Pinterest: Techie Site of the Week

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This week I am happy to have Natalie Sing as a guest blogger share her new passion:)

 Pinterest  is a visual Social Networking opportunity, and an awesome tool for teachers and home educators to find inspirational projects on the internet.  When you register for Pinterest it is similar to Twitter. You begin following people and they can follow you. You can begin to pin websites, blogs, pictures and have a visual reminder of potential future projects. 

 What I like about Pinterest is the ability to produce “boards”. Each board can be for a specific purpose. This makes it great if you want to look at doing an art project later.   You can just go to your Art board and find a project you thought you might like to do “one day” with your student.

Your followers have the ability to repin one of your posts onto their boards. This is the aspect of community. You share, others share what you have shared and so on and so on....

There is an Iphone app for Pinterest as well. Even though I am quite new at Pinterest I can tell you that it is free, useful and fun!!

I encourage you to apply for a Pinterest account and then have a great time pinning!!

My boards are under NatalieSing or bchomeschoolmom.

Blessings!!

Related article:  Can I use it with social media?

Safe Sites for the Youngun's

Back to school brings lots of fun surfing the net, but for younger students we want to create some safe places to play, network and research.  Here are my pick of the month!

PRIMARY STUDENTS Learn nursery rhymes, sing along and play games at the same time with Duck's Alphabet.  Safe and fun!

VIRTUAL GAMES

Bible Islands a Virtual Adventure.  Build your own island, create your own avatar, earn gold coins playing games and invest wisely, all while learning the Bible.  Send messages and learn how to communicate.

KungFu Panda World  Set for the age group  7 and up,  this fun site is educational and safe.  KungFu Panda movie lovers will play with swords and develop martial arts skills. 


SOCIAL NETWORKING
Scuttlepad  "Parents need to know that this simple social networking website was designed with the young user in mind and is intended to create a safe online space for kids aged 6-11. The site is a pared-down place for kids to learn the basics of social networking and, unlike other social networks geared to kids, doesn’t have any of the extraneous games, puzzles, activities, or ads (at least yet) to occupy them. All content is closely monitored and controlled: Uploaded photos are manually reviewed and status updates and comments are created only through a pre-approved list of words." Commonsense Media.

Togetherville

"Parents need to know that this site is designed to be an introduction to social networking -- Facebook with training wheels, if you will. Positive features include super-safe posts that use scripted phrases, and the ability to socialize with known friends -- without stranger-danger and inappropriate posts. Parents are kept on top of all interactions and have control over the friend selection process. But because Togetherville trains kids in the ways of social networking, you'll have to think long and hard about what age you want your kids to start.  Great for discussions about safe networking with pre teens."  Commonsense Media.

GIRLS

Girls of all ages can find something on Girl Scouts.   This safe site has a positive image much like the organisation.  Moderators check all comments and approve before they appear on the site. 

ClubPonyPals 
Club Pony Pals is a free to play game, virtual world and social network that is based on author Jeanne Betancourt's Pony Pals books published by Scholastic.
You can own, care for and ride the pony you always wanted - online. Club Pony Pals is a browser based flash game that does not require any downloads. It's also a 100% adult-moderated social network where kids of any age can exchange messages, usually involving ponies.

SAFE EMAIL
Zoobuh is a safe email application that allows your child to log into an email account that you can control and monitor, and approve before they see it.  You can restrict times your students go on this site and keep approved email addresses.

 SOCIAL STUDIES MIDDLE GRADE

Kidipede is a research site for middle grade students with lots on ancient worlds, and math and science.

MEDIA LITERACY Admongo is a safe government site which teaches students, 8 and up the importance of media literacy and how advertising works. 

Blessings to you,

Pippa

Portfolios and sharing!

I know many of my parents are anxiously putting together portfolios this week, and trying to decide which documents need to be enclosed in that magic parcel.

Some of my parents are already blogging, and so I will be able to find their samples of work quite easily in their blogs.  This morning while reading my newspaper and checking my PLN, I came across George Couros's recent blog entry on Creating a WordPress portfolio or for that matter a Blogger portfolio using Google Documents.  Take a look!  Thank you George for sharing:)   Other ways for students to share their work could be via Picasso Web, or Dropbox.  This makes it easier for parents and teachers to have all of the work in one domain. I pray that my parents will be encouraged this week as they reflect on all their students' giftings in homeschool.  Have fun sharing.

Have an awesome week!
In Christ

Pippa