Issue 23, Volume 12 February 9, 2012     Thought for the Week You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself, any direction you choose. -- Dr. Seuss   Louisiana’s Bicentennial Resources April 2012 will mark the 200th anniversary of Louisiana Statehood. To commemorate the event, the Bicentennial commission has prepared a Teacher Desk Reference, 200 years in the Making: Celebrating the Bicentennial of Louisiana Statehood that can be viewed and printed from the Bicentennial education site, crt.state.la.us/education. As the site develops, it will also contain additional education items, history podcasts, and the Bicentennial timeline so be watching as the site grows. Teacher workshops began in January and will run through March. The goal of the workshops is to provide historical background information and educational resources to help K-12 educators integrate standards-based K-12 Bicentennial education resources with core content instruction. The agendas and online registration are available at crt.state.la.us/education/teacherworkshops.aspx. NEA’s Read Across America Week – February 27 – March 2, 2012 The National Education Association (NEA) is building a nation of readers through its signature program, NEA’s Read Across America. Now in its thirteenth year, this year-round program focuses on motivating children and teens to read through events, partnerships, and reading resources. NEA’s Read Across America Day, NEA’s national reading celebration, takes place each year on or near March 2, the birthday of Dr. Seuss. Across the country, thousands of schools, libraries, and community centers participate by bringing together kids, teens, and books; and, you can too! The theme is green for a very special 2012 Read Across America celebration. NEA's Read Across America campaign will showcase the Lorax book as well as NBC/Universal's The Lorax (featuring the voices of Taylor Swift, Zach Efron, Danny Devito and Betty White). The film opens nationwide March 2, 2012 and Universal, Dr. Seuss Enterprises, and Random House have joined NEA's Read Across America, creating new posters and classroom guides for the campaign. Read Across America will also develop new event ideas and materials to help you make this a Seussational celebration. For activity ideas, resource materials, and more, go to http://www.nea.org/grants/886.htm. You can also check out these Suessical sites below: Celebrate Seuss in Pajamas! http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/5-ways-celebrate-dr-seuss39s-birthday-pajamas  And why not? Your students are sure to love celebrating Dr. Seuss' birthday by coming to school in their pajamas! Find whole group activities to explore "The Cat in the Hat" as well as "Green Eggs and Ham" with your elementary classes. Dr. Seuss and Newspapers http://www.nieworld.com/teachers/lessonplans/sneetchesplan.htm  This newspaper lesson resource links several of Dr. Seuss' books to activities involving newspapers and literacy, as well as mapping, science, health, and more. Seuss Sound Flip Books http://www.lessonplanspage.com/LASoundsWDrSuess1.htm/ Students will be focusing on beginning and ending sounds with this language arts lesson plan, themed to Dr. Seuss's book, "Hop on Pop". The key here is the recognition that rhyming words have the same endings, though they can have different initial sounds. Meeting and Reading Dr. Seuss http://teachers.net/lessons/posts/470.html  Five days of activities celebrate the life and works of Dr. Seuss, with discussion activities, readings, Venn Diagrams, and more. Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss http://mailjust4me.com/play/seuss.htm  Try the Grinch quiz here, and then have your students make up their own trivia contests based on one or more of Dr. Seuss's books and/or characters. Try preparing the famous Green Eggs and Ham breakfast with your class, and then write a rhyming tribute to the wonderful Dr. Seuss. Glurch Meets Oobleck http://www.extension.iastate.edu/e-set/science_is_here/glurch.html  Students will be conducting science experiments and participating in challenges, perhaps even making inventions that use Glurch or Oobleck! The Matter With Oobleck http://education.jlab.org/beamsactivity/6thgrade/oobleck/  Various lab pages guide student investigations through the problem, procedure, data recording, and questions as they experiment with Oobleck. A recipe is included, along with related reading and writing activities related to discoveries involving matter. Answer keys are provided. Toolbox for Education Grants Now in its 6th year of helping build better schools and communities, the Lowe's Toolbox for Education program has provided nearly $25 million to more than 5,000 schools across the country. The Outdoor Classroom Grant Program and Lowe's Toolbox for Education supports parks and playgrounds and organizations involved with K-12 education, environmental beautification, environmental education, home safety, and community development. The deadline for submitting applications for this grant cycle is February 17, 2012. However, if 1500 applications are received before the application