Reference Links for Schools

Alberta Learning Resources Centre

The Learning Resources Centre (previously the Learning Resources Distribution Centre) is well known to most of us in the education field, but did you know that you could search, browse and buy online? The LRC web site gives access to the standard resources used in Alberta schools as well as many supplementary items for teaching and learning. Instead of digging around for the catalogue, try LRC online to locate materials for your classroom.
Learning Resources Centre Online

Alberta NetBeat Archives

The Alberta NetBeat Newsletter is archived at the National Library of Canada. To view back issues of Alberta NetBeat, you can visit the archives at:
http://collection.nlc-bnc.ca/100/201/300/alberta_netbeat/index.html

Another look at the Effectiveness of Technology in Education

How many times have you had to explain or defend your use of technology in education? In the form of a parable, "Are we there yet?" is a light-hearted look to help us all rethink how we view and use technology in teaching and learning, and how we work with our colleagues to do it well.
Are we there yet?

Best Practices for Alberta School Web Sites

The Alberta Education document of best practices for school web sites is available online. Entitled "Implementing and Managing Web Site Development in Education (1999)", it provides some solid guidelines for planning, designing and building a useful and organized site for your school. You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader to obtain this 326K document

Canada's Schoolnet Directory - Is your School Listed?

Canada's SchoolNet maintains a list of Canadian schools - is your school listed in their directory yet? If so, is the information still correct? Do a quick check and take a few minutes to get your school listed or to make sure your listing is valid.
http://www.schoolnet.ca/grassroots/e/resources/schools/index.asp

Classroom Teacher Forums

There are plenty of issues facing Educators day in and day out, and the Schoolnet Online Educator forum is one place to share the challenges and successes. Ask questions, provide or gather expertise, and discuss the issues and philosophies in your teaching with other Canadian educators.
Schoolnet Online Educator Forums

CanTeach for Canadian Educational Resources

Created and maintained by a teacher from British Columbia, CanTeach is a collection of links especially for teachers in Canada. It was designed primarily for the elementary level but also has links that would be useful to some of the higher grades. CanTeach contains lesson plans, links, discussion lists and other resources with a Canadian focus. You can even help out by submitting your lesson plans to the collection.
http://www.canteach.ca/

Copyright Friendly Photographs for Education

While there are many images on the Web, most are copyright protected and require permissions and clearances for use, even in a classroom or non-profit environment. Created especially for educators, this collection is copyright-friendly and contains many photographs. All the images have been donated by the creators and are free for educational use.
Pics4Learning

Eric Search Wizard

Let other librarians help do the searching... Prepackaged searches that tap into the Eric database can bring you fine tuned results in a hurry on some of the most frequently requested education information. See whether your question is covered in the search wizard collection, modify it if you need to, and send a pre-tested search into the Eric database.
http://searcheric.org/scripts/ewiz/expert.htm

Free Stuff for Canadian Teachers

Free stuff for Canadian Teachers is exactly that. What an interesting site! With everything from posters to tapes, software, teaching guides, and more, this site is dedicated to finding all kinds of freebies for educators. Subscribing to their newsletter updates you with a list of items added to the site each week and is an easy way to quickly scan for goodies you could use.
Free Stuff for Canadian Teachers
Free stuff for Educators in Alberta

Hot Potatoes - easily create online quizzes for the Web

From the University of Victoria Language Lab comes Hot Potatoes, a free program for creating all kinds of online quizzes to post on the Web. Multiple choice, short answer, crossword style, matching and ordering, or fill in the gaps - you pick the styles you want on your quiz! You create it, post it to your site, and have the answers sent to the email address of your choice. Try it out without downloading anything by visiting the tutorials for PC and Macintosh.

Mailing List and Newsgroups - finding your topic

Although sometimes overlooked, mailing lists and newsgroups can be a valuable sources of information and contacts. There are discussions about libraries and library issues, education, children's literature... on just about everything! Finding them is easier when you use search tools that specialize in them so here's a few to get you started:
Google groups- search the archives of postings to numerous lists and groups (formerly Dejanews)
Tile.net - to find lists, newsgroups, ftp sites
Topica - for lists and newsletters (Topica now owns the Liszt collection as well)

Media Awareness - Alberta curriculum links

The Media Awareness Network has a collection of links for the Alberta English Language Arts curriculum. What makes this collection special is that it is set up in tables that group the links with the media literacy outcomes in the curriculum making it an easy quick reference.
K-9 curriculum
10 - 12 curriculum

Professional Development for Educators

Training options designed for those in the education field:
Apple Staff Development (Apple Learning Interchange - online training)
Workshops for K-12 Staff (Inet-Toolbox - instructor-led sessions for Alberta schools & libraries, and onsite staff PD days)

School library Web Pages

Peter Milbury is a school librarian who provides a variety of resources to school libraries by means of the Web. He maintains a collection of school libraries who have pages on the Web, but there no Alberta school libraries listed! Let's get in there and let the world know that we have innovative and valuable school library pages too!
Peter Milbury's Listing of School Libraries in Canada

Teaching Critical Thinking - resources for teachers

From the Center for Critical Thinking comes this site for K-12 educators. Containing articles, recommendations and lesson plans, it is a useful set of resources for teaching those all-important critical thinking skills to students.
Center for Critical Thinking: K-12 Teacher Resources

Technology Planning and Integration

Technology planning and integration is easy to say, but not always easy to do. The North Central Regional Technology in Education Consortium (NCRTEC) has a set of informational pages to assist educators in tackling technology planning and integration. There is also a Technology Profile Tool that you can download or use online to assess strengths and weaknesses in your current local practices that will encourage thoughtful implementation.
Guiding Questions for Technology Planning
Technology Profile Tool

Updated: January 2004, Additions: February 2003