament. The full texts of important reports on education in England and Wales since 1900 are here: Hadow, Plowden, Bullock, Warnock, Cockcroft, Swann and Elton etc. 200 Acts of Parliament and various other government and HMI publications. The history of England’s schools from 597 to 2010 is covered. There’s also a timeline of major events, education acts and publications, a glossary and a bibliography.
Google Scholar is a search engine that covers scholarly literature, including peer-reviewed papers, theses, books, abstracts and technical reports from broad areas of research.