deadline, then the application process will close. So, be sure to submit your application soon. To get started, click on the "How to Apply" link at http://www.toolboxforeducation.com/. Top 100 Sites of 2011 Tech & Learning is a resource for Education Technology Leaders focusing on K-12 educators. The site contains a Software Reviews Database, articles from Technology & Learning Magazine, articles from Educators in Educators' eZine, Event and Contest listings, Reader suggested Web sites, and weekly news updates on education. This particular article shares the top 100 sites, from flash-card creators to digital storytelling, and of course social networks, which really stood out in 2011. Find the list at http://www.techlearning.com/article/52117. Presidents' Day – February 20, 2012 Presidents' Day, celebrated each year on the third Monday in February, is a day when Americans honor the legacies of the U.S. presidents. The holiday was established in 1800, when Congress declared February 22–George Washington's birthday–a federal holiday. Still legally known as Washington's Birthday, Presidents' Day has become a day to honor not only Washington, but Abraham Lincoln, the 16th U.S. president who was born on February 12, and the lives and accomplishments of all U.S. presidents. Below you will find a few sites to help you plan for Presidents Day: Life Portraits of the American Presidents http://www.americanpresidents.org/  C-SPAN presents this online resource for in-depth investigations into the lives of each of the American Presidents. Extensive video collections are included, along with lesson plans and further research resources. The American Presidents http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/P/  For each American President, click for speeches, including inaugural and state of the union addresses. Click on the stamp for biographical details, as well as career highlights and major accomplishments. It's a great place to learn more not only about the presidents, but to also take a few speeches and analyze them for form, style, and content. The American Presidents on PBS http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/collections/presidents/  Each of the American Presidents provides an extraordinary life study, and your class can explore their accomplishments and major life events with these online videos. Presidents' Day Resources http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/web-hunt-presidents-past-present-and-future  Offering a tour through the lives, homes, and accomplishments of different American Presidents, including our current President, this page can be your starting point for student research exercises. Presidential Trivia Game Cards http://jc-schools.net/tutorials/game/avery27881presidential-trivia.pdf  Who was the tallest American President (that one should be easy!)? Who was the youngest, or the shortest? Find some Presidential trivia cards, create your own board game to accompany them (why not design a board game contest for student groups?), and have students come up with their own Presidential trivia cards using the following link: http://www.potus.com/ Presidents Day Worksheets http://www.schoolfamily.com/print-and-use-tools/category/97-presidents-day-worksheets  Download primary worksheets here to help you celebrate President's Day in the classroom. Entries include color-by-number, a word search, missing letters, writing prompts, word scrambles, and more. Best on the Net!! -- Visit this site for hundreds of websites for teachers! We would love to hear from you about the best educational sites you have found on the web. Please submit, via email, the sites you feel merit inclusion. Send to tech.connect@cpsb.org. Please include the URL and a short sentence about the site.  Featured Sites: (These sites were submitted by teachers in Calcasieu Parish) Healthy Hearts http://www.fi.edu/learn/heart/enrichment/activity_healthy-heart.html In this heart activity, students will open and close their fists as many times as they can within one minute (you will need a timer). A worksheet is included. They will then jog in place and retake those measurements. They will also be dissecting animal hearts, observing the chambers and identifying their functions. Teacher content is available.   The Human Heart http://www.fi.edu/learn/heart/index.html  The Franklin Institute has one of the best human heart exhibits on the web, with a breakdown of all its components and several student activities included at http://www.fi.edu/learn/heart/enrichment/activities.html.   The Human Body - The Heart http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/body/factfiles/heart/heart.shtml  Flash movies with controls allow students to explore the chambers and features of the human heart. You can click on any organ on the right side bar (for high school students) to learn about the rest of the body.   An official publication of the CPSB Technology Department For Technical Support:  help.cpsb.org Calcasieu Parish Homepage  Technology Department  Tech Help Site  Best on the Net Tech Guides  Computer Purchasing Information  Tech Connect Archive