Dianne Krause's List: English Resources

Nice collection of free audiobooks.

free classic audiobooks narration

Word Tamer is a neat site for learning the process of developing characters, settings, and plots in creative writing. Word Tamer is set up as an interactive journey through a carnival of literary devices. As students move through the carnival they develop characters, develop a setting, and develop a plot for their stories. At each stop in the Word Tamer carnival students can print out the words they have written. Along the way there are videos to help students understand the roles of characters, settings, and plot development in crafting a good story.

writing storytelling literacy vocabulary wordtamer English languagearts

A great wiki chocked full of resources for literacy in education including:  Brain based learning, comprehension strategies & lessons, independent reading, lesson design, videos, word study, writing lessons, written response lessons, vocabulary and more!

reading writing literacy languagearts english

64 Interesting Ideas* for Class Blog Posts

ideas blog blogging blogs

Buzzwords are frequently used in news media. These are words that do not typically occur in everyday speech, but are common among newscasters, talking heads, and pundits on cable news.

education vocabulary words newswordy news language english

The Visual Thesaurus is an interactive dictionary and thesaurus which creates word maps that blossom with meanings and branch to related words. Its innovative display encourages exploration and learning. You'll understand language in a powerful new way.

thesaurus visualization reference dictionary language writing visual

The Biography Maker is like those homework machines we have been hearing about for many years. It is designed to help you convert facts into insights, dull and boring information into fascination and magic. It will help you do a good job, but you must provide some of the "steam" to make it work well.

The Biography Maker is meant to inspire lively story telling and vivid writing which will make your readers want to know more about your subject.

biography writing questions

Instant Poetry forms.. enter your own information and a poem is formed. A lot of different options!

poetry writing english language_arts

"With Myfakewall.com you can easily create fake profile pages just for fun. This fake facebook wall generator allows you to create a funny profile to entertain your friends. Create it, and share it on Facebook !"

facebook template education fakewall fakebook

"Whether you’re writing a paper or studying for a test, odds are you spend more time gathering the pieces than actually working. In my experience, getting all of my notes together, hunting for quotes, and tracking down bibliographical information takes at least as long, if not longer, as writing the paper itself.

In a group situation, sharing research and collaborating on the production of one document is even more difficult without the proper tools.

Enter Evernote. For students, it’s an invaluable way to organize research and streamline the collaboration process. Here are some examples of how Evernote simplifies the student research process."

research students education evernote

This is the front page of the Simple English Wikipedia. Wikipedias are places where people work together to write encyclopedias in different languages. We use Simple English words and grammar here. The Simple English Wikipedia is for everyone! That includes children and adults who are learning English.
There are 67,234 articles on the Simple English Wikipedia. All of the pages are free to use. They have all been published under both the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License 3.0 and the GNU Free Documentation License. You can help here! You may change these pages and make new pages. Read the help pages and other good pages to learn how to write pages here. If you need help, you may ask questions at Simple talk.

wikipedia wiki elementarywikipedia esl elementary

Through the great folks in the Google Certified Teachers community I've learned that you can now sort your search results by readability. The readability index is a bit coarse, but it is helpful none-the-less. The index use a simple ranking of "basic," "intermediate," and "advanced." In order to sort by readability you have to open the advanced search tools then select "reading level" from the drop-down menus.

technology google readinglevel specialed reading speced

"Figment is a community where you can share your writing, connect with other readers, and discover new stories and authors. Whatever you're into, from sonnets to mysteries, from sci-fi stories to cell phone novels, you can find it all here."

writing figment education students reading english languagearts

"Welcome to whichbook.net - a completely
new way of choosing what to read"

books reading recommendations literature reference

"The report found that the use of Web 2.0 tools such as blogs, podcasts, wikis, and comics-creating software can heighten students’ engagement and enhance their writing and thinking skills in all grade levels and across all subjects."

writing technology instruction education

A nice group of websites used for writing and publishing online.. good for all levels. 

publishing storytelling writing digitalportfolio

"Project Global Inform (PGI) is an in-school project where students use media to spread awareness about human rights violations. PGI came out of the idea that we too often “teach” our students about genocide and human rights violations, but never “do” anything about it. This project’s main objective is to create awareness about current human rights violations in our schools, communities, and abroad. Through the use of media and technology students have the power to make a difference."

project global pgi projectglobalinform globalinform diversity

"I'm glad to announce that the first version of "101 Ways to Use Tagxedo" is completed!\n\n--> http://bit.ly/101tagxedo <--\n\nPlease be patient as it does take a while to load the document (10MB, over 150 images)."

tagxedo wordcloud wordle

"These are just a very few examples of different types of poetry. Most of the definitions have at least one example of each particular type of poetry for better understanding. All examples were provided by the members of Shadow Poetry or previous Egroup. More definitions for related poetry items may be found in the Shadow Poetry Handbook (link located above). As a bonus, we feature poetry forms created by selected poets as new and challenging writing styles. Try not only the traditional forms, but some of the rewarding invented formats as well!"

poetry writing teaching english languagearts

"NationStates is a free nation simulation game. Build a nation and run it according to your own warped political ideals. Create a Utopian paradise for society's less fortunate or a totalitarian corporate police state. Care for your people or deliberately oppress them. Join the World Assembly or remain a rogue state. It's up to you.

"

SocialStudies history simulation government politics nationstates